Wednesday, February 10, 2010

What works for one does not necessarily mean it'll work for others

Yesterday, news broke that Christopher Nolan will be "mentoring" the reboot of the Superman franchise. Spider-Man is getting an unnecessary reboot. Captain America is going to be some sort of musical. Who knows what other madness is going on out there in the comic book movie land.

Let's start with Captain America. Yes, you read right, its going to be some sort of musical. Calm down, its not going to be a full out song and dance musical, but rather they're going to change the story to where he is a performing member of the USO in order to justify the costume. WTF?!? Does no one believe in suspension of disbelief anymore? Do they really need to mutate his origin just to explain the costume? Granted, this is just early news, and could be changed between now, filming, and the release of The First Avenger: Captain America, but it still doesn't sit right with me. As bad as that 1990 movie was, this just seems to make that look like a cinematic masterpiece.

Spider-Man is getting a reboot. As much as I despise and detest reboots, this one is the most unnecessary I've ever heard of. All the pieces were in place for Spider-Man 4, then the day before filming was set to start, they up and notify everyone they wanted to go in a new direction. My guess is they thought Spider-Man 3 was too disappointing. Fact is, as bad as some think it was, it really wasn't, just needed better execution, and more of a balance between Venom and Sandman, instead of just bringing Venom in of the last 15 minutes. Anyway, my point is, when you reboot something, its usually 10-15-20 yrs after the last film. It's barely been 5, and they're rebooting? To make matters worse, they're going to make him a teenager. The fanboys are none to happy about this, and neither are us casual fans. Of course, they're doing this just to appeal to the teen crowd obviously, and probably will cast someone like Taylor Lautner or someone that has no acting talent, but will appeal to the screaming girls. What a waste, but I will keep an open mind until I see the finished project. Of course, if it flops, they'll be sorry they didn't just continue with the original plans. Its not like they haven't made them a butt load of money, or anything.

Superman has had his issues since Superman II was taken over by a different director halfway through it and just bombed. Then there was Superman Returns which just didn't seem to be anything more than a glorified Superman drama, rather than action flick. Since then, they've been trying to get Superman on the big screen, especially with the rights to the character returning to the estate of his creator at the end of next year (don't quote me on that). In what they believe is going to make it a surefire hit, they've brought in Christopher Nolan to "mentor" things. Nolan is a good director and all, but this is one of those moves that seems to be done just because The Dark Knight was such a big hit. Newsflash, people, Superman is not Batman! What works for one is not going to work for the other. Superman is not a dark, gritty character like the Dark Knight. All of Nolan's films have been dark and gritty, and depending on how much input he has on the forthcoming Superman film (which has yet to be written), will probably follow suit. *SIGH*

At least Green Lantern won't be going down that dark road. Of course, I'm not exactly sure what New Orleans has to do with him, but that's where they're filming it.

Anyway, this is a copycat world. As soon as folks see that one thing works, they change their plans accordingly. For instance, before Avatar, the only 3D movies were the animated ones, now it seems like everything is in 3D. I'm surprised they haven't announced Valentine's Day in 3D!!!!

4 comments:

Valerie David said...

Augh. I think I feel sick. I am tired of reboots and tired of dark. Everytime we get a reboot we have to have another "origin story". Like you say, once every 20 years it's fine, but every two or three? Argh. I'm still peeved they didn't give Eric Bana another shot at the Hulk. And I'm peeved that Brandon Routh didn't get the chance to do the next Superman. Neither actor was to blame for how the directors/writers messed up the films. Why scrap the whole thing each time?

I don't even want to think about a Spidey reboot. The only thing wrong with the last one was that, like all superhero movies, just as someone gets interesting they kill them off. WHAT is their deal with having to introduce 12 guys and then kill all of them off by the end of the film? The whole allure of comic books was continuing the story, seeing the bad guy again, running into a fave ally again in another volume. Grrr.

As you can see, I feel strongly about the topic. :P

Mystery Man said...

Finally, somone with a brain! I was starting to think I was the only one who didn't like dark. It has its place, but not in every...single...movie.

I wasn't too crazy about Eric Bana as Hulk, but I think that was more to do with how boring that movie was. if you could have put the two together, ti would be awesome!!!

I'm trying not to think of the Spiderman reboot, especially sicne they just said it was going to be 3D.

I'm with you on the whole too many villains in one movie. They forget that the novelty of comic book movies is having an expansive rogues gallery to hoose from for future sequels. No need to cram them all in one movie. If they're scared they wont have another movie, then write a better scrips and commit to one villain...maybe two, tops (a la Batman Returns).

I would have never guessed yoy feel strongly on this topic. It's not obvious...lol

Valerie David said...

I fear we are in the minority, my friend. Somewhere along the line, "dark" became synonymous with "high art". Now if you make something actually like the original comic book, you're lazy and boring. But if you make Superman some guy in black who has some twisted psychology, then you're a genius.

The big problem with the Hulk, and with most comic movies, is the lengthy origin story problem. The reason we were all glued to our TVs watching The Hulk TV series was seeing The Hulk *do* stuff. Crushing bad guys. Saving good people. The Hulk was all about his torturous past and the gov't trying to kill him. It's hard to really make that "fun". The little blip at the end, where he's actually doing something good and then has to Hulk out to defend it--*that's* what I wanted the second movie to be. But then they "reboot" it and start all over again. *yawn* I didn't see the Ed Norton one, though, so I can't honestly comment on its quality. I was too annoyed to go see it.

The Superman 3D thing...gah. Well, they know comic book geeks will still go see it, and then if they appeal to kids they'll get all those family dollars. It's all business now, and not any attention to story or quality.

Unless they make it dark, and then you know it'll win an Oscar. (*insert sarcasm here*)

And no, I have no opinions on the subject. But honestly, there are a lot of people who love that dark stuff. I know a girl who was disappointed in the BSG reboot because it wasn't dark *enough*. I can't imagine the soul-sucking despair she must have been longing for, if that wasn't dismal enough for her. Egads.

Mystery Man said...

yeah, i think we are in the minority. heaven forbid someone stay fauthful to the source material.

honestly, the Norton Hulk wasn't half bad. it was amore action packed and not a borderline drama like the forst one, but still wasn't that great. i liked the look of the hulk in the forst one better, though.

Suoperman in 3D? when did this news happen? Or did you mean Spiderman? lol

Nice sarcasm, there...lol

someone who thoguht BSG wasn' dark enough. I only saw a couple of episodes of the new one, but from what I saw they sucked everything that was fun about the original series out of it. sort of like they did with that unbearable bad "The DAy thr EArth Stood Still" remake (one of the all-time worst movies of all time in my book...but I'm a bit biased since I'm a hiuge fan of the original...lol)