General Discussion

It began in 2005. We saw the man turn into the bat. DC has surprised us all with a great take on Mr. Wayne and his vigilante alter ego, or is it the other way around?

A year later he returned the last son of krypton but in a less than spectacular fashion. Then the X-men took their Last Stand and we all thought, "Really?"

A year later an alien symbiote came to earth and gave us an awful piece of garbage.

Then an Initiative was started in 2008. Along with a chaotic man with scars on his face. Also a man with a skull on his shirt came back for punishment.

A year later we saw the origins of the man named Logan and we said, "You can do better!"

2010 gave us a sexy Russian assassin and nothing else worth remembering.

It was the summer of 2011 an a ring was about to be given to a man named Hal Jordan. We were also treated to the beginning of a rivalry. A god was dethroned. And a soldier was given an experimental injection.

Oh and demonic stuntman came back and that was just weird.

Anybody who was anybody was excited for one thing in June 2011, Green Lantern. At first we didn't think they could pull it off, then at comic-con the year before we were treated to some amazing footage. But then at the premiere we were to treated to incredibly cheesy footage. I swear when the credits rolled Velveeta was coming out of the screen. Anyways, there were 3 redeeming qualities . Ryan Reynolds trying his best to overcome an incredibly bad script and the after credit sequence that showed that Sinestro isn't going to be a good guy for too much longer. The other redeeming quality was the environments in space. Oa for the most part. It looked spectacular. But 3 good thing out of a movie that had many abysmal things isn't enough and DC and Warner Bros learned that the hard way.

Now Marvel has just announced one of their future movies and it was a surprise. Guardians of the Galaxy. Another ensemble picture but this one is in space. Now Marvel has 2 challenges to overcome one of which they only partially overcame in The Avengers.

The first is giving their characters deserved screen time. Hawkeye was in The Avengers for 12 minutes seriously the guy only 12 minutes of screen time. I loved all 12 of those minutes but it wasn't enough I wanted to see Mr. Renner kick as much butt as possible.This is the same hero the general public who aren't comic book readers knew nothing about and by the end of the movie still knew nothing about. This begs the question why is he in it at all?

The second challenge is one DC and Warner Bros did incredibly well at, a space environment. It's hard to create something out of nothing and i hope Marvel can pull it off. We have some intel we would lead us to believe they can ( see Asgard in Thor).

Now I know Christopher Nolan's Bat Trilogy is mostly universally renowned for being great (because it is). But other than that DC isn't giving their heroes due respect in the cinemas. I pray to god Zack Snyder gives us a great Man of Steel and not throw us a Sucker Punch.

I think Marvel is going to keep giving DC a run for the money in the big screen department. If only their comics could say the same

I think Marvel could be the ones that runs the comic book-movie into the ground just by releasing too many movies in a small amount of time. Just an over saturation of the market.

Yeah, I think Marvel might be overextending themselves now. I mean, I'm a nerd on the Internet and I've barely heard of Guardians of the Galaxy, so I can't really expect your Average Joe to know about them. I can't see an ensemble movie with a group of characters no one knows doing very well.

That said, Marvel has had a solid track record with their last batch of movies, so I guess I can give them the benefit of a doubt.

I'm very intrigued about Guardians of the Galaxy. It will be a brand new superhero experience for me when it gets released in theaters, because I've never heard of them.

Also, and I hope I won't create a series of hostile responses for this, but I don't read comic books. That's why I loved all the movies that led up to The Avengers, which is the best movie I've seen this year. They were all great Superhero films, and I was given a nice introduction to Thor, Iron Man, Captain America, and The Hulk. As well as Nick Fury, The Black Widow, Hawkeye, who were also briefly shown in the other movies.

I really hope Man of Steel will be the catalyst for a DC Movie Universe. Although I seriously doubt a DC Movie Universe will be any good because Warner Bros won't use any of the in house talent DC has like Lauren Montgomery or Bruce Timm. They need someone who can "Shepherd" the movie universe like Kevin Feige and the Marvel Cinematic Universe. As for Marvel oversaturating the market I can agree. I like Marvel's films but at the rate they're pumping them out it's just tiring. They're all good movies but it feels like there is too many of them.

What I like is that Marvel likes to keep their films fun. We have films like X-Men, Avengers, Iron Man which you can laugh along with and lose yourself in a complete fantasy world.

DC has more darker characters, Batman, Watchmen, Superman returns and dark is a great direction to go in, I thought Watchmen was made fantastically. But the Batman movies, while good, try far too hard to be 'serious' and 'realistic' - when isn't the whole point of reading comics is that it's not reality? it's why I loved Batman Returns, it wasn't a film that you could take seriously or even follows the comics so closely, but it did entertain, make you laugh and was visually dark in it's tone.

@CherryBomb said:

What I like is that Marvel likes to keep their films fun. We have films like X-Men, Avengers, Iron Man which you can laugh along with and lose yourself in a complete fantasy world.

DC has more darker characters, Batman, Watchmen, Superman returns and dark is a great direction to go in, I thought Watchmen was made fantastically. But the Batman movies, while good, try far too hard to be 'serious' and 'realistic' - when isn't the whole point of reading comics is that it's not reality? it's why I loved Batman Returns, it wasn't a film that you could take seriously or even follows the comics so closely, but it did entertain, make you laugh and was visually dark in it's tone.

That's not how the general public will see it though. It needs to be believable. And it's why I doubt they will put Rocket Raccoon in the Guardians of the Galaxy film. It will look incredibly stupid.

Film studios would not make enough money off just comic book fans going to see these films.

@OrigamiAngel said:

@CherryBomb said:

What I like is that Marvel likes to keep their films fun. We have films like X-Men, Avengers, Iron Man which you can laugh along with and lose yourself in a complete fantasy world.

DC has more darker characters, Batman, Watchmen, Superman returns and dark is a great direction to go in, I thought Watchmen was made fantastically. But the Batman movies, while good, try far too hard to be 'serious' and 'realistic' - when isn't the whole point of reading comics is that it's not reality? it's why I loved Batman Returns, it wasn't a film that you could take seriously or even follows the comics so closely, but it did entertain, make you laugh and was visually dark in it's tone.

That's not how the general public will see it though. It needs to be believable. And it's why I doubt they will put Rocket Raccoon in the Guardians of the Galaxy film. It will look incredibly stupid.

Film studios would not make enough money off just comic book fans going to see these films.

X-Men did pretty well, and Avengers, I mean you can't argue that Avenger's material was realistic? If you build up enough hype then it's sure to be successful.

@CherryBomb No, Avengers wasn't really realistic, but it didn't look stupid (Bar a couple of Loki scenes). My point is more that as soon as Joe Bloggs who knows nothing about comics sees a talking raccoon, they have already lost him as a potential customer. Sure comic book films aren't that realistic, even Nolan's Batman films, I mean, it's a dude who fights crime whilst dressed like a Bat. But they feel like they could be real, and I think for those who don't know anything about the comics or characters, that sways them over.

@OrigamiAngel: 50 bucks says Rocket Raccoon will be in the movie. He is returning on the comic seen and is the most likable character on the team by fans. If he isn't that would just be a knowing smack in the face to fans.