Is DC even going to try to compete with Marvel on the big screen?

[carabas]

How many of those films was made in house by Marvel oh wait none of them.

Eh, Incredible Hulk. It had Downey Jr. as Tony Stark in it and everything.
Not sure about that second Punisher film.

[comicboy53]

Incredible hulk was pretty good. Way better than that other Hulk movie

[timeismoney]

Eh, Incredible Hulk. It had Downey Jr. as Tony Stark in it and everything.
Not sure about that second Punisher film.

You're right and that is the only one.

[Lee-Sensei]

Let me reiterate: we won't know the full weight of Hawkeye's impact until we see the movie, but if he's less important than Thor, Captain America, Hulk, and Iron Man (all of whom are bringing their issues from previous films), then one would expect that he (and Natasha) are gonna be the SHIELD links to the team.

Again, what does it matter? He's going to be a main character in a likely blockbuster. That would automatically make him more mainstream than Green Arrow.

Nah, Flash is still in there. But, yeah, I should have added the Joker and Robin. (Do people recognise Aquaman on sight? I know that they know his name, but do they know his costume?)

Well, they'd recognize him before they recognize the Flash I can tell you that much. The five main characters from the Super Friends, and the Joker are above the Flash. Lois Lane and Lex Luthor probably would too if they didn't look so average. Catwoman, Pengun, Riddler, and a handful of other bat characters are more recognizable than him. Supergirl. Green Lantern wasn't before his movie, but he probably is now. Even if his movie flopped. I might be forgetting some characters.

[Judge-Dredd]

Again, what does it matter? He's going to be a main character in a likely blockbuster. That would automatically make him more mainstream than Green Arrow.

At least Green Arrow has Smallville exposure and an upcoming TV pilot.

[Lee-Sensei]

At least Green Arrow has Smallville exposure and an upcoming TV pilot.

Don't get me wrong. Smalville was successful, but it's still not the same as a blockbuster movie.

[bobbyraw]

Again, what does it matter? He's going to be a main character in a likely blockbuster. That would automatically make him more mainstream than Green Arrow.



Well, they'd recognize him before they recognize the Flash I can tell you that much. The five main characters from the Super Friends, and the Joker are above the Flash. Lois Lane and Lex Luthor probably would too if they didn't look so average. Catwoman, Pengun, Riddler, and a handful of other bat characters are more recognizable than him. Supergirl. Green Lantern wasn't before his movie, but he probably is now. Even if his movie flopped. I might be forgetting some characters.

I think you're seriously underestimating public knowledge of Flash. I'm relatively new to comics (have been reading for about 2 years, but in that time I've read literally thousands of issues (pretty much everything related to the X-Men and Avengers, about 300 Batman issues in total, all of the GL stuff since Rebirth, etc)). Even before I started reading comics, I could pick Flash on sight. He was more recognisable to me than GL for example

[Lee-Sensei]

I think you're seriously underestimating public knowledge of Flash. I'm relatively new to comics (have been reading for about 2 years, but in that time I've read literally thousands of issues (pretty much everything related to the X-Men and Avengers, about 300 Batman issues in total, all of the GL stuff since Rebirth, etc)). Even before I started reading comics, I could pick Flash on sight. He was more recognisable to me than GL for example

Before the movie I would have agreed with you. But being the main character in a big movie got GL a lot of recognition. Neither of them are worldwide icons yet, but at least for now I'd say that GL is a bigger name. Flash hasn't done anything mainstream in a while. GL has a tv show and a movie that just came out a few months ago.

[Judge-Dredd]

Don't get me wrong. Smalville was successful, but it's still not the same as a blockbuster movie.

I never said it was.

[Flashpoint]

What Namors Trident said. And your reaching.

I do think that if DC decided to do a Justice League film after the Avengers, it could be more successful. The founding members of the Justice League, for the most part are bigger than the founding members of the Avengers. But only if they do it well. It could be pretty epic.

Bingo.

That, IMO, is why Geoff wrote each member of the Justice League in such broad strokes in the first arc. WB's Robinov wants his Justice League movie and Geoff is laying down the characters in the first arc in an accessible fashion for WB to use as a primer. 90% of Hollywood (and 90% of moviegoers) have no clue who Arthur Curry, Barry Allen or Victor Stone are. People complain it's a dumbed-down JLA, but to me that's the whole point of an introduction--you're not going to know or see everything about these people at first glance. I do not see any logical reason why Geoff should have aspired to try and craft "War and Peace"; it was a first meeting of characters in a summer blockbuster designed to set them up for spinoffs into their own franchises. Period.

You'll get deeper and richer characterization in future arcs and hopefully movies. Put these 6 issues together in a trade paperback, hand them off to Robinov, the eventual screenwriters and the director, and say,

"Ok, you want to do a Justice League movie? Here you go. The villain has to be dangerous enough to justify why all these godlike heroes get together as a team. That's easy--Darkseid. He comes from another dimension called Apokolips and he wants to take over the universe by turning everyone into mind-controlled soldiers called Parademons. His creepy, sadistic henchman is DeSaad. They use computers called Mother Boxes to open teleporters called Boom Tubes.

Here's the Justice League.
Ok, you don't know how to shoehorn Nolan's more realistic take on Batman into this super scifi-magic world? Here's a few good lines and a couple of jokes to directly address that.

Here's a series of soundbites on who and what each character is:

GL is a brash pilot with a power ring who shoots off his mouth.
WW is a wide-eyed warrior innocent in the ways of our world, but ready for action. Her love interest, Steve Trevor, is the government liaison to the team.
Aquaman is a king and natural born leader and here's how his powers work on land.
Barry Allen's basically a dorky nice guy CSI who's got superspeed.
Cyborg's our Iron Man (see how his cyborg parts replace parts of his body just like RDJ's Tony Stark replaced his heart?), but the twist is he's also a jock who doesn't want to be a nerd that works with computers like his father.
And in the end, Superman (we all know who he is) is the most powerful member of the team which is why the bad guys take him out first--because in the end, he can stop them and help the team banish the bad guys back to their world."

That's a synopsis or pitch for a Justice League movie that you can make in 60 seconds or less. It covers each character and their basic traits in a few bullet points that are easily digestible for people who know absolute zero about superhero comic books. It's fun, marketable and anyone can understand it. And if you stick to those points, you won't screw up and completely massacre the characters. Leave the major character development for the eventual Flash and WW spinoffs that they want to do; don't pigeonhole the people hired to make those movies by defining everything about them in the JL movie. Lay down the broad strokes and then let someone else flesh them out (which Geoff and Jim are going to do anyway in later issues of the comic book as will the respective creative teams of each character's individual book).

Justice League is the template, the core from which everything else spins out. It doesn't need to be a Shakespearean oeuvre of epic proportions that details every individual character trait and every little idiosyncrasy down to the very last detail. It just needs to lay the ground work and leave room for the directors and cast to flesh it out during production.

From here, that sure looks like what they're trying to do: set up the characters so they are kept congruent to the comics throughout the movie (and TV) development process.

[Lee-Sensei]

Bingo.

That, IMO, is why Geoff wrote each member of the Justice League in such broad strokes in the first arc. WB's Robinov wants his Justice League movie and Geoff is laying down the characters in the first arc in an accessible fashion for WB to use as a primer. 90% of Hollywood (and 90% of moviegoers) have no clue who Arthur Curry, Barry Allen or Victor Stone are. People complain it's a dumbed-down JLA, but to me that's the whole point of an introduction--you're not going to know or see everything about these people at first glance. I do not see any logical reason why Geoff should have aspired to try and craft "War and Peace"; it was a first meeting of characters in a summer blockbuster designed to set them up for spinoffs into their own franchises. Period.

You'll get deeper and richer characterization in future arcs and hopefully movies. Put these 6 issues together in a trade paperback, hand them off to Robinov, the eventual screenwriters and the director, and say,

"Ok, you want to do a Justice League movie? Here you go. The villain has to be dangerous enough to justify why all these godlike heroes get together as a team. That's easy--Darkseid. He comes from another dimension called Apokolips and he wants to take over the universe by turning everyone into mind-controlled soldiers called Parademons. His creepy, sadistic henchman is DeSaad. They use computers called Mother Boxes to open teleporters called Boom Tubes.

Here's the Justice League.
Ok, you don't know how to shoehorn Nolan's more realistic take on Batman into this super scifi-magic world? Here's a few good lines and a couple of jokes to directly address that.

Here's a series of soundbites on who and what each character is:

GL is a brash pilot with a power ring who shoots off his mouth.
WW is a wide-eyed warrior innocent in the ways of our world, but ready for action. Her love interest, Steve Trevor, is the government liaison to the team.
Aquaman is a king and natural born leader and here's how his powers work on land.
Barry Allen's basically a dorky nice guy CSI who's got superspeed.
Cyborg's our Iron Man (see how his cyborg parts replace parts of his body just like RDJ's Tony Stark replaced his heart?), but the twist is he's also a jock who doesn't want to be a nerd that works with computers like his father.
And in the end, Superman (we all know who he is) is the most powerful member of the team which is why the bad guys take him out first--because in the end, he can stop them and help the team banish the bad guys back to their world."

That's a synopsis or pitch for a Justice League movie that you can make in 60 seconds or less. It covers each character and their basic traits in a few bullet points that are easily digestible for people who know absolute zero about superhero comic books. It's fun, marketable and anyone can understand it. And if you stick to those points, you won't screw up and completely massacre the characters. Leave the major character development for the eventual Flash and WW spinoffs that they want to do; don't pigeonhole the people hired to make those movies by defining everything about them in the JL movie. Lay down the broad strokes and then let someone else flesh them out (which Geoff and Jim are going to do anyway in later issues of the comic book as will the respective creative teams of each character's individual book).

Justice League is the template, the core from which everything else spins out. It doesn't need to be a Shakespearean oeuvre of epic proportions that details every individual character trait and every little idiosyncrasy down to the very last detail. It just needs to lay the ground work and leave room for the directors and cast to flesh it out during production.

From here, that sure looks like what they're trying to do: set up the characters so they are kept congruent to the comics throughout the movie (and TV) development process.

I agree with you for most of this, but I really believe that Martian Manhunter should be in the possible Justice League movie. I don't have a problem with diversity on the team, but doesn't Martian Manhunter take the form of a black person a lot anyways.

That's one of the few problems I have with the Avengers. I'm not a big fan of Ant-Man (or Goliath or whatever he's calling himself these days) and Wasp, but I really don't like them being left out of the movie.

[Mat001]

The short lived 2007 Flash Gordon reboot on SyFy Channel was really pretty cool in my opinion. Eric Johnson was in the role of Flash Gordon.

Right, who remembers that? If it had lasted five years, maybe you'd have a point.

[quote]

I guess it's really up to WB to decide if they want to make movies. They bought DC a long time ago and I'm sure it didn't cost them four billion dollars so I can see why DC movies aren't a priority to them but they need to start getting ambitious. They keep playing it safe with Batman and Superman but I don't know how long they can keep it up. They're rebooting Superman and I'm almost positive Batman will be rebooted before this decade is over.

Warner didn't buy DC, the Kiney Corporation did, after WB was bought by them. When it folded, WB kept all of the properties that had been acquired, including DC. But they didn't have much in the way of desire to make films with them, which is why they optioned the film and television rights to Superman and all related characters to the Salkinds, who would largely self-finance the Superman films. And yes, Batman will be rebooted since it's already been indicated that that will happen based on the way TDKR ends.

You're right and that is the only one.

Yep, the Hulk was part of Marvel's plan for the Avengers since he was a founding member. That's why Marvel was able to get Universal to help in making the 08 film, because they weren't going to do a sequel due to the lackluster performance of the previous film. They might have encouraged Lionsgate with "Punisher: War Zone", but that was mostly being talked about before "Iron Man" was made.

[Flashpoint]

I agree with you for most of this, but I really believe that Martian Manhunter should be in the possible Justice League movie. I don't have a problem with diversity on the team, but doesn't Martian Manhunter take the form of a black person a lot anyways.

That's one of the few problems I have with the Avengers. I'm not a big fan of Ant-Man (or Goliath or whatever he's calling himself these days) and Wasp, but I really don't like them being left out of the movie.

It's unpopular to say it out loud, but that's why Nick Fury is black. Besides, the lack of consistent racial diversity with casts in both comics and TV & Film has gone on way too long. Roddenberry broke the mold with Star Trek, but white male entertainment execs have continually tried to undo that over the years (which is very much IMHO). Thanks to non-white and female creators, the glass ceiling has some big cracks in it and a few characters and their creators have broken through. But most of the casts and characters are overwhelmingly white, straight and male (with women frequently relegated to stereotypical roles as love interests and sex interests).

The biggest problem I've always had with Martian Manhunter is his obvious baggage as a "little green man from Mars" Fifties stereotype. Everybody knows there isn't sentient life on Mars and the whole idea of green men from Mars is a tired trope of early 20th century science fiction that looks undeniably dated to 21st century eyes and minds. Fans love him because he's been around for years and he had the good fortune to get some serious love from writers like Starlin, Giffen, DeMatteis and Morrison in the Eighties and Nineties. But people don't believe in Martians anymore (outside of comic books ).

RE: Goliath/Giant-Man/Wasp
When Hollywood special effects and/or directors find a way to make size-changing superheroes look plausibly realistic onscreen, you'll get those heroes in a movie. But so far, the technology hasn't come up with much better ways to do it than they already have. I mean, how silly and ridiculous would a scene like this look in a "serious" superhero movie?

[WhiteEyedWonder]

Martian Manhunter could work well if they call him John Jonnez(sp?) instead. And if they use his Nu suit instead of that weird underwear and chest buckle thing. That would not translate well on screen...

And as far as the size-changers go, they don't have to change their sizes as much as they would in the comics. Going from 6ft --> 12 ft would be enough IMO. 100ft tall is overkill. (outside of comics that is).

[Lee-Sensei]

It's unpopular to say it out loud, but that's why Nick Fury is black. Besides, the lack of consistent racial diversity with casts in both comics and TV & Film has gone on way too long. Roddenberry broke the mold with Star Trek, but white male entertainment execs have continually tried to undo that over the years (which is very much IMHO). Thanks to non-white and female creators, the glass ceiling has some big cracks in it and a few characters and their creators have broken through. But most of the casts and characters are overwhelmingly white, straight and male (with women frequently relegated to stereotypical roles as love interests and sex interests).

Is that why Nick Fury's black? I thought it was because they were going with the Ultimate version of the character. Before creating Ultimate Nick Fury, Samuel L. Jackson said that they could use his likeness if he got to play the character in the movies.

The biggest problem I've always had with Martian Manhunter is his obvious baggage as a "little green man from Mars" Fifties stereotype. Everybody knows there isn't sentient life on Mars and the whole idea of green men from Mars is a tired trope of early 20th century science fiction that looks undeniably dated to 21st century eyes and minds. Fans love him because he's been around for years and he had the good fortune to get some serious love from writers like Starlin, Giffen, DeMatteis and Morrison in the Eighties and Nineties. But people don't believe in Martians anymore (outside of comic books ).

MM is like.. 6'8. He's hardly 'little'.

Does everyone know that there isn't life on Mars? I thought scientists still believed that it was possible. People don't believe in Martians? How many believe in Kryptonians? Or Atlanteans? Or a magical land of female warriors from Antiquity? Whether Martians are real or not, MM can work in a movie. And he could be the non-white character in the group.

RE: Goliath/Giant-Man/Wasp
When Hollywood special effects and/or directors find a way to make size-changing superheroes look plausibly realistic onscreen, you'll get those heroes in a movie. But so far, the technology hasn't come up with much better ways to do it than they already have. I mean, how silly and ridiculous would a scene like this look in a "serious" superhero movie?

Yeah, Jack Black in Gullivers Travels didn't look silly to me. It could work.