The Avengers (May 4th, 2012)

[Beantown]

Filming begins.

That means the movie is finally here, which means news will start coming out about it and the on-set shots will be here sooner rather than later...which means it was time for an official thread on the movie.

I know we have the "Lets cast....The Avengers" thread that was started in '08 and contained a few posts from last year about The Hulk re-casting, but with permission we'll talk about the movie in here.

I, for one, am excited to see a full-cast shot at some point.

[TheShizNo1]

What the hell sparked these super hero movies in the last 3-4 years?

[rockchisler]

Quote: Originally Posted by TheShizNo1

What the hell sparked these super hero movies in the last 3-4 years?

The running out of ideas and Spiderman...

[Scottdau]

Quote: Originally Posted by TheShizNo1

What the hell sparked these super hero movies in the last 3-4 years?

Spiderman got it going.

[KingV2k3]

Quote: Originally Posted by TheShizNo1

What the hell sparked these super hero movies in the last 3-4 years?

Showbiz is a "copycat league"...



Batman / Dark Knight and Ironman certainly contributed to this as well...

[SPTO]

Quote: Originally Posted by Scottdau

Spiderman got it going.

It's a little more deeper than that. Marvel has been wanting to branch out their properties to the big screen but there's been multiple failures over the years. Spider-Man opened the floodgates and now Marvel has a subsidiary totally focused to putting their heroes to the big screen.

WB and DC have been slow to catch up but over the last year or two they've ramped up their branching of the DC properties and one of the main people behind the comic books (Geoff Johns) heads up DC Entertainment vis a vis the handling of their properties on TV and film.

[DaveDQ]

I somewhat disagree that DC has been trailing. Superman was huge with Christopher Reeve and Batman with Keaton/Nicholson was a huge success. The sequels to these films were rough but the Batman craze in 89/90 was big.

Maybe where they lack is developing less popular characters, but Marvel's go at it hasn't been the greatest. The Fantastic Four/Xmen films are mediocre at best and it took Hulk a couple of go arounds to have something special. I liked Iron Man, and I'm not saying Marvel is laying a bunch of eggs. I love that these characters are coming to film. Who would have thought we'd see a Thor movie?

I think though that the DC representation in film has been small but impressive.

[SPTO]

Quote: Originally Posted by DaveDQ

I somewhat disagree that DC has been trailing. Superman was huge with Christopher Reeve and Batman with Keaton/Nicholson was a huge success. The sequels to these films were rough but the Batman craze in 89/90 was big. Maybe where they lack is developing less popular characters, but Marvel's go at it hasn't been the greatest. The Fantastic Four/Xmen films are mediocre at best and it took Hulk a couple of go arounds to have something special. I liked Iron Man, and I'm not saying Marvel is laying a bunch of eggs. I love that these characters are coming to film. Who would have thought we'd see a Thor movie? I think though that the DC representation in film has been small but impressive.

I agree with you the ratio of good film the number of releases has been a bit better with DC. What I meant was that DC hasn't taken full advantage of their properties the way Marvel has. The Superman and Batman movies you mentioned were leased out and such but there was very little involvement from the comic book side.

Marvel since Spider-Man has had a very close link between the folks that work on the comics side and the movies. Avi Arad who founded Marvel Studios came from the comics side as he once owned Marvel outright for a few years and led the company out of bankruptcy. So even though now it's more run by Hollywood types these days there's still a strong connection and the movie and publishing arms are intertwined.

It's taken DC a while to catch up but there's now starting to be that kind of intermingling with WB/DC and the DC Entertainment brand. One thing DC has done MUCH better than Marvel is in the animation department as DC really built up its properties on TV and on direct to DVD film.