They are going ahead with a Justice League movie
- Thread starter Flying Spaghetti Monster
- Start date
I think just jumping into a Justice League movie is a huge mistake. Everyone knows Batman and Superman, but the others are all basically unknown. Some might include Wonder Woman, but she's really not known outside those who actually read comics. Sure, everyone and their dog knows Wonder Woman, but you go ahead and ask any of those people to tell you anything about Wonder Woman other than the fact she was played by Linda Carter, they'll stare at you blankly. To the public Wonder Woman is essentially: Linda Carter, lasso, invisible airplane. An it's easy to see why. Superman and Batman have fairly straightforward concept, origins, powers, but Wonder Woman has so many conflicting ideas involving mythology, patriotism, feminism, and BDSM that no one really knows who she is.
The others aren't much better. Flash is fairly simple, but Green Lantern is an inherently silly concept that will probably need some explaining, and don't tell me they won't need to explain it since he was in a film just a bit ago. That movie is like the sixth biggest flop ever so they can't really expect people to know about Green Lantern from it. Martian Manhunter, Aquaman, Hawkman, Cyborg and others are inherently strange and will probably need a fair amount of setup as well. And Green Arrow is easy as hell but would have the stupid public complaining they were ripping off Hawkeye.
The others aren't much better. Flash is fairly simple, but Green Lantern is an inherently silly concept that will probably need some explaining, and don't tell me they won't need to explain it since he was in a film just a bit ago. That movie is like the sixth biggest flop ever so they can't really expect people to know about Green Lantern from it. Martian Manhunter, Aquaman, Hawkman, Cyborg and others are inherently strange and will probably need a fair amount of setup as well. And Green Arrow is easy as hell but would have the stupid public complaining they were ripping off Hawkeye.
If anything Aquaman would need the "hardest" movie to overcome the damage Super Friends did to him.
I don't understand the assumption that lack of prior knowledge of the characters is a dealbreaker. Nobody knew who Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia were when Star Wars came out in 1977. Nobody knew who Marty McFly and Doc Brown were when Back to the Future came out. Thousands of movies over the decades have been built around characters the audience had never previously heard of, because they never existed before their movies came out. So where in the world does this bizarre notion come from that unfamiliar characters can't work in a movie?
And the fact that it's a team movie doesn't change anything. There have been plenty of successful movies that have been built around teams of entirely new characters, from The Seven Samurai to The Dirty Dozen to Ocean's Eleven to The Usual Suspects. Even in superhero movies, X-Men proved that you can begin a film series by introducing a team of characters who are mostly unknown to the mass moviegoing audience. There didn't have to be solo Wolverine, Rogue, Storm, Cyclops, and Professor X films before the team movie happened. Starting with the complete team has worked, and it can work again.
I would absolutely love to see an Aquaman movie done right though. A brief origin, getting to know Atlantis, then he discovers his brother is planning war on the surface world and we get huge awesome fights. And in the end, of course, he gets his hand cut off.
I think the best thing they could do for a Justice League movie is to have Flash and Green Lantern making fun of him for a good chunk of the movie, then Arthur leaves out of annoyance, only to return at the climax of the film leading a squadron of Atlantean aircraft and riding a fricking kaiju to help save the day.
EDIT: Also, X-Men worked because all the characters had the same origin.
I think the best thing they could do for a Justice League movie is to have Flash and Green Lantern making fun of him for a good chunk of the movie, then Arthur leaves out of annoyance, only to return at the climax of the film leading a squadron of Atlantean aircraft and riding a fricking kaiju to help save the day.
EDIT: Also, X-Men worked because all the characters had the same origin.
The problem is you're dealing with characters who have decades-old history behind them which carries a LOT of weight with them in terms of the general audiences. It's part of the problem the TNG movies had with not wanting to connect too much to the series itself or the ones on the air, and with the newest movie wanting to be pretty much be a reboot.
Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, etc. are NOT new characters in the same regards as other movie characters because these characters are decades old and general audiences are going to be scared by that. Thinking they'll have too much weight on them from the past that'll leave them lost and confused.
Besides, look at the MCU, all of the characters got "origin movies" before the team movie to establish them. Rush right into a JL movie and people might be afraid that it'll connect too much to Batman movies they've probably not seen, that the characters without movies aren't familiar enough to connect to them (this is a problem I think Hawkeye suffers from in the Avengers. He isn't established.)
Besides, whether or not you "need" origin movies for these characters or not is beside the point. Aquaman and Wonder Woman are strong characters who DESERVE their own movie.
Some would feel that way, but I doubt the rank and file of general-audience moviegoers who are the primary target here would know the difference or care. I mean, when Smallville was on the air, there were a lot of viewers who had no idea that it had anything to do with Superman. We genre fans are too prone to forget that most people aren't as genre-savvy as we are.
Of course they are. I just don't agree with the assumption that those movies have to come before a JL movie. Marvel's already done it that way; if DC just copies it, it'll seem like a copy. Let's at least keep our minds open to the possibility of a different approach.
Who the hell remembers the Super Friends? That was 30 years ago. In the meantime, the Justice League cartoon has come out, Justice League Unlimited, Batman: Brave and the Bold, Young Justice, Smallville.
Why does the Super Friends matter, except to a bunch of aging people? Who aren't the target audience?
And speaking as a DC fan for decades, this is ridiculous. Most audiences won't give a rat's ass about the comic history, they didn't for Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, Batman, or Spiderman. In fact, because Wonder Woman has been in the public consciousness for so long, it should be EASIER to introduce her... unlike, say, Green Lantern.
Audiences aren't concerned with what happened in issue 55 of Aquaman, they want to know what he can do, AND, more importantly, what is character like... is he funny, is he angry, what does he want... Period. This "weight of past" is genre fans thinking way to hard and not realizing, most of that "weight" is just stuff that isn't really important.
Yea, pretty much, if the general audience has a passing familiarity or none whatsoever, they don't care abut all the different versions of the character from the past, they care about this specific version in this specific movie they are watching
Christopher said:
If cluelessness were an Olympic sport, this country could be great again!
Yes, clearly not being familiar with something in pop culture makes someone an idiot.
I still want a Justice League movie starring Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Cyborg and Zatanna. Not too many characters, a good male to female ratio, different power sources and abilities and easy to introduce.
Batman: I'm permanently pissed off, I fight crazy guys and prefer to lurk in the shadows.
Superman: I'm the sole survivor of a distant planet and have incredible abilities but I grew up here on earth and my mom's pie is the best in the world!
Wonder Woman: I'm an ambassador of peace from an advanced society hidden from the rest of the world, but I won't hesitate to punch your lights out if you force me to.
Cyborg: I'm a cyborg!
Zatanna: I can do magic!
Seriously, the last two aren't well known outside of the comics but they are very basic and well known ideas, the audience will understand them without any big introducton, they are pretty much self explainatory.
Characters I wouldn't use are:
Martian Manhunter (to similar to Superman's origin, one lone survivor from a different planet is enough)
Green Lantern (his movie was a flop, he could work on Justice League but there's no reason to risk stinking up the movie with GL's smell of failure when you have a rhousand other characters to choose from)
Flash (he's fast, everything he can do can be done by Superman ... yes, I kow, he's faster than Superman, whatever, in a 2 hour movie it's easy enough to have Superman be fast enough)
Aquaman (it's hard to make him useful on land, so unless you want to introduce an underwater lair or a secret underwater entrance for him to infiltrate a base or someting, leave him out)
Batman: I'm permanently pissed off, I fight crazy guys and prefer to lurk in the shadows.
Superman: I'm the sole survivor of a distant planet and have incredible abilities but I grew up here on earth and my mom's pie is the best in the world!
Wonder Woman: I'm an ambassador of peace from an advanced society hidden from the rest of the world, but I won't hesitate to punch your lights out if you force me to.
Cyborg: I'm a cyborg!
Zatanna: I can do magic!
Seriously, the last two aren't well known outside of the comics but they are very basic and well known ideas, the audience will understand them without any big introducton, they are pretty much self explainatory.
Characters I wouldn't use are:
Martian Manhunter (to similar to Superman's origin, one lone survivor from a different planet is enough)
Green Lantern (his movie was a flop, he could work on Justice League but there's no reason to risk stinking up the movie with GL's smell of failure when you have a rhousand other characters to choose from)
Flash (he's fast, everything he can do can be done by Superman ... yes, I kow, he's faster than Superman, whatever, in a 2 hour movie it's easy enough to have Superman be fast enough)
Aquaman (it's hard to make him useful on land, so unless you want to introduce an underwater lair or a secret underwater entrance for him to infiltrate a base or someting, leave him out)
I don't agree that it's hard to make Aquaman useful on land. Surviving in the ocean depths with their crushing pressure, freezing cold, perpetual darkness, and abundant predatory animals would require truly superhuman strength, endurance, and senses. Far from just "guy who talks to fish," Aquaman would have to be one of the most physically powerful and indestructible members of the League, close to Wonder Woman's or Superman's power levels. He'd be one of its top-tier fighters in any environment. Plus he's a king (literally a king named Arthur), which could certainly make him a distinctive character with a complex backstory (and let's not forget that even in a movie about superheroes, stories are about characters' personalities, relationships, and emotions, not just their physical abilities).
I think Batman: The Brave and the Bold's version of Aquaman is one that other versions of the character would be well advised to emulate. He had that superhuman strength and fighting prowess, and he had the pride and confidence of a king, as well as a flamboyant, bombastic personality that made him a fan favorite and a standout in the show's enormous cast. Plus they gave him Mera's ability to form weapons out of water. Maybe a movie Aquaman could have the same sort of thing that Young Justice's Aqualad had in season 1, reservoirs of water on his costume that he could form hydrokinetically into blades, a shield, etc. (Much like waterbenders in the Avatar animated universe often carry waterskins on their belts so they always have water on hand to manipulate.)
I think Batman: The Brave and the Bold's version of Aquaman is one that other versions of the character would be well advised to emulate. He had that superhuman strength and fighting prowess, and he had the pride and confidence of a king, as well as a flamboyant, bombastic personality that made him a fan favorite and a standout in the show's enormous cast. Plus they gave him Mera's ability to form weapons out of water. Maybe a movie Aquaman could have the same sort of thing that Young Justice's Aqualad had in season 1, reservoirs of water on his costume that he could form hydrokinetically into blades, a shield, etc. (Much like waterbenders in the Avatar animated universe often carry waterskins on their belts so they always have water on hand to manipulate.)
Very well said.
That goes for the general audience and it goes for me too.
That's all true but water is still his gimmick, if you don't use it and turn him into another Superman/Wonder Woman type, why use Aquaman at all?
You're also right that he's a king, but Diana is a princess so the royal member of the Justice league seat is already taken.
That's an idea I like, it gives him distinctive waterbased abilities. You convinced me, he just became the sixth member of Takeru's Justice League. But that's it, no one else is allowed to join, too many characters fighting for screentime is not good, six heroes is already pushing it.
This is why i prefer Marvel to DC.. Marvel's characters are for the most part more interesting in their flaws (granted.. i have only superficial knowledge about DC heroes apart from Superman and Batman).
However Marvel is not above releasing crap or questionable actions.. i'm reminded especially of fan favorite Wolverine who comes back from any wound possible. He's literally been torn in half by the Hulk or burnt down to his skeleton only taking him a few panels to be fully healed up again
Apart from that Marvel and DC are quite similar.. they even have similar powersets for many characters (Quicksilver/Flash, Hawkeye/Green Arrow etc) so it just comes down to background and personal preference.
Moviewise Marvel has clearly the upper hand.. almost anything DC does now including building up their universe with stand alones leading to a JL movie would just reek of copying their archrival however they can't just do Superman and Batman movies infinitely.. at some point the formula would just wear off.
However they really need to get lucky one day and have the kickstarter movie for their universe.. Green Lantern failed to do it and Nolan's Batman was for all intents and purposes removed from the main universe. Marvel got lucky with a set of stand alone popular movies until they hit paydirt with Iron Man.
I can only with luck to DC to pull that off too.. i'd like to see some really good DC movies and am very much looking forward to see the new Superman.
Perhaps a mod should rename this here thread They are not going ahead with a Justice League movie, amirite?!
Or They Will NEVER go ahead with a Justice League movie?