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DC Movies - To Infinity and Beyond

I watched the last two episodes of Peacemaker last night--it was a pretty great ending, with the type of cameo at the end that we should have seen in The Suicide Squad.

I think my problem with the humour in both the movie and the series is that it poses as being edgy "adult" content, but it actually comes across as being pretty adolescent in tone and that's where they lose marks for me.
 
theenglish said:
I watched the last two episodes of Peacemaker last night--it was a pretty great ending, with the type of cameo at the end that we should have seen in The Suicide Squad.
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I felt the same way. The mission in Peacemaker seemed more appropriate to using a small squad to deal with preliminarily where as the movie was more of a threat that would warrant
the Justice League
. EDIT: after the fact edit, sorry being a bit careless with spoilers

I think my problem with the humour in both the movie and the series is that it poses as being edgy "adult" content, but it actually comes across as being pretty adolescent in tone and that's where they lose marks for me.
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After so much MCU content I like that it revels in being trashy. You could argue that is to reflect the stunted state of Peacemaker and Vigilante but I think just as much Gunn just enjoys indulging in it.
 
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James Gunn seems to have an affection for little creatures taking over humans.

There was “Slither” then the little starros and now the butterflies.
 
I don’t think Starro is supposed to kill you when he takes over in the comics. You wouldn’t be able to have any heroes fall under it in that case. Unless they were going on “vacation” of course
 
Thestral said:
I'm getting some real Long Halloween vibes from what I've been seeing lately, particularly with Catwoman's inclusion, which is a huge selling point for me. I was turned off for a long time but I've gotten more and more interested, to be honest.
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It's my favorite one along with Dark Knight Returns. I was glad to see it finally get the animated treatment on HBO
Max.

On the subject of the Peacemaker, I tried to get into it, but it was way to crude and crass for my taste. Not my cup of tea, but it seems to be doing well so more power to those who enjoy it.
 
Waiting for the Deluxe Edition of Long Halloween before I see it. Jensen Ackles as The Batoman should be fun. His previous DC characters he portrayed were both called Jason bizarrely
 
theenglish said:
All some people are saying is they want to see something different than the darkest version from the nineties and early 00s.

Personally, I would love to see the 70s and early 80s version--which has never been seen on screen before.
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:wtf:

The move to re-establish Batman as a dark character was started in the 70s.

Adams had his first collaboration on Batman with writer Dennis O'Neil. The duo, under the direction of editor Julius Schwartz, would revitalize the character with a series of noteworthy stories reestablishing Batman's dark, brooding nature and taking the books away from the campy look and feel of the 1966–68 ABC TV series. Their first two stories were "The Secret of the Waiting Graves" in Detective Comics #395 (Jan. 1970) and "Paint a Picture of Peril" in issue #397 (March 1970), with a short Batman backup story, written by Mike Friedrich, coming in-between, in Batman #219 (Feb. 1970). Adams introduced new characters to the Batman mythos beginning with Man-Bat co-created with writer Frank Robbins in Detective Comics #400 (June 1970). O'Neil and Adams' creation Ra's al Ghul was introduced in the story "Daughter of the Demon" in Batman #232 (June 1971)[47] and the character would later become one of Batman's most common adversaries. The same creative team would revive Two-Face in Batman #234 (Aug. 1971) and revitalize the Joker in "The Joker's Five-Way Revenge!" in Batman #251 (Sept. 1973), a landmark story bringing the character back to his roots as a homicidal maniac who murders people on a whim and delights in his mayhem.
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All the writers did in the 80s and 90s was continue that vibe.
 
thribs said:
Waiting for the Deluxe Edition of Long Halloween before I see it. Jensen Ackles as The Batoman should be fun. His previous DC characters he portrayed were both called Jason bizarrely
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I'll be picking it up too when it comes out. The animation was on point, it was very faithful to the story and didn't add anything that shouldn't be there a la The Killing Joke.
 
Mr. Adventure said:
The mission in Peacemaker seemed more appropriate to using a small squad to deal with preliminarily where as the movie was more of a threat that would warrant the Justice League.
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Except that Waller had very good reason not to want the likes of the League involved.
After so much MCU content I like that it revels in being trashy. You could argue that is to reflect the stunted state of Peacemaker and Vigilante but I think just as much Gunn just enjoys indulging in it.
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I haven't seen Peacemaker, but agreed on The Suicide Squad. It's "adult" in the sense the content is obviously (and gleefully) R-rated, but I don't feel like Gunn has any pretensions about it.
 
theenglish said:
I don't agree. He was turned into a more serious, grim (not grimdark) figure who was an avenger of the weak and helpless.

The turn to DARK started with Miller in what was supposed to have been an alternate take on the character, but inspired writers who came after.
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Yes. The Batman of the '70s did get more serious, but no more so than other DC comics at the time (e.g. Wonder Woman and Green Lantern/Green Arrow taking a turn to more down-to-earth and socially relevant adventures), and there was still room for lighter storytelling and for Batman to be a wholesome, heroic figure who had a sense of humor and close ties with his fellow superheroes. Basically the Batman of The Animated Series comes close to this, along with the Batman in the final two Superfriends seasons in the early '80s when it got more serious and truer to the comics.
 
theenglish said:
I don't agree. He was turned into a more serious, grim (not grimdark) figure who was an avenger of the weak and helpless.

The turn to DARK started with Miller in what was supposed to have been an alternate take on the character, but inspired writers who came after.
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Folks have forgotten how full of satire "Dark Knight Returns" was though, at times it's like Dark Comedy more than just "Dark".
 
I think right now we're kind of getting the best of both worlds with Batman, we've got the Michael Keaton Batman in a world where he coexists with more fantastic (as in fantasy, not quality) characters, like The Flash and Supergirl, but then we're also getting a ground, gritty version with The Batman.
 
JD said:
I think right now we're kind of getting the best of both worlds with Batman, we've got the Michael Keaton Batman in a world where he coexists with more fantastic (as in fantasy, not quality) characters, like The Flash and Supergirl, but then we're also getting a ground, gritty version with The Batman.
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Keaton's Batman was an insanely dark take actually... just in a ridiculous way.
 
JD said:
I think right now we're kind of getting the best of both worlds with Batman, we've got the Michael Keaton Batman in a world where he coexists with more fantastic (as in fantasy, not quality) characters, like The Flash and Supergirl, but then we're also getting a ground, gritty version with The Batman.
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By contemporary standards, you're right. But I remember that I decided how much I hated the film the moment Batman started killing people. That was not the seventies version of Batman and, as much as I like Burton, he never even pretended that he understood the character.
 
Anwar said:
Was it, really? It was still pretty camp, when you think about it.
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Uh, yeah. The film features, among other things:

- A father being struck down with a gun by a mugger, maybe killed depending on how the hit landed, with the mugger proceeding to threaten the mother and child with the gun
- Police corruption
- Batman inadvertantly involved with the creation of the Joker
- Batman defying the police
- A whole art museum full of people being killed by the Joker
- A woman's face being disfigured by the Joker
- The Batmobile being chased by both gangsters and police with considerable damage to the gangsters' and police cars, as well as bystanders
- Alfred voicing his worry about Bruce getting himself killed
- A TV anchor being poisoned on air
- Probably dozens, if not hundreds, of dead from the Joker's parade
 
Kai "the spy" said:
Uh, yeah. The film features, among other things:

- A father being struck down with a gun by a mugger, maybe killed depending on how the hit landed, with the mugger proceeding to threaten the mother and child with the gun
- Police corruption
- Batman inadvertantly involved with the creation of the Joker
- Batman defying the police
- A whole art museum full of people being killed by the Joker
- A woman's face being disfigured by the Joker
- The Batmobile being chased by both gangsters and police with considerable damage to the gangsters' and police cars, as well as bystanders
- Alfred voicing his worry about Bruce getting himself killed
- A TV anchor being poisoned on air
- Probably dozens, if not hundreds, of dead from the Joker's parade
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None of which precludes it also being campy. A lot of things are both campy and violent, e.g. The Man from UNCLE or a lot of the Roger Moore Bond films.

Here are some old review columns that I felt did a good (if overly snarky) job spelling out how deeply campy and silly the Burton films were despite their pretense of being grim 'n' gritty:

https://comicsalliance.com/batman-1989-review-2/
https://comicsalliance.com/batman-1989-part-two-review/
https://comicsalliance.com/batman-returns-review/
https://comicsalliance.com/batman-returns-1992-review/
 
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