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Superhero Overdose

Ta-metru_defender

Entry posted by Ta-metru_defender

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Essays, Not Rants! 135: Superhero Overdose

 

If you haven’t heard, DC recently announced their cinematic plans for the next six years. We’ve got a Justice League movie, a Wonder Woman movie, one with the Flash, one with Aquaman, a Green Lantern movie, and so on. It’s DC’s answer to Marvel’s Avengers. They’re looking to emulate Marvel’s formula, releasing two a year. Not only that, it looks like most of the Justice League roster from the cartoon is getting their own movie (except Martian Manhunter which is its own infuriating can of worms). Between Marvel and DC, we’re looking at four superhero movies a year — and that’s not even counting other studios with rights to Marvel characters, like Fox with X-Men and the Fantastic Four. That’s a lot of superhero movies, a lot of men in proverbial tights (and one woman, so far) running around doing superhero stuff.

 

Now, with so many superheroes flying around, it’s likely we’re looking to get a glut of that genre. Woohoo, there’s Age of Ultron, Ant Man, and Fantastic Four next year, but after that there’s gonna be Batman v Superman, a new Captain America, a new X-Men movie, and Suicide Squad. And then after that comes Wonder Woman, and Justice League (so far). Genres can become tired, look at how few Westerns there are as opposed to a few decades ago. With all these superhero films coming out, and with superhero movies usually following a specific pattern we could end up watching the same darn movie over and over again. If that happens, then people get tired, people stop watching these movies, and people stop making superhero movies.

 

Thing is, we’ve seen the superhero movie a hundred times. The hero gets powers, the hero figures out what to do with powers, the hero fights bad guys. Sequels have been playing with the follow up, but we’ve seen the super-powered-hero-fights-evil formula over and over again. Superhero movies as we know them has happened.

 

So how do we keep it interesting? So far the trick has been genre blending. The Dark Knight was a crime movie with Batman. It was different and it was big (though I’ve heard the argument that it wasn’t a Batman movie, but that’s another issue). More so now than ever, superhero movies have to stand out. The Avengers was a heroes-fighting-villains narrative, but did it better than anyone else and threw in some internal conflict and hints of a war movie for good measure. Unless a new movie surpasses it, doing the same thing will be repetitive.

 

Marvel Studios, and Joe Quesada, know this. Look at the most recent releases from Marvel. Iron Man 3 was as much Lethal Weapon-y as it was Iron Man, The Dark World was borderline pure fantasy, The Winter Soldier was a spy/espionage movie, and Guardians of the Galaxy was pure space opera. Looking ahead, Ant Man is planned to be a heist movie, which there are never enough of. Marvel’s keeping things varied. In fact, I think one of the reasons Winter Soldier and Guardians were so well received is that they were so unique. Both tapped genres relatively unheard of at the moment, and both executed them incredibly. If Marvel Studios can keep making movies that challenge the idea of a ‘superhero’ movie they’re in good shape.

 

So the onus is on DC to do the same thing. It’s hard to judge how they’ll do, especially given the kinda mostly alright Man of Steel, but if they can make Aquaman feel very different from The Flash and not just in subject material, then there’s hope. We don’t wanna keep watching the same movie with swapped out details.

 

But I cannot overstate how freaking excited I am about all of this. In the next two years I’m getting a second Avengers movie, a new Star Wars, a movie with Batman and Superman, and what’s reportedly a movie about Captain American and Iron Man. Heck, they just announced a movie featuring The Lego’s Movie glorious riff on Batman! All this is the twelve-year-old in me’s dream come true. I don’t like not liking things, it’s tiring and it’s not fun to hate everything you watch. I want these movies to happen, I want to like these movies. I just hope these movies are good.

 

Also, I'm making a movie! Help me get it funded!

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shadow pridak money gang

A-HAAAAA THANK YOU THANK YOU. Paging Nate and Micah, because we have had this conversation so many times. 

 

I think another thing to consider is that there's only so much talent in the movie industry that wants to get bogged down in the often-long-term commitments that superhero movies bring (see Marvel and their unprecedented contracts around the start of MCU Phase One) and how, with those starting to wrap up the closer we get to Avengers III, people are starting to say they want out. Chris Evans isn't going to stay on as Captain America. ScarJo and Jeremy Renner are both underutilized and have their own careers going. Marvel's entirely lost control of Robert Downey, Jr. with the will there/won't there Pandora's box that is Iron Man 4. And Marvel's ship is so creatively tight that they need to keep churning out these movies before the bubble bursts - see Edgar Wright's ouster from Ant-Man, a move which I still think is gonna shake the movie up and give the MCU the closest thing it's really had to a bust.

 

It's prevalent in Doctor Strange, too - just look at the clusterbomb that the casting for that movie has been. First it was Benadryl Clambasket. Then it became Tom Hardy. Then it was Joaquin Phoenix. Now they're saying it could be anyone from Jared Leto to Ewan McGregor to even Matthew McConaughey. The short list is incredibly varied; all of those actors are surreal in their own way, but surreal in wildly different aspects, and with Strange's release date starting to look not-so-far-away after all, that's a big deal. 

 

DC's gonna suffer the same problem, only they don't have the added benefit of both 5+ years of consumer goodwill and they are trying to find a set of diversified actors and stories that Marvel can't compete with. Sometimes it could work (Will Smith and Tom Hardy in a Suicide Squad movie? God on high, yes yes yes) and sometimes I just swear they're setting themselves up for a mixed bag (Batman v Superman on the same weekend as Cap 3, now featuring RDJ? Really? DC sales are going to be hamstrung)

 

(Also another note calling Man of Steel kinda mostly alright is incredibly generous for me because the only reason I could honestly get through it was staring at Henry Cavill and wishing I could be that handsome. It was supposed to be the big boost that DC needed to match Iron Man in shared universe potential and that is not what it was) 

 

I definitely agree with you, though, on the genre blending being crucial to the success of the shared universes - Winter Soldier and Guardians got rave reviews because they were fresh, original concepts that didn't just feel like different takes on the same story, the way the Iron Man movies (and to an extent the Thor movies too) did. If DC can copy that? Yeah, I think they'll definitely be alright. It's just a matter of finding talented directors who can bring that hybrid vision of superhero/[genre here] to the screen.

 

-Tyler

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Vorahk1Panrahk2
Genres can become tired, look at how few Westerns there are as opposed to a few decades ago

 

A fact which I will continue to lament. I was hoping that the Coens would be able to revive the western with their (absolutely wonderful) True Grit remake, but that didn't really happen. And then The Lone Ranger came out which I'm going to guess killed it for good. :(

 

I've still got my Once Upon a Time in the West DVD to keep me company, though...

 

 

With all these superhero films coming out, and with superhero movies usually following a specific pattern we could end up watching the same darn movie over and over again.

 

Maybe it's because I've never really been into comic book characters, but this is one thing that's starting to frustrate me. With all of Marvel's wave 1 films being origin stories it really did feel like I was watching the same thing over and over, down to the hero's one liners. By the time we got to Captain America I was sick and tired of it. It's part of why The Avengers was actually kind of refreshing (even if the one liners where still there).

 

I haven't seen any of the wave two films, but the two you mentioned (Captain America and Guardians) appeal the most to me for the genre bending reasons you mentioned. I enjoy a good conspiracy film (and Robert Redford), and I always appreciate a film being able to poke fun at itself or it's genre. I hope that they continue to find ways to deviate from the tired formula. Specifically I hope that one day we see a comic book movie without a major villain. Surely these characters have problems every once in a while that don't involve saving the world from someone, so why can't we see those?

 

But, then again, I was never into comic books, and still kind of not into action movies. So maybe a movie about Tony Stark battling alcoholism (which apparently he does in the comics?) isn't a movie that anyone else would want to see.

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