Marvel Gets Cash to do 10 Films

jmozena writes "Marvel has raised $525 million to independently finance 10 movies based on its comics over seven years. The titles named are Captain America, The Avengers, Nick Fury, Black Panther, Ant-Man, Cloak & Dagger, Dr. Strange, Hawkeye, Power Pack and Shang-Chi. The company's also changing its name from Marvel Enterprises to Marvel Entertainment."

Comments

Good Investment

[fembots]

Based on the statistics, comic-turn-movies are bringing in around $350 millions each after cost.

It's a pretty safe investment, they just need two good ones to break even, and another 8 crappy ones @ $20m each to have 30% return.

Re:Good Investment

[Koiu Lpoi]

I dunno man... Ant Man? Just not seeing the returns on that one.

Re:Good Investment

[fembots]

Still, shouldn't have problem getting $20m. There are people who watch everything-comic, or just couldn't buy seats for their intended movies.

Ant Man - Like Spiderman, but with 6 legs.

Re:Good Investment

[ciroknight]

Based on SlashStatistics (a general look through the comments), these movies will fail, miserabily.

The novelty of a comic book movie or a video game movie wears off very quickly, and are often greatly critisized by the true fans of the comic/video game. Yet they keep making these movies because they don't need to put a lot of thought into them; their designers already put their hearts into it and spent their life drawing these characters out in the comic books.

I will admit, there is an occasional breakout hit: The Matrix, Sin City were amazing, Spiderman was not as bad as it could have been. But it hardly makes up for the disasters they wage in the process (Daredevil, Elektra, The Incredible Hulk, come on).

It really is evident in the hollywood scheme of things that they have ran out of movie ideas because the corporation is stifling the idealists. People are too busy crunching the numbers on the films instead of spending the money, making it, and learning something from it. Some say Hollywood has matured in this way, but just look at the box offices: Hollywood hasn't matured at all. They're just remaking the same movies over and over, with different names for the characters, different actors, and in different cities.

I think that's all I can say before I get into a rant..

Re:Good Investment

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

Ant Man I can see, lots of money in CGI effects films.

Power Pack though... Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, Batman!

Super-powered Toddlers has already been done one time to many.

Re:Good Investment

[ihtagik]

Based on past movies based on ants/ant-like creatures/and men with links to said creatures:

Antz - 170million
Spider Man - 400million +
Spider Man II - 250million in 2 weeks

what's not to see, the better question is how many sequels can we expect!

Re:Good Investment

[Jeff DeMaagd]

You left out A Bug's Life.

Antz and Bug's Live didn't try forcing an unknown comic book hero to the screen. Spider-Man is incredibly well-known and actually was made into a couple decent movies. I just don't see Ant-Man as being very marketable.

Re:Good Investment

[Jeff DeMaagd]

They're just remaking the same movies over and over, with different names for the characters, different actors, and in different cities.

Worse in some cases. Sleepless in Seattle and You've Got Mail were basically the same movie but they forgot to replace the same actors! One comment I've heard was "It wasn't as if the Empire State Building collapsed that they needed to make a new one!"

Re:Good Investment

[Jeff DeMaagd]

Still, shouldn't have problem getting $20m. There are people who watch everything-comic, or just couldn't buy seats for their intended movies.

If that $525M gets split evenly into 10 movies, that means $52.5M goes to Ant Man's production. A $20M take means a $32.5M loss for a movie that probably shouldn't have been made. I'm thinking this will be an Electra but won't have the pull of Jennifer Garner, which, for many, was the only reason to see it.

I understand your reasoning though, but I don't think it should be treated as a batch-gamble, where they seem to throw piles of money, small ideas and big names at a vat-o-projects and hope a few get a blockbuster.

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Again with the criticism of Hulk.

I don't get it - I personally loved the movie (and hated it as a comic, go figure).

And many of the things that it was criticised for, such as the split views/comic book stylings, are things that other movies such as Sin City, and the upcoming rotoscoped Scanner Darkly (yeah, I know:not a comic) are being lauded for.

Hulk was better than others give it credit for. If you want to give some disasters stick with Catwoman or Electra, please :)

Re:Good Investment

[Crashmarik]

You Insensistive CLOD

I liked Daredevil and Elektra

Re:Good Investment

[Nivoset]

sometimes.. there even the same actors. or get put in allot of the same things.

Re:Good Investment

[ErikZ]

It's aimed for kids.

And if you know kids, there's no such thing as "Too many times"

Re:Good Investment

[zakezuke]

Worse in some cases. Sleepless in Seattle and You've Got Mail were basically the same movie but they forgot to replace the same actors! One comment I've heard was "It wasn't as if the Empire State Building collapsed that they needed to make a new one!"

Could be worse. A mild mannered Microsoft employee working 100hr weeks gets fed up with all the software piracy. His only resolve is to put on an Ant constume to fight commercial piracy and spams moral messages to all the kids in....

"You've Got Mail from Sleepless Antman in Seattle"

Don't copy that floppy!

Re:Good Investment

[the-build-chicken]

here here! Daredevil was a fantastic movie, Elektra was great too. I hope they make Daredevil 2

Re:Good Investment

[magarity]

Antz and Bug's Live didn't try forcing an unknown comic book hero to the screen
 
Is there really any practical difference between a character who is unknown versus one that is completely new?

Re:Good Investment

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

...and if you'd ever picked up "Power Pack" when it was being published, you'd know that one can be too many very easily. Kid or not.

That book was plain and simple CRAP.

Re:Good Investment

[flyingsquid]

I dunno man... Ant Man? Just not seeing the returns on that one.

Shit, I can come up characters just as good as "Ant Man"! Like Slug Boy, Earwig Lad, Captain Fruit Fly, Dung Beetle Man, Pillbug Woman, and the Amazing Aphid.

Anyone care to give me $50 million apiece to develop these properties for the big screen?

Re:Good Investment

[nunchux]

I will admit, there is an occasional breakout hit: The Matrix, Sin City were amazing, Spiderman was not as bad as it could have been. But it hardly makes up for the disasters they wage in the process (Daredevil, Elektra, The Incredible Hulk, come on).

Superhero movies are a pretty safe bet because they do make their money back, eventually. Even the "failures" you mentioned (Daredevil actually did quite well, BTW) make the cash back in foreign markets and on DVD. And the ones that do well do spectacularly well-- as in, people will see it in the theater, buy the DVD and still watch it on cable.

And yes the die-hard fans will complain about liberties being taken... But the die-hards are never happy. The superhero genre relies more on the casual fan, those who used to read the books when they were kids, or those who just like superhero movies... And there are a lot more of these people than the die-hards.

Yet they keep making these movies because they don't need to put a lot of thought into them; their designers already put their hearts into it and spent their life drawing these characters out in the comic books.

Well, maybe in Sin City's case, or Ghost World, or V is For Vendetta... But come on, there's no heart and soul in Marvel's assembly line. A Marvel comic might have a talented artist or writer pass through every now and again, but that's all they're doing-- passing through. Most of the time it's done by hacks for hire. I don't consider The Fantastic Four to be too sacred for a B-movie adaption.

It really is evident in the hollywood scheme of things that they have ran out of movie ideas because the corporation is stifling the idealists.

You think this is something new? There have always been shitty movies. And shitty movie sequels. Superhero movies certainly aren't a new trend, and cheesy sci-fi serials have been made since the thirties. Movies have always been made for the lowest common demoninator, with a few bold talents managing to squeak through (and the same goes for comic books, doubly so.) We tend to forget the crap, so it's easy to say Hollywood is going to hell... But the good-to-crap ratio has been pretty steady for eighty-plus years.

BTW there are a lot of good movies being made right now, you just have to know where to look. With the advent of cheap DV editing suites, for example, documentaries have never been better.

Re:Good Investment

[circusboy]

the things is, unlike daredevil and elektra which were passed off to secondrate scripters and directors, the Hulk was a brilliant and underappreciated film. of all the comic book movies, it is the one that most closely captured the graphical elements of comic book design since will eisner and walt simonson. the way ang lee manipulated the multiple layers of imagery and time was really brilliant.

one thing that really makes the hulk a great adaptation of a comic book though is that the writers and director were smart enough to cut rick jones. if there was *ever!* a comic book character that needed to burn in hell, it was rick jones. who managed to be the dippy sidekick to not only the hulk, but captain america and captain marvel too (and the whole bloody avengers team!) oy what a waste of ink!

I am not a great fan of the Hulk comic book, I was aways in the x-men corner, and while I think the x-men moves are well made and a lot of fun, (more joss whedon dialogue please) and the spider-man movies are very good, the hulk is, I think, a much better piece of art. (of course I prefer batman begins to any of the other batman movies to date too, despite the plot holes.)

the things that always made the great comics characters, was the real depth of character, and what really made the comics books great, was creators who really believed in and felt for those characters.

see what kind of rant 3 glasses of wine can start? kids, don't drink and post!

  more (hic) wine!

Re:Good Investment

[Basehart]

"I just don't see Ant-Man as being very marketable."

How about Ant Man starring Brad Pitt. You think that would raise the films profile?

Actually, if Marvel play their cards right and treat each film with the respect they deserve, make them arts house/actors studio type projects, they could easily start pulling in some big names for the lead roles.

Keep it underground, cool, classic.

Re:Good Investment

[DannyO152]

So. 52.5 million per title. Three years to develop, script, film, post-produce and distribute the first movie. Does it get put in the summer slot? Guess so. Do they all? Maybe if it's a 2/2/3/3 release cycle. Those last 6 may get shutdown (or straight to DVDed) if the first two don't make back their negative costs.

Still it's 10 films released in four years from 2008-2012, or a title every five months if it was spread out.

Today a special effected film seems to cost, what, 110 million. In six years, that will be up to 130 million (maybe more as demand increases for special effects houses). Where does the other 60-80 million come from? The domestic distributor? Overseas pre-sales? Do they hire above-the-line talent or economize and rely on character and story.

If a title doesn't get produced, does some money go back to the investors? And how do the backers get paid? Out of the net? Okay back from laughing. Got a hankering to walk over to Book Soup, stare at the, formerly, Caroloco building and mumble something about the stuff of dreams.

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but, comic-turn-movies generally cost $100 million, minimum. Where will they be getting the money for the second five?

They could save money by shooting overseas, but this saves nothing compared to the cost of securing A-list actors. Then again, they could get unknowns to act.

With foreign production + unknown actors, this is starting to look like a Roger Corman operation (a bit hyperbolic- Miramax/Dimension, maybe). I don't think Avi will be willing to compromise that much. Marvel doesn't want to cheap out and end up with the films tanking at the box office because everyone knows they are second-class, to be bought on the $5 DVD bin at Walgreens, particularly given this rather meager literary property. (For a modern example of a $30-$50 million action movie, see "Sky High", "The Punisher", and "Elektra".

I know of what I speak, I worked on Spiderman, Hulk and Fan 4. Avi and the Marvel producers show great attention in production to making good, high-quality films. With they themselves (instead of Uni/Fox/Sony) footing the bill, I can only see that pressure increasing.

Forgive my AC-ness, but my business does not reward people with opinions on it, right or wrong.

Re:Good Investment

[strider44]

The problem is that they've already done the good and popular comic books. I've only heard of Captain America out of those, and I doubt that that's even going to make it to the cinemas here in Australia. (Sorry mates but America's reputation quite right at the moment to have a superhero named after it)

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes there is. Just look at how the Punisher did. The Punisher is also not very well known and the movie reflected that.

Re:Good Investment

[dustman]

(Daredevil, Elektra, The Incredible Hulk, come on).

I am pretty picky about movies, and I kind of liked The Incredible Hulk.

I'm not into comics and I never watched the show, so the way he was running around at mach 2 or whatever was dumb, but not a deal-breaker for me.

And I really, really liked the way they split the screen up into different frames like a comic book. That was really cool.

I enjoyed it more than, say, Spiderman, because Spiderman had better special effects and better acting (not to mention better nipples), but they were both mindless "summer movies", and the Hulk was at least entertaining. Spiderman was just boring to me. And the Green Goblin looked stupid.

Re:Good Investment

[Minwee]

Oh, he's marketable. You just have to give the audience all magnifying glasses.

Re:Good Investment

[Pxtl]

What, and you're expecting Nick Fury or Captain America not to suck hard? Do you remember the crapfest that was Blade? Punisher? Marvel has become the main goldmine for B-movies, and Cap and Fury are the ultimate B-heroes. Or the Avengers - superhero teams of completely unrelated superheroes hasn't been attempted on film yet.

I'm thinking these will suck, hard. Hawkeye could be passable, but I doubt it.

Wake me when they do Adam Warlock. The Infinity Watch was the last cool thing Marvel did in a while.

Re:Good Investment

[Ucklak]

I think most of us wanted 'Hulk Smash' and not 'Dad, why did you do experiments on me'

Re:Good Investment

[slashdotnickname]

Yet they keep making these movies because they don't need to put a lot of thought into them; their designers already put their hearts into it and spent their life drawing these characters out in the comic books.

Huh? There's no need to get complicated in analyzing things.

Hollywood keeps making these movies because they make money. When you count the world-wide ticket sales and dvd/merchandise revenues, even the "bad" ones pay for themselves and then some. It's as simple as that.

It's true, though, that movie studios aren't always able to translate the "good stuff" from a comic book on to the screen. But, to be fair, it's not usually because of incompotence or lazyness.

As with any reading material, the writer/artist can only go so far to convey a story given the limited paper medium, so the readers must fill in the rest with their imaginations. Forcing the audience to use their imagination produces a more powerful story because, by virtue of them imagining, the audience immerses itself into the story... enhancing its realism. That doesn't mean the storyline can be weak,

A movie, with its real-time sound and imagery, leaves fewer blanks that need to be filled in by its viewers. This means that a movie has to work harder to immerse its audience into its story...

(need to stop this thought, pizza's here!)

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Sleepless in Seattle was pretty lame, but You've Got Mail (aside from being a blatant AOL commercial) had a pretty good story about power games.

They may both be about finding love via chance, and may have the same actors, but the two movies are so far apart in regards to the actual content that it would be foolish to say that they are basically the same movie with different sets.

It's like saying Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure was the same movie as Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey. The first was a frolic, but the second one had tackled some serious philosophical ideas successfully.

See You've Got Mail. It's definitely worth seeing. Skip Sleepless in Seattle. It's pretty bad.

Re:Good Investment

[DeICQLady]

It's possible they figured that the change they would rake in is small compared to the franchises they could license (toys, spinoffs on Nickolodean, etc) as well as comic book sales they could generate... remember there are kids coming up, it may seem stupid to us now, but may spark some fascination in a 7 yr old somewhere else to start drawing and/or reading comics.

Re:Good Investment

[cgenman]

And yes the die-hard fans will complain about liberties being taken... But the die-hards are never happy. The superhero genre relies more on the casual fan, those who used to read the books when they were kids, or those who just like superhero movies... And there are a lot more of these people than the die-hards.

The die-hard fans who are complaining have already seen the movie and given their 10 bucks. I'm not dissing the casual market, but I'm guessing all of the Daredevil fans out there that considered the movie "sacrelige" did so after boosting the opening weekend gross quite nicely.

But come on, there's no heart and soul in Marvel's assembly line. A Marvel comic might have a talented artist or writer pass through every now and again, but that's all they're doing-- passing through.

The listed titles are: Captain America, The Avengers, Nick Fury, Black Panther, Ant-Man, Cloak & Dagger, Dr. Strange, Hawkeye, Power Pack and Shang-Chi. There is a lot of entertaining backstory there to pilfer, certainly enough in each one to make a movie (maybe not Hawkeye). None of what is listed is Sin City, but then again a lot of what is listed is on par with Batman or Spider Man. Which is, to say, a great director can never be undervalued. Unless he goes and directs The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl in 3-D.

The thing I'm worried about with this is that Marvel is flooding their own market. Sure, there is demand for some superhero movies. Sure, great superhero movies will always make money. But the public's tastes are fickle. Make a super hero movie every few years, and you can really spark the public's imagination. Pump out bad superhero movie after bad superhero movie and suddenly everyone is interested in the slasher revival, or really great pulp action movies, or (gasp) well written dialog with deep characters. After 10 movies, won't people want to see something... else?

Re:Good Investment

[Captain Splendid]

I dunno...you get Robert Rodriguez, or maybe even Chris Columbus or Robert Zemeckis, you could get a pretty good Power Pack movie.

Re:Good Investment

[carlos_benj]

The Punisher is also not very well known and the movie reflected that.

I could see how not being "well known" might have affected the box office appeal, but The Punisher just wasn't a good movie. It could have been, but it just wasn't.

Re:Good Investment

[carlos_benj]

Dude! With a lineup like that we could ressurect The Tick!

Re:Good Investment

[ePhil_One]

Dude! With a lineup like that we could ressurect The Tick!

Comic > Animated TV > Live Action TV > Movie

Book it Dan-o! We gots a sure thing!

But I really want to see American Maid back. And maybe Ninjas. Bat Manuel may have the edge on Die Fleidermaus. And Stinky, I mean Sewer Urchin! Perhaps guest appearances by Door-man and Plunger Man!

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

How about "Flying Squid"?

That seems pretty marketable.

Re:Good Investment

[unitron]

"What, and you're expecting Nick Fury or Captain America not to suck hard?"

There was already a Nick Fury movie. He was played by David Hasselhoff.

Re:Good Investment

[MJOverkill]

... bringing in around $350 millions each after cost.

Remember, the listed numbers are what the theatres take in, not what the studioes get. Theatres kick back about 40% on average, and that is the gross revenue from the movie. There is still the taxes, MPA dues, advertising, printing, etc. to take care of.

A movie can make twice its production cost and still end up a loss, so I would say they are not particularly safe investments.

Re:Good Investment

[unitron]

"Sleepless in Seattle and You've Got Mail were basically the same movie..."

Not at all. "You've Got Mail" was a remake of "The Shop Around the Corner" (which was also remade as a musical, "In the Good Old Summertime") whereas "Sleepless in Seattle" was plagarized from "An Affair to Remember" (which was a remake of "Love Affair").

Re:Good Investment

[Seumas]

Well, considering I've never heard of most of the things they listed, I guess I won't be able to bitch and complain about whether they butchered anything.

Of course, I've never read/seen/whatever the couple that I did hear of, either.

*shrug*

Re:Good Investment

[Zebidiah]

You are the only other person I know, apart from myself who enjoyed The Hulk. When I came out from the cinema after the film I was on a high. I was picking up my son and bounding him through the air. I must have looked like a right prat.

Now The Fantastic Four, that was awful.

Re:Good Investment

[Babbster]

I would submit that, handled properly, Power Pack could be a kick-ass kids movie. The comic book origin story included (obviously) cute kids with super powers, good aliens with equine features, evil lizard aliens...With the right script it's perfect for the younger crowd and movies aimed at that audience make some nice chunks of change.

Re:Good Investment

[blackicye]

First off, I'm not defending the quality of Blade or the Punisher..

But have you seen the crap that passes for a movie these days. The movies targetted at kids are probably the worst offenders.

Spy Kids.. Sharkboy and Lavagirl in 3D! I didn't need to watch either to tell you that they weren't the pinnacle of movie production. I wonder if they broke even, and if they did.. how the fuck?!

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Go away woman :P

Guys are trying to discuss what movies are worth watching here ;)

Re:Good Investment

[paran0rmal]

the Hulk was a brilliant and underappreciated film?
the hulk is, I think, a much better piece of art?

Please, somebody mod the parent funny! Seriously, you must be joking. The only recent superhero movie that you can consider anywhere close to brilliant is Batman Begins, and even that does even approach a work of art. It's Hollywood special effects. If you're trying to find art then stop watching comic book adaptations go watch some of the low-budget stuff coming from independent and foreign producers. Or even better, find some high-class Japanese manga and get the best of both worlds. I highly recommend Ninja Scroll or Ghost in the Shell.

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe they can have him save New Orleans from disaster or something... ...Oops! Too late, I guess.

Re:Good Investment

[earendil]

Those are _different_ movies? I figured they had two titles for that one...

Re:Good Investment

[NickFortune]

Oh, I dunno...

You've got mad superscience, lots of cool shots absed on perspective and scale, giant ants, (relatively speaking, anyway) and... um...

I suppose the problem here is that Ant-Man, never had any real arch-nemesis or classic plots. For spidey you can say "we'll do the Green Goblin, work in some of the death of Gwen Stacy stuff. Maybe do Doc Ock for the sequel". That's harder to pick out for Ant-Man.

On the other hand, if you consider it as a Hank Pym movie then you get Ultron, the whole twisted oedipus complex that goes with him, possibly the Vision and Jocasta, as well as the chance to turn the CGI the other way and do some Giant-Man/Goliath stuff as well.

It could be cool. It all depends on what age range they target. If it turns into "Honey I shrunk the kids" in spandex...

But if they're financing these things theselves then that reduces the chance that they'll have such descisions forced upon them by the film backers. Of course, that still leaves the board at Marvel to worry about... mutter mutter... peter david... mutter grumble... hulk... mutter grumble grouse

Re:Good Investment

[capiendo]

They're just remaking the same movies over and over, with different names for the characters, different actors, and in different cities.

I think it's unavoidable to rehash stories. I mean, one person's experiences aren't so unique that some other person hasn't experienced something similar. But even if screenwriters mix it up and introduce twists in pursuit of a unique script, they can only do so much before it gets unbelievable and stupid.

you: I have a mom and a dad.

me: No way. Me too!

you: But wait, there's a twist. My dad's a midget quadruple amputee!

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually I thought DAREDEVIL was millions times better than that trash of a Hulk movie. The Hulk tv series was the real thing and the movie a disgrace.

Re:Good Investment

[sgant]

Actually, the first two Spy Kids were great...I too looked at them and said they looked like crap. But having a 10 year old and wanted to see them, I was surprised. They were pretty good.

Now, the 3-D stuff is just bad. Any movie that all of a sudden says "we're going to film this in 3-D" instantly gets crappy. Why do they even bother with this gimmick anymore?

Re:Good Investment

[RidiculousPie]

http://maddox.xmission.com/dare_devil.html

That is all.

Re:Good Investment

[The Wooden Badger]

I'll be there opening night for the Tick! That was a great show. I only got the chance to see one of the live action shows and I thought it was good stuff. I think the biggest problem with the show was the time slot. It was doomed from the beggining.

Re:Good Investment

[Kierthos]

And it sucked. It was also a TV movie, not a theater movie, as I recall.

Kierthos

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Or even better, find some high-class Japanese manga and get the best of both worlds. I highly recommend Ninja Scroll or Ghost in the Shell.

Manga is usually printed work, but that aside, were those 2 titles the best examples of Anime you could reccomend?

I would suggest Osamu Tezuka's Metropolis as an example of real art, or the Manga/Print version of Ghost in The Shell, or any of Shirow Masamune's work.
I also enjoyed The Hulk, sometimes what goes unsaid is more important than what is.

Re:Good Investment

[dj245]

It really is evident in the hollywood scheme of things that they have ran out of movie ideas because the corporation is stifling the idealists.

I think that is only half the problem. The people hacking the movie to bits in the editing room don't seem to have gone to film school or remember it if they have gone. Basic filmmaking techniques aren't being designed into the final cut. Those few movies that do take the old basic standards of making movies and put those elements in: the montage, the slow cresendo, using music to great effect; are doing great. Those that don't usually are just hacks and are deemed terrible by anyone with good taste in movies. I'm talking flicks like Snatch (not a believable story but incredibly fun to watch) and like you mentioned, Sin City. Hollywood needs to go back to film school.

Re:Good Investment

[unitron]

" And it sucked."

"When I said "He was played by David Hasselhoff.", I thought I had pretty much covered that angle.

Re:Good Investment

[Targon]

The thing to consider is that the movies they have done so far are mostly well known comics. The ones that are mostly unknown havn't done as well. Green Lantern(not one of the best known) would do better than most of that list I expect. Or Iron Man, or one of the other well known characters.

Or even doing a spin-off from the X-men would do better. Trying to use a movie to promote a lesser known comic is doomed to be a flop.

Re:Good Investment

[Dr. Zed]

Still, shouldn't have problem getting $20m.

If that $525M gets split evenly into 10 movies, that means $52.5M goes to Ant Man's production. A $20M take means a $32.5M loss...

Your conclusion is based on an arbitrary assumption. I doubt that they would divide the money evenly. It is more likely that the titles which have more earning potential will receive more for production, advertising, etc.

Also, given Ant Man's ability (shrinking, IIRC), they shouldn't need the same special effects budget as some of the more special effects.

Re:Good Investment

[MrBandersnatch]

You arent alone :) With a good script and director it has the potential to be a really great kids movie...I just hope they keep whitey and the snarks ;)

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd bet on 10 crappy with 9 of those in the hideously offensively crappy category. But with another 250 million in marketing, I bet they double their money.

Re:Good Investment

[Faw]

I don't know, a Captain America movie in WWII would be cool.

Re:Good Investment

[Kombat]

I will admit, there is an occasional breakout hit: The Matrix, Sin City were amazing, Spiderman was not as bad as it could have been.

Sure, if by "not as bad as it could have been" you meant "smashed pretty much every box office record at the time." The "Batman" and "Superman" franchises have been very popular, the "X-Men" movies also broke records when they were both released. Comic book movies are almost sure-fire moneymakers. Very few fail to meet their profit expectations ("Fantastic Four," "Spawn," "LXG" to name a few).

Now, video game movies, those ones are almost always flops. "Super Mario Brothers," "Street Fighter," "Mortal Kombat" (and the inexplicable sequel)... the number of successful video game movies is roughly equal to the number of failed comic book movies. And that number is very, very small. "Resident Evil" did very well, but I'm having a hard time thinking of any other successful video game movie.

It really is evident in the hollywood scheme of things that they have ran out of movie ideas

I disagree. It is only recently that Hollywood realized that documentaries can be very successful. "Bowling for Columbine" surprised them, so they followed up with "Farenheit 9/11," "Supersize Me," and "March of the Penguins." "Memento" was a very innovative movie that Hollywood bet on and succeeded. "Team America..." come on, when's the last time a marionette movie was in theaters? The entertainment industry tried several new groundbreaking things in releasing the Matrix sequels by filming them at the same time (I believe it was the first time Hollywood greenlighted 2 sequels to be filmed simultaneously), releasing them in rapid-succession (a tactic followed up by Kill Bill doing the same thing), releasing the movie simultaneously throughout the world instead of the conventional regionally-staggered schedule, and tying in the movies with a video game, and a DVD of dark, animated shorts that fit in with the movies.

Hollywood is not stupid. They know their revenues are dropping. They know they need new ideas. And they're not all a bunch of rock-dumb idiots. They've been in the business a very long time, and have lots of formal education doing this sort of thing. They're working on new ideas all the time, and trying things they wouldn't have had the courage to try a couple decades ago.

Re:Good Investment

[rayde]

and according to this Ant-Man has previously teamed up with Spiderman. Oh I see the crossover possibilities already.

perhaps all these movies are to serve as introductions, and the real blockbuster will be the huge every-marvel-superhero-we've-ever-mentioned vs. Apocalypse or something movie, which will no doubt come out in 15 years or so.

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

A Marvel comic might have a talented artist or writer pass through every now and again, but that's all they're doing-- passing through. Most of the time it's done by hacks for hire.

okay, so apparently you haven't done your homework. currently, marvel's (exclusive) writers include: jeph loeb (smallville), orson scott card (ender's game), J. Michael Straczynski (babylon 5), etc...

Re:Good Investment

[Lord Apathy]

That or Power Pack. Not seeing much cash on that return ether.

Re:Good Investment

[Cereal Box]

I believe it was the first time Hollywood greenlighted 2 sequels to be filmed simultaneously

What about Back to the Future 2 and 3?

Re:Good Investment

[barzok]

The die-hard fans who are complaining have already seen the movie and given their 10 bucks. I'm not dissing the casual market, but I'm guessing all of the Daredevil fans out there that considered the movie "sacrelige" did so after boosting the opening weekend gross quite nicely.

I'm barely a "casual" comic fan, but I was pissed that I dropped $17.50 (2 tickets at $8.75 each) on Daredevil. Not because it was a crappy film adaptation of a comic book (I know nothing of the DD backstory), not because it was "sacrilege", but because it just a bad movie, period - comic adaptation or not.

Re:Good Investment

[Wireless Joe]

All of you 30-somethings may remember a little super hero named THE BLUE BEETLE!

I miss The Electric Company. And Morgan Freeman as Easy Reader? Fergeddaboudit.

Re:Good Investment

[shokk]

Definitely! Just as soon as you get a 30 year track record selling them as successful comics to guarantee a following that would beat their mothers blind for a chance to see the movie version.

Re:Good Investment

[Kombat]

Today a special effected film seems to cost, what, 110 million. In six years, that will be up to 130 million

What? Get the hell off Slashdot. You've forfeited your geek license. That's like saying, "today, RAM costs $n/GB. In six years, it will be up to $3n/GB."

Technology costs go DOWN as time increases, not up. How much $$$ did Pixar have to invest in rendering farm servers to make the first "Toy Story?" How much do you think they spent on hardware for "The Incredibles?" I don't even need numbers from you, just say "more" or "less."

The correct answer, of course, is "less." Technology is making these effects cheaper, and at an incredible pace. 6 years from now, CGI like we saw in Skycaptain will be gracing the screens at independant film festivals.

Re:Good Investment

[schon]

As others have said, Hulk was a steaming pile.

But as they haven't said, here's why:

In the right hands, split screen can be a powerful tool, able to weave together two (or even more) seemingly disparate scenes into a cohesive whole that gives the viewer a sense of understanding of the story that can rarely be done any other way.

Or it can be an annoying gimmick that makes the viewer say "fuck, why do they have everybody talking at once?!?! I can only follow one of the conversations." When done this way, the viewer is annoyed because *at best* they miss 1/2 the dialogue, and are wondering if it's needed for the story. (At worst, the viewer missed *all* of the conversation because they're too busy trying to pay attention to both.)

Hulk is a perfect example of the latter. The split screen effects were *USELESS*. They were used *way* too frequently. They did not bring anything together, they looked like they were just put there to make it more "comic-book like".. - you know what? I *ALREADY KNOW* that you lifted this from a comic book, stop beating me over the head with it! Did they think that people would pay money to see it over and over in order to catch all the dialogue?

Hulk sucked. It was just annoying to watch.

Re:Good Investment

[H3lldr0p]

"...he Hulk was a brilliant and underappreciated film. of all the comic book movies, it is the one that most closely captured the graphical elements of comic book design since will eisner and walt simonson. the way ang lee manipulated the multiple layers of imagery and time was really brilliant.

Hear,hear! Couldn't have said it better myself.

Re:Good Investment

[hesiod]

> The Punisher just wasn't a good movie. It could have been, but it just wasn't.

Unfortunately, for The Punisher to be filmed appropriately would require so much fake blood and body parts as to bankrupt the movie studio. Well, maybe just give the CEO a temporary .01% pay cut, which is just as unacceptable.

Re:Good Investment

[__aailob1448]

No, it was crap. All your justifications don't change this basic fact.

Re:Good Investment

[Dogtanian]

The entertainment industry tried several new groundbreaking things in releasing the Matrix sequels by filming them at the same time (I believe it was the first time Hollywood greenlighted 2 sequels to be filmed simultaneously), releasing them in rapid-succession (a tactic followed up by Kill Bill doing the same thing)

Kill Bill was originally intended as a single film, and was only later decided to be split into two parts. It was also marketed as a single film in two parts; therefore, I don't consider "Kill Bill Vol.2" to be a "sequel" in the traditional sense.

In fact, the Matrix #2 and #3 are, if anything, even more so. *Neither* of them stand alone as a story; they're clearly two halves of the same narrative, and don't provide a complete experience on their own.

In short, I doubt it would have made sense to make people wait for 2-3 years to see "Revolutions" any more than it would make sense to split a film in two and leave a gap that long between showing the two halves. The same applies to shooting; one story, so it wouldn't have made sense to do them separately.

Re:Good Investment

[Dogtanian]

I've only heard of Captain America out of those, and I doubt that that's even going to make it to the cinemas here in Australia. (Sorry mates but America's reputation quite right at the moment to have a superhero named after it)

"Captain Bulgaria" it is, then...

Re:Good Investment

[ConceptJunkie]

Station!!!

Be excellent to each other, and... PARTY ON, DUDES!

Re:Good Investment

[Fear the Clam]

You've Got Mail was a remake of The Shop around the Corner, but with our generation's weak version of James Stewart.

Re:Good Investment

[chrish]

There already was a Captain America movie, and verily it did suck hard.

Re:Good Investment

[fanfriggintastic]

Since when is there a 'G' digit in hex?

Re:Good Investment

[Bob Uhl]

Oh, I thought that The Fantastic Four was a pretty good comic-book flick. Yeah, it wasn't deep, but it was fun. Now if only they'd replaced Alba with Johansson my cup, it would indeed have run over.

But it was a pleasant way to spend an hour and a half. Far better than some flicks in the theatre of late.

Re:Good Investment

[Bobsledboy]

How dare you insult Hasselhoff, the ever present bastion of acting talent!

Re:Good Investment

[soft_guy]

Yeah, I read that and I was like, "What the hell is Ant Man?"

Re:Good Investment

[Cerberus7]

At the risk of turning this into a Hulk love-fest, I enjoyed that movie, too! So, that makes 3 people. Can't say anything about FF as I didn't see it. I'm waiting for the public library to get that one. I hear such things I'd rather get on the list and watch it for free than pay anyone anything to see it. Of course, if I like it, I'll buy it, but I'm not holding my breath.

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

"Capt. America" (the nickname I give my brother, because he made Capt. in the armed forces just recently & I am proud of him (he's over in IRAQ)) will be a good one I think, mainly because the storyline & powers he has are VERY believeable (especially in our era of modern chemistry, e.g.-> "flintstones vitamins" like steroids &/or HGH etc. & who KNOWS what else is out there nowadays for that).

"Dr. Strange" ought to be "killer" as well (he is a sorceror but for 'the good')

Especially IF they keep the storyline around that original material period (vs. villains like Dormammu, which today's special FX can duplicate his appearance (flaming skull) & his strange dimension too).

That's the REALLY early stuff from that series (Dr. Strange), circa Steve Ditko art period!

If done that way? IT too, will be excellent...

(& I will take a "special interest" in THAT one, lol, because it's the nickname my friends gave to me - "Dr. Strange" lol!)

Also, & so will "The Avengers"... I hope they do the ORIGINAL cast of them (Hulk, Iron Man, Thor, AntMan & The Wasp... if not Capt. America, who took the Hulk's place later circa issue #4 iirc).

* :)

To me? As a Marvel Comics 'afficianado'?? This is GREAT news!

APK

P.S.=> So far, X-Men I & II, Spider-Man I & II, DareDevil, Blade I, II, & III, & even the Fantastic Four have more than lived up to my expectations, even WITH the "minor twists" used in the screenplay adaptations... apk

Re:Good Investment

[bay43270]

Pump out bad superhero movie after bad superhero movie and suddenly everyone is interested in the slasher revival, or really great pulp action movies, or (gasp) well written dialog with deep characters. After 10 movies, won't people want to see something... else?

This is exactly why Marvel is making the movies themselves. After the studios trashed the Electra script (Jennifer Gardner almost left after the rewrite), Marvel figured out that they can't trust the studios to put together a thoughtful deep movie. The studios just want a formula movie that opens well. Marvel wants to protect their characters.

I don't believe a large volume of movies will hurt anything as long as the stories are good. I know I've seen at least a half dozen comic movies in the last few years (some good, some bad). When it comes to telling all the good stories already out there in the comic book world, I don't feel like they've even scratched the surface. I look forward to seeing more.

Re:Good Investment

[th3space]

I enjoyed both movies, personally...of course, I also liked Joe Versus the Volcano (there's just something about Tom & Meg that I'm addicted to). My one real problem with those flicks is this: while they were clearly intended to come off as modern day fairy tales - which they succeed at - Nora Ephron was entirely too heavy handed with the rose colored lens treatment on breakups.

In Sleepless, when Meg and Bill hit the splits, it's all very chummy and kind of "Oh hahaha, you're right, I do deserve better"...in Mail, the breakups are even more unrealistic, "Oh, I don't love you anymore, haha!" "Hey, I don't love you either, and there's someone else!" "Hey, me too!" "hahahahaha"...what the fuck is this shit? Where do these kinds of people live, and why haven't *I* ever experienced a breakup that went so well?

I suppose this is meant to further the notion that none of what you see is real, and it is intended to be lighthearted to the point of ridiculousness, but come on...at least have one person be INDIGNANT...

Re:Good Investment

[Minna Kirai]

What? Get the hell off Slashdot. You've forfeited your geek license.

He's right though, although in a meaningless way. The price will go up because of inflation... but the money available will have gone up too (assuming they put it in some safe mutual funds and didn't just sit on the cash)

That's like saying, "today, RAM costs $n/GB. In six years, it will be up to $3n/GB."

No, it'd be more accurately like "Today RAM is $n per PC, later it will be $1.2n". That takes into account both a continual rate of monetary inflation, and the fact that you'll need more RAM to get any work done because code bloat will proceed.

Even though SFX rendering will become cheaper, for the next few decades this will just mean that films spend the same (inflation-adjusted) amount, but expect better and better results.

Ticket sales are determined by FX quality relative to other films coming out that year.

CGI like we saw in Skycaptain will be gracing the screens at independant film festivals.

Sky Captain did a poor job, so that isn't saying much. (Sin City annihilates it in every way). The fact is that Sky Captain is an extended remake of a short film that was created by an individual sitting at home with his Mac. The quality didn't improve very much in the jump to a professional studio.

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

"...the die-hard fans will complain about liberties being taken..."

Seriously though...who's a die-hard fan of Nick Fury, Black Panther, Ant-Man, Power Pack or Cloak & Dagger anymore? And who's even heard of Shang-Chi?

Honestly, I think the reason that these characters are the ones chosen is that Marvel wants to build interest in these franshises so people might buy those books again. But please...Power Pack?!?

Re:Good Investment

[dirtyboot]

Blue Beatle tried to catch a bullet with his head and lost.

Re:Good Investment

[circusboy]

In the right hands, split screen can be a powerful tool...

I'm curious, what would you suggest is a good example?

Re:Good Investment

[frank_adrian314159]

...I don't think it should be treated as a batch-gamble, where they seem to throw piles of money, small ideas and big names at a vat-o-projects and hope a few get a blockbuster.

It's a common investment strategy. Diversification accross several similar projects and regression to the mean brings a smaller, though less risky, average return. This strategy is also the basis of most VC firms' investment strategies.

Re:Good Investment

[Callitrax]

Based on the statistics, comic-turn-movies are bringing in around $350 millions each after cost.

Sure - if you pick and choose your sample.
a few more Marvel movies:
The Punisher (1989)
Fantastic Four (1994) (yes there are caveats with this one)
Nick Fury: Agent of Shield (1998) (David Hasslehoff!?)
Captain America (1991)
and I'm sure there are more..

Re:Good Investment

[ashshy]

It really is evident in the hollywood scheme of things that they have ran out of movie ideas because the corporation is stifling the idealists. People are too busy crunching the numbers on the films instead of spending the money, making it, and learning something from it.

There is a very important line item in this agreement that people seem to miss:

Total creative control.

Sure, the greater profit potential is good, and the risk is rather low (bomb out and lose movie rights to the failed characters), but AFAIK and IMHO horrors like Elektra are products of the stifling effects of old-line studio bigwigs that don't want to take risks. That could have been a good movie, if the people who care about Elektra as a character had loose reins on and could run with their ideas. But no, this should be a SFX action flick, so make one, dammit! Not how you make great art.

For a counter-example, look at what happens when you have a director who loves his material, who runs off to New Zealand to shoot his movies so he can't be touched. Or if your director is a big name, and again he loves this stuff about webcrawling superheroes, so he can use his clout to get his way. Good stuff, people.

I expect great things out of Marvel movies in the next few years. Disclosure: I hold a small amount of Marvel stock. Maybe it will become a big amount if this deal works out like I think.

Re:Good Investment

[drxenos]

There was also a Captain America movie that sucked bigtime. I haven't seem the newer Punisher movie, but the old one also sucked.

Re:Good Investment

[pmancini]

Arthur: Are we dead yet?

Tick: Far from it, Arthur! We have them on the run!

(The Tick runs towards the Idea Men as ropes fall into view and each of them grab on to them)

Tick: Onward!

(They are then pulled up into a blimp with a large blinking light bulb on the side)

Tick: Hey cool! They've got a blimp!

(Screen shows blimp flying)

Sally: That was the scene today at the Rive Droite Bank as the mysterious gang known as the "Idea Men" struck again continuing their terrible crime wave. It was the sixth time in as many days that the baffling criminals have descended from the sky to literally lift The City's most valuable assets. But today their nefarious plot was foiled by a heroic blue stranger.

Tick (on TV): Hey cool! They've got a blimp!

Sally: Our modest blue benefactor exited the scene without comment. The Idea Men's menace is far from over. Says Mayor Blank:

Mayor Blank: ...In fact we believe these criminals have just practicing for a more larger caper.

Sally: We'll have more on the story as it develops. In the meanwhile, On a lighter note... clowns

(screen shows....clowns)

Re:Good Investment

[maxpup979]

Secret Wars anyone?...

Re:Good Investment

[Knuckles]

I'm not the OP, but check out Grand Prix by John Frankenheimer, 1966

Re:Good Investment

[Golias]

I'm thinking this will be an Electra but won't have the pull of Jennifer Garner, which, for many, was the only reason to see it.

Unless, of course, it's "Jennifer Garner as Ant Man!!!"

But seriously, the real crime here is that Marvel still seems to have no intention of doing a Silver Surfer movie anytime soon. If any superhero story really deserved to be told on the big screen in the age of CGI, that seems to me like it would be the one.

I always thought Noran Radd was just a little bit cooler than most flying superheroes, since he flies in a standing position.

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Cloak and Dagger is the only possible title there that doesn't say "pointless shit movie." Nick Fury has no real depth in the comics or any of the cartoon adaptations, serving as little more than an element in the super-secret quasi-malignant government. Black Panther? Who cares? How many B movies feature animism? If Cat Woman can't make it, Black Panther has zero chance. Ant-Man? You might as well make another Toxic Avenger movie. I don't even know who or what Power Pack refers to, and frankly I don't care enough to look; Marvel can just count me out for that one. Shang-Chi? Wtf, that just sounds racist.

I don't think Marvel is securing the funding for this movie to boost comic sales, I think they're just securing the money for the sake of acquiring $500m. They'll make these movies, they'll flop, and they'll have their cut of the $500m use in production, as well as a percentage of whatever the flops actually make in the theatre/DVD/cable markets. What do they have to lose, exactly? They're getting paid to air worthless comic assets, and people will still go spend $9 on a ticket to see Spider-Man 3.

Re:Good Investment

[milkman_matt]

I dunno man... Ant Man? Just not seeing the returns on that one.

It's ridiculous.. With all of the great comics Marvel has out there, what is this trash they're looking at? I mean, a few of these I can see as good.. Capt America could make up for the old movie, Avengers? Yeah, I'm sure they oculd make that work, Hawkeye maybe too since he WAS an Avenger.. Dr. Strange could probably work, and since Punisher did alright, i'm sure Nick Fury could be sold as well, even Cloak and Daggar (Would that be anything like the OLLLLLD Cloak and Dagger movie?).. But Black Panther? Ant-Man!? I was hoping they would make mention of Ghost Rider and maybe a Silver Surfer movie or something... Especially with having Dr. Strange and Avengers, plus the recent Fantastic Four.. these are all comics that were wrapped up in the Infinity Gauntlet book(s) which could probably be made into a pretty good movie as well.. Multi-Issue crossover series comics come to the big screen.. if anybody could pull that off Marvel probably could given their recent track record for comic movies.

Re:Good Investment

[Koiu Lpoi]

They don't understand their audience. I would so watch a Silver Surfer movie, but Ant Man won't even be worth pirating.

Re:Good Investment

[jafac]

The Tick?

Already inspired two TV series. . .

Re:Good Investment

[Rakarra]

I will admit, there is an occasional breakout hit: The Matrix, Sin City were amazing, Spiderman was not as bad as it could have been.

Agreed there. I thought Spiderman was "pretty good," and Spiderman 2 was excellent.

But it hardly makes up for the disasters they wage in the process (Daredevil, Elektra, The Incredible Hulk, come on) ... It really is evident in the hollywood scheme of things that they have ran out of movie ideas because the corporation is stifling the idealists. ... Hollywood hasn't matured at all. They're just remaking the same movies over and over, with different names for the characters, different actors, and in different cities.

Sure, Daredevil and Elektra weren't good, but I feel the Incredible Hulk was greatly underrated. It was a completely different type of movie from the others, given to a creative, non-action director. Audiences seemed to want a lot more "hulk smash" than was in the movie though (and I have to admit it meandered towards the end with a bit too much Nick Nolte) so it tanked. But to me that spells creativity that the audience wasn't interested in, not that the same movie was made over and over again.

I'll admit there's a general lack of creativity these days, and it doesn't help that the theater experience is often a bad one. I disagree firmly though with one of your main points, that the bad comic book movies recently have outweighed the good. If I have to stomach a Daredevil disaster to go with Spiderman 2 or X-men 2 or Batman Begins, then I think I've come out ahead.

Re:Good Investment

[Rakarra]

Hey man, don't be hasslin' the Hoff

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you've missed the joke. Read it again.

Re:Good Investment

[Rakarra]

I don't get it - I personally loved the movie (and hated it as a comic, go figure).

I think this is mostly why Hulk has been controversial and only somewhat successful -- because it was different in tone from the comics. So fans expecting one thing got something completely different.

I liked the movie more than most, apparently.

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it just me, or are the bulk of those characters in the 'mediocre' bin of Marvel characters.

I'd like to see something that could have a good storyline, make you laugh, and cry; give you action, and drama. A great character like the merc with a mouth, Deadpool. Now, I know he's not a 'hero', exacly, but who says it needs to be a 'hero' movie. Can't it just be a good movie without the cliche 'good guy vs. bad guy' theme (Hulk tapped into this style of movie a little bit)?

And am I the only one that would like to see Omega Red or Mr. Sinister in one of the X-Men movies? Or Venom in a Spiderman movie?!

Re:Good Investment

[Lord Apathy]

Preach On! Lets just take all 500 million and put it in to one big Tick movie... or several little tick movies.

Re:Good Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

how many years did George Lucas take to tell us the whole story?

Re:Good Investment

[Dogtanian]

The Star Wars films were all self-contained to some extent, although they had a greater story. I defy anyone to watch the Matrix #2 and tell me that it's complete on any scale; it has no 'conclusion', and ends smack in the middle of things.

Re:Good Investment

[schon]

I'm curious, what would you suggest is a good example?

The one that most people will be familiar with is "When Harry met Sally" - the four-way split conversation between Harry, Jess, Marie and Sally.

Re:Good Investment

[Pope]

Brian dePalma has used it extensively throughout his career, sometimes more effective than others. Believe it or not, its usage in "Phantom Of The Paradise" was done quite well, especially during The Juicy Fruits musical number.

Re:Good Investment

[Cervantes]

Dude, I think you need to check your "3 glasses of wine" for the antifreeze that was slipped in there by the scheming Frenchmen.

Seriously dude, if Hulk hadn't been so boring that I almost fell asleep, or so horrid that I almost walked out of the theater 3 times, it still would have been such a piece of crap that I would have been physically ill.

I will agree, the /concept/ that Ang Lee had was nice, I liked the stylistic elements and the comic-book-pane look, but that was the only, ONLY redeeming feature of this otherwise waste of cellulose.

Hey, I wonder which side is going to win, the people who think the first line was racist and mod me down, or the Simpsons fanboys who get the reference and mod me up?

Re:Good Investment

[pipingguy]

And if you know kids, there's no such thing as "Too many times"

I have 10 children; I know the meaning of "too many times".

Re:Good Investment

[pipingguy]

(more joss whedon dialogue please)

Maybe it's just me, but this witty/clever/trend-making dialogue (as seen in Buffy and to a lesser extent, Angel) got to be tiresome really quickly.

Re:Good Investment

[circusboy]

non-stop in a weekly show sure, but in a relatively short movie, especially comic-book, wild-premise movie, a bit of self observational, laconic sarcasm works well.

the part where he does well is remembering that, to the people in the movie, what is going on is not necessarily weird and unexpected. the lack of matter-of-fact attitude is what irritates the hell out of me in many other movies and shows.

I suppose I'm attaching his name to a style that could easily be referred to as 'venkman-ish' if you would prefer...

Re:Good Investment

[pipingguy]

I agree. Quirky is good, but when every character is like that it is grating.

Re:Good Investment

[bill_mcgonigle]

I always assumed Tom Hanks woke up one morning and wanted to kiss Meg Ryan again. So, he called up his agent.... Tom Hanks has such superpowers.

Re:Good Investment

[bigdavex]

Good grief. I wasn't particularly insightful but -1 for this comment is absurd. If you liked Sin City moderators then please post why you thought it was good.

This is the guideline for negative scores:

Bad Comments are flamebait. Bad comments have nothing to do with the article they are attached to. They call someone names. They ridicule someone for having a different opinion without backing it up with anything more tangible than strong words. Bad comments are repeats of something said 15 times already making it quite apparent that the writer didn't read the previous comments. They use foul language. They are hard to read or just don't make any sense. They detract from the article they are attached to.

I hope you enjoy modding this down as well.

Not Too Much Left

[Nimrangul]

Anyone else notice how those are all the second grade comics of Marvel being done? I mean, seriously, who would want to watch a film about Ant-Man?

Re:Not Too Much Left

[npietraniec]

Just because they weren't the most popular characters ever doesn't mean they wouldn't make good movies... I mean, look at it from the opposite direction. The Daredevil and Hulk movies sucked... So did Catwoman for that matter. Punisher wasn't that great either... Hm...

Re:Not Too Much Left

[lasmith05]

I completely agree. Although I liked power pack, I can't imagine a decent movie being made around it. Maybe a spykids like deal.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[gardyloo]

I mean, seriously, who would want to watch a film about Ant-Man?

    The studio is obviously hoping that swarms will want to watch.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[maxbang]

I'd want to watch it. The founder of the Avengers and creater of Ultron? Who wouldn't want to watch that? Plus, I always thought the Wasp was hot.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Mr. Underbridge]

It does mean that it'll be hard to make money, though. I think they've really mistimed this - Hollywood's all about streaks of nearly identical movies, and outside of franchises like Batman and Spiderman, I think the string has played out. My personal guess, but it looks like the public is cooling on these movies combined with less recognizable titles. Hell, I've only heard of two of them and have no interest in seeing those two.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Bob54321]

I'd say a lot of people will actually see it - as long as it is not released at the same time as something big. Even if it flops at the cinema, people rent really crappy movies all the time - when your nt paying much a crappy movie doesn't seem that bad

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Danathar]

Rumor is that Wes Craven is going to do Dr. Strange.

That promises to be horrific

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Anonymous Coward]

I remember an episode of Saturday Night Live when Garrett Morris played Antman. The episode was called Superman's Party, with Margot Kidder, Aykroyd, Belushi, the whole crew.

The Flash: What are your super powers again? You - you - you talk to the ants, is that it?

Antman: Well, partly. But, mainly, I shrink myself down to the size of an ant while retaining my full human strength.

The Flash: Really?

Antman: Yeah.

The Flash: [sarcastic] Oooh, that's really impressive. Size of an ant with human strength. You must be able to clean house on those other ants, huh? [chuckles] Hey! Hey, Hulk! Hey, check this guy out.

The Hulk: Ooooh!

The Flash: He's got the strength of a human!

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

Have to agree. "Wes Craven Does Dr. Strange" is a porno flick I have no interest in. Not into sausage fests.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[bclark]

It's all about appealing to the hive mentality of movie-goers.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[brunokummel]

Yeah I have to agree but i guess Catwoman is from DC comics, isn't she?

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Nimrangul]

Yes, Catwoman and Batman are both DC properties.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[NitsujTPU]

Everyone on The Hill said that they'd go.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[meta-monkey]

I'm just glad they're making a sequel to Punisher. That's a franchise that could go far.

By the way, did you know Ghost Rider, starring Nicolas Cage as Johnny Blaze is in production for 2006 release? Time will tell.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Kris_J]

Just because some popular comic book characters sucked as movies, that doesn't mean unpopular characters will rock on the big screen. Much more likely is that they'll suck even worse.

Anyway, what do I care? The only movie I'll see at the cinema for the rest of this year will be Serenity. And I'll be getting a ticket for that using one of the free passes I got because the cinema buggered up the sound on Star Wars Episode 3. I've got a great source for ex-rental DVDs at barely more than the cost of a single adult movie ticket. If it's not written by Joss Whedon I can wait for the DVD release.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[killtherat]

This is probably because Marvel has already sold the rights to all the cool characters (ie Sony has rights to the SpiderMan movies). Now they can make movies about all the second string characters they couldn't hawk off before.

I know it isn't marvel, but to quote Losing Lois Lane "Green Lantern, you're a second string charcter, hell I work with you and I don't even know what you do. Green!?!? Green isn't a power, it's a color!!!!!"

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Anonymous Coward]

> I mean, seriously, who would want to watch a film about Ant-Man?

The gay community. ;-P

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Anonymous Coward]

Joss Whedon screwed up Alien 4. I just can't believe that is was that bad before he got to it.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[magarity]

If you liked Losing Lois Lane, check out it's opposite: "Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex" by Niven. Which is an analytical essay about what would happen if Lois and Superman actually hooked up.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Sathias]

They should do a CGI movie of the Infinity Gauntlet series, that would be awesome. Silver Surfer ftw!!

Re:Not Too Much Left

[aztektum]

Those movies you listed may have used characters that are well known, but the characters themselves are some of the weakest.

DareDevil's biggest claim to fame in the Frank Miller run. They've been doing nothing but trying to recapture that ever since. Kevin Smith's run was "eh" at best.

Hulk has been a long time icon of The Avengers, but the essence of the character has been so dilluted by now that no one is really sure who the Hulk is. That's not to say making an interesting comic about a green brute who can't talk and has a prediliction toward purple pants is easy.

Punisher is Punisher. Death Wish with a skull on his chest.

The problem is these characters don't really have much character to them to begin with. They are constantly being reimagined and reinvented in the comic books.

When someone says X-Men or Superman, you immediately have this basic feeling of what they are talking about. Almost an essence, which is all you need to capture to make a good movie. The studios are looking to make some fast scratch, but like any movie, making a *good* comic book movie that will bring in the casual audience and the fans requires just as much attention to the character as the special effects. It isn't enough to have them smashing shit up and talking like idiots, people will get sick of that. But if you inject the essence of the character, that part of them that people instantly recognize throughout your 1.5-2 hours, that's when you have a successful movie.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Flower]

I just have a morbid curiousity in knowing how they would use the Wand of Watoomb... .

Re:Not Too Much Left

[patio11]

They'd be lucky if they could even convince swarms to pirate it by hosting a .torrent themselves.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[CAIMLAS]

Just off the top of my head, these would all be potentially awesome marvel heroes for an adaptation:

* several more X-Men films (at least)
* Wolverine/Logan (their origins, maybe? and at least one sequel)
* Capt. America
* Thor
* Gambit
* Captain Marvel
* Silver Surfer (maybe)
* another Punisher film

I mean, shit. Just on the "X-Men" front alone, they haven't even touched good story arcs like the Sentinels, Apocalipse, Mr. Sinister, the Phoenix, and god knows how many others. And Wolverine and Captain America present almost as many opportunities as Spiderman did, but IMO they're cooler opportunities: Captain America and Logan (and Sabertooth) were cold war/WWII "super soldiers".

There's a lot of potential there for cool retro films, as well as taking them and putting them into current environments: Captain America going to Iraq, maybe? Or taking on the French?

Take the starch out of Captain America's costume (navy blue, light grey, and blood red), and it'd be a pretty badass looking getup, too.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[gatzke]

They did a Captain America movie: straight to video. Terrible. Ok for TV, but terrible.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[barneyfoo]

I don't think they could do the infinity gauntlet easily. Maybe in a two movie series, but it's hard to sell that because no one is familiar enough (as in lotr) to invest time in a plot that cuts out half way through. Not to mention that marvel already sold the rights to the xmen characters and spiderman. So that leaves out alot of the plot contained in the Infinity Guantlet miniseries.

Of course as with any movie project, if you have a script and story boarding, and they are done very well, with a good dramatic pace (no 10 minute love scence), then you could sell it to anyone with a brain.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Mr. Underbridge]

I'll be honest, I'm not a comic book fan, so I've never even heard of them. Doesn't mean they're bad, not at all - just means that selling this to average moviegoers is going to be an uphill battle.

Beware of Nick cage - has one character he can play, and mails it in just about all the time.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Errtu76]

bittorrent swarms? I thought they definately do *not* want them to watch it ;)

Re:Not Too Much Left

[F_Scentura]

Yeah, but is she going to go "HE'S SO DREEEAMY" every time a new guy comes on screen?

Re:Not Too Much Left

[soft_guy]

Analyzing superheros or santa claus or the like from a technical angle for laughs is shooting fish in a barrel. I like Niven and I've read the piece. Fish. Barrel. Bang.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[armb]

Is that really enough to sustain an Ant-Man movie and an Avengers movie? Maybe Ant-Man as the founding of the Avengers and Avengers as a sequel wouldd work.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Anonymous Coward]

Hulk has been a long time icon of The Avengers, but the essence of the character has been so dilluted by now that no one is really sure who the Hulk is. That's not to say making an interesting comic about a green brute who can't talk and has a prediliction toward purple pants is easy.

Hulk an icon of the Avengers? Sure, he was involved a bit in the beginning, but he went way off on his own very quickly. Ironman, Hawkeye, Captain America, they're all closer to the Avengers than the Hulk.

The biggest problem with the Hulk movie is that it did NOTHING to truly reference the character. No real conflict with the military, no isolation of Bruce Banner, no sacrifice to save Rick Jones.

Just some flimisily put together stuff with his father. Yes, I know in the comics, Bruce's dad did abuse him as a child, but the genetic engineering is a bit much.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[Kris_J]

Alien 4 rocked, well, at least up until that humanoid alien child thing. At the very least it was a particularly valiant effort after the train wreck that was Alien 3.

I'd be interested in seeing future movies with Joss's Ripley and Call.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[mink]

Sounds like we need "NOT BRAND ECHH: Who says a comic book movie has to be good." the movie.Followed by it's obvious "What th--?!" sequal. After that epic lineup they can do the "You Univers" about normal boring people.

With a cast like the following, what could possibly go wrong.

Charlie America, The Inedible Bulk, The Mighty Sore Son of Shmodin, Scaredevel, Forbush-Man, Echhs Men, Knock Furious Agent of SHEESH, Fantastical Four (It's hard to write funny thing dialog that does not sound like regular thing dialog.), The Silver Burper, Sgt. Furious and His Hostile Commandos, Ironed Man, The Pulveriser, Bower Brats, Clunk and Dagnabbit, New Pubescents, Doctor Deranged, Peter Porker the Spectacular Spider-Ham, The Vizzion and the Scarlet Wench, The Revengers, Awful Flight and all the rest.

Also onthe cheap they can cover most of the to be made or badly made movies in the 2 movie blockbuster.

Re:Not Too Much Left

[mink]

Thanos might be a fun obscure character to center a film around. He is a villian who gets around and eventually, sort of, becomes a good guy, kinda. This would necessatate Adam Warlock and crew , now those would be some effed up movies.

One I think I'd like to see, but would be panned as a Robocop rip off would be Deathlok

deadpool?

[dosle]

No Deadpool or Carnage flicks? wow, what a jip.

Re:deadpool?

[Anonymous Coward]

Duh, they will only make movies on them once they have used them in Spoder man. Deadpool is in spider man 6 and carnage is in Spider man 5. Cause Venom will be in Spider man 4 most likely and carnage can only come after venom. Spiderman 3 will will have the lizard and the hobgoblin. I hope that helps

Re:deadpool?

[mink]

The film needs more Myserio!

First order of business:

[maxbang]

Make sure Roger Corman is available...to be locked far, far away from these monies.

Re:First order of business:

[mesach]

Why, with Roger Corman at the helm, they could probably put out a movie for EVERY hero in the marvel universe. Plus a Sequel, Sure they would probably be pretty cheesy, but i bet all of that could at least pay for themselves based on just the marvel name, AND Rog might have some left over to play with for his next few Toxic Avenger movies

Re:First order of business:

[Anonymous Coward]

I worked with Roger in the old days. He's absolutely one of the best film makers there's ever been. I'm not saying his films are the best, far from, but he was one of the best at the science of making movies. It's why they called it the Corman's school. You could learn more about real film making in a couple of years there then in an entire career in the studio system. What people forget is his company did make good movies just most of them were really bad. He gave people freedom, you could do whatever you wanted so long as you didn't go over budget. In that climate people could rise to the top and a shocking number of top film makers came out of Corman's. Today's studio execs could learn a lot about film making from Roger. They spend today more on a single film than he spent in his entire career collectively, we're talking hundreds of films. And he made money on virtually every film. There were a handful of flops but no one in the business has a record like his. Corman had a get it done no matter what it takes approach. Today most film makers claim it can't be done unless they have the actors they want, the budgets they want and specific locations. With Corman so long as you had a camera and actors and a place to shoot you were making a movie. The actors may not have been that good, the camera may have been worn out and barely worked and the location may have been a bit dodgy, PAs make good spotters when you are shooting at a location "unofficially". Trust me if you want to learn film making don't work on a Speilberg film work on a Corman film.

Re:First order of business:

[mink]

I'm up in the air as to which Fantastic Four film I like better.

All old characters...

[MMC Monster]

All these characters have existed for at least 20 years. Which goes to show you that Marvel really hasn't come up with much exciting stuff in the last couple decades. Just more crossovers featuring everyone's favorite mutants, with a splash of Spiderman in for variety.

Now, I wish someone would make a movie based on the Vertigo version of Lucifer...

Re:All old characters...

[NanoGator]

"Which goes to show you that Marvel really hasn't come up with much exciting stuff in the last couple decades."

On the flip side, it means that Marvel has franchises that have withstood the test of time. Frankly, I don't think highly of super-hero movies, but if they have a devoted fan base then give them what they want.

Re:All old characters...

[IAmNotACowboy]

Now, I wish someone would make a movie based on the Vertigo version of Lucifer...

only if Neil Gaiman wrote the screenplay.

Re:All old characters...

[GaryPatterson]

(somewhere in Hollywood...)

Exec A:
"I'm thinking "The Sandman" from those cool comics, only in the movie he's not some skinny guy, but a musclebound hero!"

Exec B:
"I'm listening..."

Exec A:
"He's got the power of making people sleep, or hallucinate during the day. He fights crime and recharges his magic bag of sleeping dust every night. And his arch-enemy is his own sister, Desire!"

Exec B:
"Good twist. What about the love interest?"

Exec A:
"Well, his girlfriend is a rock-grrl from New York, street-hip and so marketable. We've got sketches of a clothing line"

Exec B:
"I like it. We need to drop some of that touchy-feely crap from the stories. I want action, and long fight sequences. Is that Woo guy available? I'm thinking of a huge fight scene, where the Sandman fights that sister, starting with fists and then getting swords from a wall or something. It'll end with him cutting off her head just when she's about to skewer him. We'll need some special effects though. Do these guys fly?"

Exec A:
"They do now!"

Exec B:
"Shit we're going to make so much money from this. Maybe there's a sequel, and she's not dead but comes back for revenge. It doesn't matter though."

Re:All old characters...

[unitron]

" All these characters have existed for at least 20 years."

Most are at least 40 years old.

Re:All old characters...

[alnya]

I was in a Q&A with Neil Gaiman once, who was talking about the film adaptations of Sandman, and how they'd gone through 7 scripts or something (this was in 2000):

"I opened the last one that was sent to me and read the first page, which began:

Camera opens on a dark alleyway, two CRIMINALS are going through a purse. A long dark shadow casts itself over their faces. They draw guns and fire!

                                SANDMAN
Hah, you fools. Your weapons cannot harm me, for I am sandman..."

NEIL GAIMAN mimes dropping script into dustbin.
"

Beating it to death...

[nebaz]

This has happened before. Right after the initial success of Batman
the movie studios thought that super-hero movies were the way to go. The resulting movies were not made well.
They made Captain America once before. As much as I loved the X-Men and Spiderman movies, Fantastic Four was only so-so,
and bringing back Captain America, they should be careful. Hollywood tends to beat genres to death, wait a while and do it
all over again.

Re:Beating it to death...

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, FF wasn't great but it was a HELL of a lot better than the crapfests that were X-Men 1 & 2.

Re:Beating it to death...

[Anonymous Coward]

Back then though, I think Batman was the only one that came out well. This time around they've had a much better run, with maybe half of the ones they try coming out well.

Re:Beating it to death...

[Anonymous Coward]

I think Batman was the only one that came out well

Which one are you talking about? Keaton's Batman?

Re:Beating it to death...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the one linked in the grandparent.

Re:Beating it to death...

[Anonymous Coward]

I just need to know how they can make 2 X-Men movies, and only give Kitty a single cameo in each.

Re:Beating it to death...

[Anonymous Coward]

There are so many characters they only have time for cameos. Except for Wolverine. Because he's got the cool claws.

Re:Beating it to death...

[CAIMLAS]

I somehow doubt they'd redo Captain America today (as much as I want them to), given the anti-US military sentiments of Hollywood. Captain America was a US super-soldier. Today, he'd be in Iraq killing hajji.

Though, it might work for hollywood (politically, that is) if they were to do it "retro" and make some vague parallels between Bush == Hitler (sadly, I'm serious). They made some pretty direct comparisions in the new star wars (to the "bush/america = evil" vein), basically changing previous conceptions about the goodness of the Old Republic.

Re:Beating it to death...

[Fyz]

On the other hand, they could probably do better than the 1991 version of Captain America, which is currently #76 on IMDB's bottom 100.

It also has the top user comments, "There is no God!" and "If even ONE actor in the movie could act, this film might be able to pass for a piece of crap"

Re:Beating it to death...

[VAXcat]

Agreed...and the miscasting of munchkin Hallie Berry as Storm is a major crime.

Greh

[Madsci]

Those movies sound terrible. And Hollywood wonders why it's in a slump? You can't make ten of something and have each be interesting/worth $10 in its own right.

Re:Greh

[$RANDOMLUSER]

If you download any of this dreck, we'll sue you.
Love,
The MPAA

Re:Greh

[BewireNomali]

Well, hollywood uses an interesting model. They pay the bills and produce movies with borrowed money. This includes paying exorbitant salaries of the talent as well as the execs. so there's financial incentive to produce big budget movies... especially for producers, who typically get a percentage of the production budget plus gross participation.

For example: Miramax last year got an operating budget of $700 million from parent Disney. This pays for Harvey and Bob's salaries and expensive lifestyles, and a lot of the decadence that has evolved from the indie scene. Out of that cash, they make a few films, and acquire a few others. If a profit ensues... good shit. If not, there's always next year. Except, they had like three red years in a row, and Disney axed Bob and Harvey. So Bob and HArvey promptly went to investors and asked for a billion dollars to start the Weinstein Company. Because they got fucked on their exit deal with Miramax - they left with nothing - no library to speak of (anybody in film knows that its a LIBRARY that makes you money - assets that appreciate over time - especially for oscar films, of which miramax had a few) They were laughed out of the room. Now they're begging for 300 million at smaller banks and still getting snickers.

As far as a producer and film company is concerned - you assume your film will take a loss. the producer and film company makes its revenue in the short term from its advances from parent companies and investors all looking for a spider man or titanic. It's a tenuous system built up in part because the high barriers of entry prevent serious competition.

Re:Greh

[blonde rser]

Those movies sound terrible.

How do you figure you have enough information to make a judgement one way or the other on how these movies will be. If you know who these characters are then all you know is a nugget of the premise. You don't know when in the characters story the movie will take place. You don't know the structure, the pacing or even the director. There are so many things that can make or break a movie that just knowing the pitch isn't anything more than statistical noise.

There have been a lot of terrible comic book movies; there have been a lot of great comic book movies. Why would Punisher fail when Batman succeeds? Maybe because Burton is a better director than Hensleigh. I'm sure a good film maker could make a great film that has a basic premise of Punisher. And there have been several poor films (by poor film makers) based on the premise of Batman.

Re:Greh

[Sirch]

Except, they had like three red years in a row, and Disney axed Bob and Harvey.

Actually, that was the end of the deal established when Miramax was bought by Disney; it was always part of the plan that Harvey and Bob would be heads until 2005.

Bob has kept hold of Dimension, which is actually much more profitable than Miramax ever was, so Disney have really only kept hold of a name, which is currently synonymous with Oscar success. Harvey's great talent was always in winning Oscars for his films, as well as having a good head for editing them (some would say he's overbearing and sometimes does it to impose himself on his filmmakers, but it's generally recognised that her has a good eye for these things), but Miramax has rarely been a cash cow.

For more info and background on Miramax and the Weinsteins (as well as Sundance and Robert Redford), check out Down and Dirty Pictures by Peter Biskind.

from the ways-to-flog-dead-horses dept

[Anonymous Coward]

Damn what happened to all the good comics? oh theyve already been made into movies

before there was monotheism

[circletimessquare]

there was demigods and hero worship

the roman gods and greek gods or the gods of hinduism, for example

i think there is some sort of psychological sweet spot that superheroes touch in our heads and hearts

it's a meme that monotheism just can't kill

sort of ideal representations of who we think we should be or who we wish we were, and the relationships we have with other elements of society, and the struggle with evil... a social and psychological context that some nameless faceless uberentity that is a monotheistic god just can't satisfy in us

we'll be with superheroes and marvel/dc for a long, long time

Re:before there was monotheism

[Eightyford]

Just cuz you never see jehova kickin' bad guy asses, doesn't mean he aint cool, man.

Re:before there was monotheism

[cynicdave]

it's called celebrities dude. have you seen mainstream entertainment?

or even in the geek world. linus this linus that. macs and jobs this jobs that. nazis and gates this gates that.

Re:before there was monotheism

[suitepotato]

Uh, before you start feeling warm in the glow of yet another shallow and not very well concealed slap at Christianity, remember that the tales of Christians and before them Jews are replete with legendary men and women of note. It isn't about monotheism versus pantheism. It's basic to all humans; a species that is on the whole psychologically messed up and viewing itself as powerless.

Oddly, only the monotheism you take a whack at has truly embraced free will and self-determination. If anything about it rankles, it is that it also embraced the concept that it comes at the price of conscience and responsibility. How dare anyone tell anyone that there's good and evil, that some actions are right and others wrong? Only as long as everything is beyond our will and absolving us of responsibility or assuring us of our righteousness over anyone telling us different or both are we alright with it.

Obsession with heroes is if anything a tacit admission of our own surrender. Only someone else can be that good, noble, and selfless. And how wrong that idea is. Heroes aren't fictional people. They're the people who don't abdicate the power and responsibility both that are free will, make the choice to be better, and follow through even if it means giving up everything they've most desired and cherished in their whole lives.

Capes and spandex optional.

Re:before there was monotheism

[Anonymous Coward]

Just cuz you never see jehova kickin' bad guy asses, doesn't mean he aint cool, man.

Thor would slap him down easy. Look what happened when Yahweh's kid met an ordinary hammer, let alone the power of Mjolnir.

Re:before there was monotheism

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

Not everyone needs religion, and not everyone needs to identify with nonexistant creatures, some people just learns to live with the fact that you can't know or explain everything, and that not everything has a purpose, in the human explanation of "purpose". Once you learn to live with this two facts, you don't need this kind of stuff, and you can be a happy atheist, and identify yourself with more meaningfull mirrors that are real and live nextdoor.

Re:before there was monotheism

[firewrought]

Oddly, only the monotheism you take a whack at has truly embraced free will and self-determination. If anything about it rankles, it is that it also embraced the concept that it comes at the price of conscience and responsibility.

I don't follow... social prerogatives are compiled in at the psychological level and exist in pretty much all cultures and humans, despite whether they believe in 0, 1, or multiple gods. Honesty, loyalty, sexual restraint, self sacrifice, and other such values pretty much exist everywhere. Some theists see this as an argument for God from universal morality (the "knowledge of good and evil" humankind gained when some certain somebodies ate some certain forbidden fruit). Personally, I see this a result of socialization and evolutionary psychology... there are plausible reasons from game theory why unilaterally "doing wrong" is a bad strategy.

I'll grant that different cultures seem to have different amounts of free will and self-determination, and that religious belief can make a large difference. It could be argued, for instance, that America owes a great deal of its wealth to the Protestant work ethic. Right now though, it seems that the Christian church has relinquished any driving force it might have had as champion of the individual... after 9/11, it's all about conformity and control (and acting victimized). We need some modern Martin Luther's to break up the spiritual hegemony.

(I have no clue what that last paragraph is saying, but it sounded good. :-)

Re:before there was monotheism

[Klowner]

I think people tend to gravitate toward the 'superhero' type because they always have some sort of flaw which people can identify with, considering nobody is perfect. Whereas the a monotheistic God is viewed as flawless.

Re:before there was monotheism

[BewireNomali]

Obsession with heroes is if anything a tacit admission of our own surrender. Interesting, and well put. Somebody mod up please.

Re:before there was monotheism

[king-manic]

Obsession with heroes is if anything a tacit admission of our own surrender. Only someone else can be that good, noble, and selfless. And how wrong that idea is. Heroes aren't fictional people. They're the people who don't abdicate the power and responsibility both that are free will, make the choice to be better, and follow through even if it means giving up everything they've most desired and cherished in their whole lives.


You sound like you have some snake oil to sell. A hero is someone who happens to be in the right place (next to a burning building) who does somethign right but foolish (runs in to save kids he hears screaming) and is fortunate to survive. It's not the lack of people willing to do this (at least not in canada) it's a lack of situations where this is needed is the reason we lack heroes. Plus, about half the time they die making a tragic hero.

Re:before there was monotheism

[Minwee]

Hey, you don't mess with Jesus Christ, Vampire Hunter.

Re:before there was monotheism

[tarunthegreat2]

A word about Hinduism. Hindus also believe there is only one God - well the correct translation is Supreme Being. It's just they believe that there are different forms of the same Being. Different forms for different purposes and eras. So yes, by the strict definitions of other religions, this is polytheism, but in essence, Hinduism is monotheistic as well. Linky The Smarta perspective dominates the view of Hinduism in the West. Smarta monists, seeing in multiple manifestations the one God or source of being, are often confused by non-Hindus as being polytheists. It is seen as one unity, with the personal gods being different aspects of only one Supreme Being, like a single beam of light separated into colours by a prism, and are valid to worship

Re:before there was monotheism

[tarunthegreat2]

Followers of Hinduism are also forbidden from using line breaks and formatting in their Slashdot posts. DOH!

Re:before there was monotheism

[zakezuke]

Hey, you don't mess with Jesus Christ, Vampire Hunter.

I would agree... don't rent it, don't look at it, don't touch it. Don't mess with it at all!

I'm all for b-rated movies, but this is clearly sub-b. In someways it's a sci-fi kung-fu musical. But usually with kung-fu even if the story is bad the visual choreography is entertaining even if it ends up being fought in a city with a trampoline behind every bush. But just as some might say white men can't jump... these canadians can't Kung-Fu. Music well to be frank I fast forwarded through the feature. Audio quality was crap... and I mean wind in the boom crap. And worse yet, worse yet... it doesn't make good heckling material.

Oddly enough the only people who enjoyed this film were those who enjoyed Repo Man. Repoman at least had a semi-decent sound track, a odd twisted story, and at least the feeling that even though there are some continuity issues and crew and boom visiable here and there, you get the feeling they actually tried.

Jesus Christ, Vampire Hunter is just a joke, so please, if you value your self respect don't mess with it.

Re:before there was monotheism

[CFTM]

The irony to the entire thing is that the monotheastic religions of today are a result of the same process as that of the comic book super heroes. What I find fascinating about comic book characters is they are one of the last bastions of mythic creativity occuring within modern culture. Mythic creativity has been a meme within human cultures for a very long time and unfortantely the mainstream monothesastic religions no longer allow for any mythic creativity thus it spilled over in to comic books.

If anyone is interested in an academic approach to this subject matter I suggest checking out some of Joseph Campbell's work. The Power of Myth is a great place to start; it does not deal specifically with comic books but it deals with the sociophenomona of myth creation. Great stuff!

Re:before there was monotheism

[vertinox]

Oddly, only the monotheism you take a whack at has truly embraced free will and self-determination.

Well... Wrong. There is Buddhism. But of course that depends on which version of Buddhism you follow... But Buddism in general looks at overcoming human impulse so that you can truly determine your fate rather than just letting your psycological impulses and desires take.

And strictly speaking... Many forms of old school Christianity believe in pre-determination that since God is all powerful and all knowing that he knows what you are already going to do so therefore it is already determined.

Re:before there was monotheism

[Dread_ed]

For more research and detail on this phenomena than you ever thought was available please see this book by Joseph Campbell: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0691 017840/102-8735635-8866503?v=glance

Re:before there was monotheism

[pipingguy]

Sure, if you are 13 forever.

You think hero worship is not here today? What about movie stars, sports stars, TV soap opera stars? What is that all about?

Wishing that you are wealthy, famous and important?

I'm always astounded at the hero worship thrown at the Beatles in their early years. Was that genuine or fabricated by media?

If you stand somewhere and look up for 5 minutes or so inevitably a crowd will collect around looking up with you. Most will walk away after a few seconds, some will stay longer.

I'm still holding out...

[B00yah]

for Lobo from DC to get a movie, or at least a cameo...I doubt it will happen, but it's got to be better than Ant-Man

Re:I'm still holding out...

[rinkjustice]

I'll go you one better: Ranxerox vs Lobo?

Unfortunately, the violence would be so much and so intense, it would make Quentin Tarantino squeemish. Not for me.

Just tell me who wins.

Re:I'm still holding out...

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.comics2film.com/ProjectFrame.php?f_id=1 58

apparently, ranxerox has one.

Woohooo Power Pack...

[Severious]

Those comics were so good that a couple months ago I threw away the first 30 of them. Thats right, they are so awsome that I did not even bother to put them up on ebay.

I get the feeling that Marvel got a little movie money happy and sold all the rights to their good characters already. Now they are stuck trying to produce...crap.

Re:Woohooo Power Pack...

[i_should_be_working]

So you admit to having the first 30, eh?

Well, I too scoffed at the idea of a Power Pack movie. But no one said it will be marketed towards adults. This could be totally directed at kids. When I was much (much) younger and collected this series I would have paid money to see the movie.

It's Ant-Man that makes me think they got too money happy.

Re:Woohooo Power Pack...

[Severious]

Yes it is sad that I had them but they just came in a couple boxes of comics I bought from somone. I don't regret it I got the Frank Miller Daredevils and a lot of classic Batmans out of it and a whole bunch of other nice stuff. But Power Pack??? I never read one of those, but it did make me wonder about that guy.

I have never even heard of Ant-Man.

Don't get me wrong, but what?

[ReformedExCon]

Just my impressions of the list:

Captain America
Didn't they do this one and it sucked?

The Avengers
A facless hero clan. I can't even name a single hero in this group.

Nick Fury
I guess because the Punisher movie worked so well...

Black Panther
Ah, a hero named after a hyper-racist group. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Ant-Man
Honey, I shrunk the superhero!

Cloak & Dagger
Not that Cloak was a completely contrived character, or that Dagger wore far too little clothing, but how could this movie possibly be interesting?

Dr. Strange
Who?

Hawkeye
Ah, Daredevil without charisma, but empowered with a ridiculous costume.

Power Pack
Never heard of them.

Shang-Chi
Is this like the token Asian guy?

I think they probably need to stick with their franchise heros and stay away from these B and C-list zeroes.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

Dr. Strange
Who?

Well, if they said they'd make a superhero movie about Dr. Who, I'd probably say, "Dr. Who? Strange."

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[qw(name)]

Actually, of all the movies listed, Dr. Strange is the only one that has the possibility of being a CG boom. I always read Dr. Strange. His story is the deepest of most of the comic heroes Marvel ever produced.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[NiceGeek]

"The Avengers
A facless hero clan. I can't even name a single hero in this group."

You just did - Captain America, Ant-Man, Hawkeye and Black Panther have all been members at one time or another (along with fair chunk of the Marvel Universe)

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Nimrangul]

Including War Machine and Iron Man, who should both have had movies by now.

I can see the series of films already, the first about Iron Man, then him being beaten down and War Machine taking over and then Iron Man coming back.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[bjbyrne]

Captain America
Didn't they do this one and it sucked?

There was the horrible 1979 tv series movie, followed by the even worse 1991 movie. I still remember his Plexiglas shield that attached to his motorcycle.

Nick Fury
I guess because the Punisher movie worked so well...

Even worse then Captain America, the Nick Fury TV movie staring David Hasselhoff in 1998

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[zakezuke]

I have to hit the marvel directory to find out what other geeks are talking about.

Power Pack
Never heard of them.

http://www.marveldirectory.com/teams/powerpack.htm

The Power Pack are too young to act as professional adventurers, but they continue have exploits requiring the use of their superhuman powers when the occasionsarise

Alex took, the name "Gee" due to his power over gravity ("G-power"), Jack called himself "Mass Master" because he could take gaseous form or compress his mass to as to become tiny, Julie called herself Lightspeed became she could fly fast, leaving a trail of colored light behind her, and Katie became the Energizer, due to her ability to store energy and fire it from her body

I would paraphrase this and attempt to poke fun at the idea, but it's pretty awful in it self.

Shang-Chi
Is this like the token Asian guy?

Your thinking of Samuri from the "super friends".

This clearly isn't your average token asian guy who knows kung fu who moved and got employed as a secret agent and likes to fish who's arch nemisis lives in China Town. The fact that he's from china, knows kung fu and likes to fish and happens to have an arch nemisis in Chinatown are totaly beside the point... and was only formaly employed by MI-6. The nunchukas are just a tasteful detail and clearly isn't intended as being stereotypical at all.

http://www.marveldirectory.com/individuals/s/shang chi.htm

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Allen Varney]

Doctor Strange is a good character. His backstory is all about redemption, a good theme for both comics and movies. Many Marvel writers have told good stories about Strange over the last four decades. He also fulfills a valuable narrative role in the Marvel universe; he's the Sorcerer Supreme, or at least he was last time I looked.

Shang-Chi had a long run of good stories in the 1970s title Master of Kung Fu. They were interesting for their leavening of philosophy. It wouldn't be at all hard to turn that book into a decent kung fu movie.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Flower]

They already did Nick Fury on SciFi Channel. I saw bits and pieces of it. Nick Fury was played by that guy from BayWatch. It hurt. It hurt real bad.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[jayhawk88]

Captain America
Didn't they do this one and it sucked?

They also did Spiderman and FF movies that by all accounts were horrible before the "big" releases. It's not like anyone is not going to go see a summer blockbuster movie because that one time some independant film company in the 70's lucked into a license and the movie sucked.

The Avengers
A facless hero clan. I can't even name a single hero in this group.

Captain America, Thor, Ironman, Hawkeye, Giant Man, The Wasp...Hell if they go really old school Hulk will make an appearance. Yes the Avengers don't have the kind of name recognition the X-Men, FF, or Justice League has, but that's what pre-movie hype is for.

Nick Fury
I guess because the Punisher movie worked so well...

If they go for a Marvel Ultimates Universe style with this movie (which is pretty much what they did with FF), Nick Fury is a black, eye-patch-wearing James Bond ass-kicking character with a suit that allows him to fly and turn invisible. I guarentee you Sam Jackson's publicist is already pimping him for this role.

Black Panther
Ah, a hero named after a hyper-racist group. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Are you posting this from the 1950's? Did someone invent timetravel:// and not tell me? Please, that argument isn't even worth responding to.

Ant-Man
Honey, I shrunk the superhero!

Yeah, and? Those movies did pretty well if I recall; there is a huge movie market aimed at kids these days. I'll admit Ant-Man as serious comic-book movie doesn't sound too appealing, but Marvel has and obviously would love to continue to hit the 8-14 demographic or whatever, perhaps this is part of that?

Cloak & Dagger
Not that Cloak was a completely contrived character, or that Dagger wore far too little clothing, but how could this movie possibly be interesting?

Hmmm...dark, brooding character who is in constant pain, running around fighting crime with an ultra-hottie. Nope, can't think of any demographic that would appeal to!

Again, this probably isn't the type of movie that you take that seriously, but there is obviously a male teenage demographic to hit with this flick.

Dr. Strange
Who?

Think of Gandalf battling the Balrog in Fellowship, except the Balrog is Dormammu, Lord of all Hell, and Gandalf is Dr. Strange, who can fly around and cast all kinds of CGI-friendly magic spells. And then take it times 10. Strange is all about magic in the MU, and this perhaps has the chance to be the best of the titles if done properly.

Hawkeye
Ah, Daredevil without charisma, but empowered with a ridiculous costume.

Again, if they go the Ultimate Universe route, Hawkey basically looks like Brad Pitt; a super soldier who can use a bow like guys in John Woo movies use pistols. Hardcore action flick potential.

Power Pack
Never heard of them.

Probably another kiddie flick, they were basically a bunch of kid superheros back in the 80's. Honestly this does seem like a strange choice to me, I would guess Marvel is seeing a Spy Kids type thing.

Shang-Chi
Is this like the token Asian guy?

Yeah, because martial arts pictures aren't popular or anything.

Look, I know most of these movies will probably turn out to be on the level of Elektra or Punisher, but the point is that there is material to work with here. These characters/teams are not as well known to the general public as a Spiderman, Hulk, X-Men or FF, but they do have interesting characters and stories to tell.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[HBI]

Hmm, always liked Starlin's Dreadstar back in the 80s for that. The stories were pretty good, at least the first 28 issues or so.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[ObitMan]

nice comeback man.

I wish though they'd do a Luke Cage movie.
Hell I'd even settle for Power Man and Iron Fist.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[zaren]

Just my impressions of the list:

And my impressions of your impressions :)

Captain America
Didn't they do this one and it sucked?

Yeah, back in 91. A lot of movies sucked back then. As did that one.

The Avengers
A facless hero clan. I can't even name a single hero in this group.

Do you mean the West Coast Avengers? Or the East Coast Avengers? Or the Great Lakes Avengers?

Now, I'm not surprised that you can't name any of the Avengers, because there have been so many (and even I don't know who's in the teams now). But seriously, their lineup has included:

Captain America
Thor
The Hulk
The Sub-Mariner
Iron Man

And let's not forget Ant-Man, Hawkeye, and the entire Fantastic Four!

Nick Fury
I guess because the Punisher movie worked so well...

Come on, in this day and age, you think a movie about a super-tough anti-terrorist government agent with tons of nifty guns and gadgets (and a floating fortress) isn't going to play?

Black Panther
Ah, a hero named after a hyper-racist group. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Hey, he was a big deal back in the day, leader of his own country as well as a powerful hero.

Ant-Man
Honey, I shrunk the superhero!

Okay, I've gotta go with you on that one. I see little potential to that movie.

Cloak & Dagger
Not that Cloak was a completely contrived character, or that Dagger wore far too little clothing, but how could this movie possibly be interesting?

A bit more modern spin - she the naive and innocent girl from the good side of the tracks, and he the rough and tough gangsta from the mean streets. Mix in some exotic street drugs, some righteous vengeance, and you've got a winner.

Dr. Strange
Who?

Dr. Stephen Strange, the Master Mystic, the Sorcerer Supreme! All sorts of juicy ghost-busting special-effecty opportunities there.

Hawkeye
Ah, Daredevil without charisma, but empowered with a ridiculous costume.

And don't forget the fancy bow and arrow!

Power Pack
Never heard of them.

Nobody did, and more's the shame. Some decent writing effort went into making and managing the characters in that series. It could be a really good kiddie movie.

Shang-Chi
Is this like the token Asian guy?

Could be. And yet, it could be their excuse for a lovely martial arts wire fest.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Saint Stephen]

Silver Surfer! Silver Surfer! Silver Surfer!

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you read Marvel comics? seriously.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[ReformedExCon]

Do you read Marvel comics?

Not since I was a kid. Do you still read them?

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[jejones]

Nick Fury
I guess because the Punisher movie worked so well...

If Steranko were involved (and given appropriate authority), I'd see this one in a heartbeat.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[EireannX]

Actually there are some good character opportunities in that list, and some horrific ones.

Captain America never struck me as having any depth. Was always a goody two shoes, and I really don't know how much mileage you can make out of him being frozen in ice. Maybe you can go with something Indiana Jonesish with the Nazis / Hydra? And end the movie with him being frozen. Which might be something I could watch.

Hawkeye - The original seemed a bland character with a bow, however the ultimate series seems to have made him more a trigenometry / geometry genius who expresses himself with a bow. Throw in a touch of autism and you might be able to create some depth to this character. A hero who can't deal with people in his normal persona might add some interesting challenges.

Ant-man. Already has a complex back-story, most of which I know little about. Was a hero and leader of Avengers I think for a time, then became unstable, beat his wife (the wasp I think) and is now trying to recover from all the things he has self inflicted. I have issues empathising with those who beat down on those weaker than themselves, so this would take some work.

Nick Fury. Yet again I would use his Ultimates persona, although I don't think I have ever read any of his pre-ultimates stuff. And in the Ultimates it is his job to keep tabs on all the different heros and villians running around, as well as running the Ultimates. And you can never be sure if he is an evil government lackey or one of the good guys. Rather than being a shade of grey he seems to constantly transition between shades. Could be done well explaining why he got the job and who he is under it all. Also had a part in dissassembling the Weapon X programme, and kept tabs on Spidey's development and responsible for Magnetos imprisonment, so he can be used to tie in the X2 and Spidey franchises, without actually doing crossovers. Might even be good to wind this movie up with a charter for the Avengers.

Which would then give you an avenger movie where you know the main players from before, who now have to take their idiosyncrasies that have been put on display and actually work together. Add in Ultimates Thor, who doesn't behave like a soldier and will only obey Fury if he thinks it is the right thing, and Iron Man and you could have a nice ensemble. X and X2 had to work on introducing the back stories of their characters, whereas Avengers would have fully fledged entities and so could focus on the story and chcracter development rather than backstories.

But they will probably just spend the money on name actors and cheesy FX and rely on the 'franchise quality' of the characters to attract an audience.

Hopefully Marvel making the movies in house will mean a higher focus on stories and characters and a lessened focus on lunchboxes and merchandising, as the long-term gain may be increased comic revenue.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[BewireNomali]

Iron Man is considered first tier - and I think it's one of the films already optioned by a studio.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Tom Cruise was attached to play Tony Stark at one time.

I think that Iron Man is actually a great franchise for production, and timely, given that we're about to enter the era of serious body augmentation.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[HyperHyper]

Power Pack - bunch of whiny kids who get powers (gravity control, flying, gaseous form and energy absorption/release). I made the mistake of collecting a wad of them and when I reread my collection, I skip over those ones and pretend I never bought them. The best nemesis for them were the Snarks (aliens from Snarkworld... sigh) - Personally, I thought the "garbage man" storyline was cool because he was some kind of weird creature that messed them up pretty good. Typical "drugs" are bad storyline though. Shang-Chi is a martial artist - they should have used Iron Fist... Overall though, a poor choice of characters aside from the Avengers and Captain America. Iron Man would have been the best one to choose though... oh well... Long live Dr. Strange... ...

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[BewireNomali]

They are doing a Luke Cage movie.

Tyrese Gibson is rumored to star. John Singleton is attached to produce and direct.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[M. Baranczak]

Yeah, I think everyone involved was kinda hoping we'd all forget about that one.

By the way, "that guy" is David Hasselhoff. Funny, I always think of him as "that guy who had the talking car". Must be a generational thing.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Flower]

Thanks. His name was on the tip of my tounge but I just couldn't remember it. The BayWatch reference was deliberate to connotate how acting poor that movie was. Kitt had more emotional range to work off of than anybody on Nick Fury: Agent of Shield.

1998 was it really so long ago? I thought SciFi was hyping it up just last year.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[mbourgon]

Cloak & Dagger
I loved this movie. Dabney Coleman and, um, that kid. The opening bit with the 20-sided dice - very sweet.

Dr. Strange
This is a remake too, I believe. I remember seeing something similar on late-late-night Showtime back in the 90's.

Nick Fury
Yeah, I remember this one, too. Not one of Hasselhoff's best roles - but maybe they'll have him sing in the new movie.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Lisandro]

Nick Fury
I guess because the Punisher movie worked so well...

    Am i the only person on Earth who enjoyed that film (a lot)? It was no Citizen Kane, but was a fairly good adaptation of the comic, with some superb moments - like the fight with the russian or the family slaugther scene.

    I saw it on DVD recently and i can't figure why it did so bad as they say. It was far, far more entertaining than other recent comic adapatations (Elektra, Daredevil, etc).

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait, did you actually just say that FF was a good movie?

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Nimrangul]

Rob Lowe, Tom Cruise, Nicholas Cage and a few others have been tossing around the Internet for the 2007 Iron Man, but nothing really solid has been said, not even who directs.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[PainBot]

You're the kind of person that would have said about early plots for the Lord of the Ring: "Who wants to hear about funny dwarves and walking trees fighting for a stupid ring ? I mean how deep a story can this be ? Besides, there were dwarves in that Snowwhite movie and I didn't like it."
Give them a rest, and talk about this when they come up with a plot for the movies.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[bmeteor]

I think you're on to something here.

My guess is Marvel's essentially taking these titles over for one of three reasons:

1. Stories. they want to reintroduce the populace to a lot of the Marvel characters by way of the Ultimates rehashings. Hawkeye, the Ultimates (avengers), Nick Fury, ant-man, all have under gone some major facelifts by rewriting some of the histories under joe quesada. They focused on the story and not the franchise. Hopefully, this will translate in the movies. I'm suspicious that the movie studios were yearning for more franchises.

I, for one, have really been looking forward to a Captain America, with a yearning for man vs. himself conflict with U.S. Agent. (could speak volumes about the state this country is in).

2. kids - power pack could be a good kids movie, and Ant-man could be delightfully campy. kids would love it.

3. action - never read any shang-chi, but it could be a good kung-fu movie if done well. you probably wouldn't even know it was a comic book but for the marvel entertainment credit.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[ReformedExCon]

I saw Lord of the Rings, Fellowship of the Rings and was not impressed. Sure, I was impressed with the quality of the cinematography and the absolutely wonderful scenery. I wasn't impressed with the story, though. I didn't think there was any character growth except for the times when the director felt it necessary to beat the audience about the head with cliched obviousness. Frodo doesn't grow as a character, neither do any of the other characters. They all start out in their one-dimensional roles and stay that way the whole time.

Then you get battle scene after battle scene. I suppose if I was 12 years old I might have thought it really cool, but at this age I found it tedious.

None of the peripheral characters were explained to any depth. There was a very weird and out of place scene where an "angel/elf" flips out for two seconds and looks like she's going to eat Frodo, then the next moment she's back to normal. What was that all about?

The story itself doesn't seem to go anywhere, though the characters are supposed to be on some very important journey. Instead of story, we get fight scenes. Instead of character development, we get characters introduced then forgotten. Instead of storytelling, we get computer graphics.

The movie was a total wreck when removed from its fancy computer-aided trappings. It offers the viewer nothing but great scenery, but that can't possibly hold a movie together for 3 hours.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[The Wooden Badger]

Cloak & Dagger Not that Cloak was a completely contrived character, or that Dagger wore far too little clothing, but how could this movie possibly be interesting?

I don't see what the problem is here. You've got a lithe blonde chick in way too little clothes. Sounds like this is going to be a commercial success to me.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[arthurh3535]

Captain America
This would require a lot of tooling in the ultimates line, but could be doable. Hard to say.

The Avengers
Hmm. This could be quite intersteting. With the cast of Thor, Captain America, Iron Man, Scarlet Witch, Vision and others, you have a lot of possibilities.

Nick Fury.
Not holding out much hope here.

Black Panther
I'm not sure what they have planned, but BP can be an intersting character.

Ant Man
Small is cool. Nano-tech terrors!

Dr. Strange
Built for CGI and some very creative computer artist. Hope it works out.

Hawkeye
Hope they bring him back to life first!

Power Pack
This is one I seriously thought they were going to make into a cartoon recently. Marvel's answer to Teen Titans, so to speak. With Snarks. Must have Snarks. So maybe an animated flick like Jimmy Nuetron.

Shang-Chi
Modest budge kung fu flick? Sounds fun.

If you only see the really bad, you aren't seeing the potential. Some of them won't work well, but others have some real potential.

Now if we can only save Iron Man from the father/son plot that I've heard about.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[pekoe]

Just the other week friends and I were discussing this. Power Pack would make a great movie - it's certainly ripe for Harry Potter audiences, and it's the only one that interests me, as great things have been done in kid's fiction (Phillip Pullman, anyone?). Power Pack has extremely strong child characters, interesting aliens and technology, and a tight script. Guaranteed, Hollywood will waste the opportunity.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[ObitMan]

Awesome. Thanks!

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL! Thas a goo one!

"Dr. Strange
Who?

Well, if they said they'd make a superhero movie about Dr. Who, I'd probably say, "Dr. Who? Strange.""

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[TrentC]

Captain America
Didn't they do this one and it sucked?

Yes. twice, if you count the crappy 70's TV show.

The Avengers
A facless hero clan. I can't even name a single hero in this group.

The Avengers are Marvel's version of the Justice League -- all of the big-name characters in one book.

Which is why the movie will suck; they may get away with not having to do Captain America's origin (or the Hulk's if they stick to the classic Avengers origin), but they'll have to do Thor, Iron Man, Ant-Man/Giant-man/Yellowjacket/Dr. Pym ( yes, the same guy in four different costumes); not to mention, which B-list Avengers will be in the movie? Scarlet Witch? Hawkeye? (who's a pile of ashes in the Avengers at the momentally)? Vision (an android that can vary his density)?

What villian(s) so you use? Loki? Kang the Conquerer? Ultron?

Nick Fury
I guess because the Punisher movie worked so well... ...that we'll forget that we tried this once already -- with David Hasselhoff as Fury.

Black Panther
Ah, a hero named after a hyper-racist group. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Aside from the unfortunate name (a holdover from an unfortunate time when Marvel prefaced many of the names of its black superheros with the word "Black", in case you couldn't figure it out from their skin tone), the recent incarnation of the series by Christopher Priest wasn't too bad. As it was deconstructing the character and his existing storyline, it kinda required you to have some familiarity with the character, though.

Ant-Man
Honey, I shrunk the superhero!

Given the lack of name recognition, a good director and good script could make this work. (Of course, the current Ant-Man is also dead, a victim of the same storyline that killed Hawkeye.)

Cloak & Dagger
Not that Cloak was a completely contrived character, or that Dagger wore far too little clothing, but how could this movie possibly be interesting?

Eh, I dunno. Make it more of a gothic horror story than a straight superhero story, and it might work.

Dr. Strange
Who?

A powerful mage (the "Sorcerer Supreme"), whose origin recently was retold in a mini-series by J. Michael Straczynski. Think Constantine, but hopefully more faithful to the actual character. (He also got the bad 80's movie treatment, which wasn't too bad except for the horrible costume -- purple with a yellow cape! AIEEE!)

Hawkeye
Ah, Daredevil without charisma, but empowered with a ridiculous costume.

And currently dead. (Not that that'd stop 'em.)

Power Pack
Never heard of them.

This one might actually work very well, if they aim for the "Spy Kids"/Kim Possible crowd. (Okay, a bit higher than that...) Four young siblings, ages 5 to 13, find a crashed alien spaceship whose dying pilot transfers one of his powers to each of the siblings -- matter/energy conversion, flight, control over personal mass (going from super-small and super-dense to a large gaseous form), and gravity amplification/negation on himself and anything he touched -- to defend Earth against the alien invaders that were following him. (The nice thing about the original incarnation of the comic series is that the kids were written like real kids, not miniature superheroes. The powers could be transferred between the siblings, which led to some interesting stories...)

Shang-Chi
Is this like the token Asian guy?

Kind of; your generic kung-fu action character.

I think they probably need to stick with their franchise heros and stay away from these B and C-list zeroes.

I hate to break it to you, but until the movie, Blade was among the "B- and C-list heroes". At the time the first movie came out, they were in the process of canceling his current series, after only about 6 issues; they didn't try to give him another one until after the second movie came out, IIRC

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[91degrees]

Power Pack

Probably another kiddie flick, they were basically a bunch of kid superheros back in the 80's. Honestly this does seem like a strange choice to me, I would guess Marvel is seeing a Spy Kids type thing.

I think it's a good choice. Definitely Spy Kids. It's a decent kid's flick premise, with backstory and characters already created. Basic kid's superhero wish fulfillment stuff. And since anyone who cared about it has grown out of it now, there really aren't a lot of fans to offend.

The only problem with all of these is that a lot of Marvel's TV and Movie output has been really really bad.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[qw(name)]

He was good, too. A bit on the moody side but well worth reading.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[mshiltonj]

Dr. Strange
Who?

Look him up. This is the one character on the list I'd like to see in a movie. Not the most popular character in the Marvel universe, but I think one of the most interesting.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Anonymous Coward]

With regard to the Avengers, you DID name a hero previously, depending on which generation of Avengers you're talking about. Captain America lead the Avengers off and on for a long while.

They did the Punisher before (and it sucked - thanks Dolph), but they did it again.

You honestly think Captain America is a B or C-list hero?

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[hwolfe]

When did Nick Fury turn black?

This one will be interesting, which part of his life will they focus on? His exploits in WWII leading the Howling Commandos? I know my dad and I would go see that. Or will they do his years with SHIELD, possibly ignoring some or all of his backstory?

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Avengers
A facless hero clan. I can't even name a single hero in this group.

You just named four: Captain America, Ant Man, Black Panther, and Hawkeye.

Others you would know with only a passing interest in comic books would be Thor, Iron Man, The X-men's Beast, Spiderman, and The Hulk.

Black Panther
Ah, a hero named after a hyper-racist group. I don't see anything wrong with that.

I'm not sure I'm awake enough at 7:30am to properly address this nonsense. Suffice to say, the Black Panther Party for Self Defense started out as just that. Defending black folk from police brutality. There are several books on the subject. I suggest you read them. As for The Black Panther character, Wesley Snipes has been trying to get T'Challa's story told on film for years. He's an African king from a fictional African nation (Wakanda) that is very advanced technologically. The character was meant to give black youth a hero to look up to.

~Edweird

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[birder]

Dr. Strange would be a great Franchise. The first movie would need a lot of back story but subsequent films could really be fun. The effects they can do now would make the Dr. Strange universe and villians look great.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Anonymous Coward]

They also did Spiderman and FF movies that by all accounts were horrible before the "big" releases. It's not like anyone is not going to go see a summer blockbuster movie because that one time some independant film company in the 70's lucked into a license and the movie sucked.

I believe he was referring to the one done in 1991 by Albert Pyun. That one and the FF done about the same time were done mainly for purposes of maintaining the copyright.

Are you posting this from the 1950's? Did someone invent timetravel:// and not tell me? Please, that argument isn't even worth responding to.

You already did. And it was the 1960s, youngster. Moreover, there are still a lot of people who are not rabid Comic Book Guys. They will associate "Black Panther" with the movement and not the comic book character.

Think of Gandalf battling the Balrog in Fellowship, except the Balrog is Dormammu, Lord of all Hell, and Gandalf is Dr. Strange, who can fly around and cast all kinds of CGI-friendly magic spells. And then take it times 10. Strange is all about magic in the MU, and this perhaps has the chance to be the best of the titles if done properly.

You hang out in comic book stores too much. You can add "if done properly" to any one of these future films. Chances are that the proposed films have a two-fold purpose: to make a quick buck and to keep some copyrights going. As such, it's doubtful that any of them will be done properly. See the Dr. Strange TV film from the 1970s if you want to see how bad it can get.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[fallen1]

Captain America

Didn't they do this one and it sucked?
Yes, they did. I'm betting that this one will be much better since Marvel has, in general, improved on the amount of cash it can spend, the talent it can acquire, and scriptwriters/scripts.

The Avengers
A facless hero clan. I can't even name a single hero in this group.
Umm, yeah, see Captain America. Not to mention Hawkeye, Scarlet Witch, Vision, Thor, Iron Man, Wasp, Black Panther, Moon Kinght, Black Knight, Ant Man (I believe - see a pattern forming here?), and numerous others.

Nick Fury
I guess because the Punisher movie worked so well...
I am not sure why they can't seem to get The Punisher to work correctly.. Maybe they need to tell the story WITHOUT putting in a love interest, touchy-feely crap. Show the Punisher as he is/was in the 80s - a driven, kill-em-all-let-God-sort-em-out kind of a guy. Sure, he concentrates on the evil people most of the time but his methods are usually quite brutal and to the point. Nick Fury is along those same lines. Linked to several superhero groups and to a TON of evilness and bad guys/girls. Close ties with Captain America as well. Wow, still seeing a pettern here?

Black Panther
Ah, a hero named after a hyper-racist group. I don't see anything wrong with that.
The Black Panther has been around for a long time in the Marvel Universe with no backlash that I am aware of and I have read/collected/followed comics and the comic world for a LONG time. He is usually well-written and with pretty good story lines. Yes, he would probably be considered B-list in the Marvel Universe but then again, so would the majority of superheros in their universe - including one I truly enjoy, Dr. Strange.

Ant-Man
Honey, I shrunk the superhero!
Yeah, Ant-Man is another B-list superhero but it could make an interesting movie since he has been around for a LONG time and is affiliated with several of the Marvel superhero groups. Could have lots of walk-ons/tie-ins with other superheros.

Cloak & Dagger
Not that Cloak was a completely contrived character, or that Dagger wore far too little clothing, but how could this movie possibly be interesting?
Well, I see this movie going one of two ways - it will either be marketed directly toward the teen crowd (since Cloak & Dagger were teens) with lots of "in" things going on in the movie or Marvel will push the PG-13 rating, make Cloak much darker, and dress Dagger with much less clothing and try to appeal to teens/twenties/horny males. :-p

Dr. Strange
Who?
Dr. Strange, Master of the Mystic Arts. Think of a little like Call of Cthulu meets Marvel but Dr. Strange doesn't go all psychotic because he has delved into the occult. Faces some pretty cool enemies like Mephisto, The Mindless Ones, Shuma Gorath, Dormammu, and several others - all of them demonic or Cthulu-ish in nature. So, done correctly, Dr. Strange could make a great Occult/Horror movie. Done correctly.

Hawkeye
Ah, Daredevil without charisma, but empowered with a ridiculous costume.
Heh, well, yeah. Decent back story on Hawkeye though AND, like Ant-Man, ties in with lots of Marvel superhero groups so there could easily be tie-ins and walk-ons and cameos. They could also make him a little darker of a character along the lines of Batman and probably make a cool story out of it.

Power Pack
Never heard of them.
DEFINITELY aimed at the under-teen crowd. Child marketing at its best I'm sure. Power Pack is a group of children with, well, super powers. Rainbow-like and all that. See: not for those above 12.

Shang-Chi
Is this like the token Asian guy?
Shang-Chi, The Master of Kung-fu. Son of Fu Manchu. One of the licensed products of Marvel and it had a pretty long run. Some pretty cool villians and, of course, Shang-Chi has a Bruce Lee feel to it. Linked to several Marvel s

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[mojoNYC]

ok, maybe there's a bit of a generation gap going on here--these are all 'Generation X' heroes (my era)--I think there's a lot more going on here than anybody who was born after 1975 appreciates...

personally, here are the one's I think could be good:

Nick Fury: from the Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. days, with DoD dream equipment, fighting the hordes of HYDRA...

Shang-Chi: Master of Martial Arts-great storyline...

The Avengers: much better to put Ant-Man, Giant Man, et al, in a group...

and some that they missed:

Ghost Rider: stuntrider turned into hellspawn riding a fiery chopper...

Silver Surfer: f/x could finally do this character justice...

the Black Falcon: teamed with Captain America to make a biracial crime-fighting superteam...

Howard the Duck: I'm suprised this hasn't been mentioned--a great comic, but the movie set the standard for comic movie flops;>

the biggest reason why Marvel kicked ass in the 70s was due to the storylines--full of humanity and topical action (racism, the war in Vietnam, government corruption, etc. (this is why Spiderman was so successful--the human element, not the f/x)

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[tholomyes]

The Avengers (original): Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, The Hulk, Ant-Man, if memory serves. So, with Ant-Man, 3 of the 5 already will have had their own movies, and Thor and Iron Man are pretty recognizable. (Of course, who knows what sort of weird line-up they will end up with? The Vision would be cool.)

Dr. Strange: A master of the mystic, showed up in the Avengers, Spider-Man, and any cosmic cross-over storylines, but his own comic was right good.

Power Pack: A group of kids who got some pretty cool superpowers, I read all of these when I was a kid. Could make a killer kids' movie.

Hawkeye: Kinda unfair to compare a guy who has "eye" in his name to a blind guy, isn't it? More like "The Green Arrow without charisma, but empowered with purple instead of green".

Of all of these, Nick Fury, Black Panther, and Shang-Chi (who?) make me the most skeptical. I would love to see a Dr. Strange movie though.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[tholomyes]

> "The Avengers: Captain America, Thor, The Hulk, The Sub-Mariner, Iron Man... And let's not forget Ant-Man, Hawkeye, and the entire Fantastic Four!"

Although never officially a member, Spidey had his share of cameos too.

What I'd really like to see is the alternate Fantastic Four: Spider-Man, Wolverine, The Hulk, and Ghost Rider. Ghost Rider is getting his own movie soon enough, anyway...

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Anonymous Coward]

I hope if they do make a film of it, it turns out to be more Harry Potter than SpyKids. Louise Simonson, June Brigman, and Jon Bogdanove created a wonderful world that sticks with me all these years later. I haven't thought of the Goo-Gams in ages.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[hesiod]

> did you actually just say that FF was a good movie?

Compared to the first FF attempt, yes, it was spectacular.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[hesiod]

> There was a very weird and out of place scene where an "angel/elf" flips out for two seconds and looks like she's going to eat Frodo, then the next moment she's back to normal. What was that all about?

It was to demonstrate the addictive (?) and corruptive power of The Ring.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[jayhawk88]

Marvel has what the call the Ultimate Universe, which is essentially relaunches of their flagship titles in a universe totally seperate from the traditional Marvel "616" universe that has been in existance for the past 30-odd years. The Ultimate Universe takes place as if these characters are being born/created/mutated in modern times, without the 30 years of backstory.

The stories are essentially the same, Spiderman still loses his Uncle Ben and learns the whole "Great Power/Responsibility" thing, the Fantastic Four still get their powers and battle Doom, the X-Men are still hated and feared by humankind and battle Magneto, but there are some differences. Nick Fury being black is one, and in fact is drawn to very much resemble Samuel Jackson; I think the character actually jokes about SJ playing him in a movie at one point in the book. Ultimate Nick also is a much younger man than 616 Nick, and I don't believe he has any WW2 exploits. He's still the head of SHIELD, but takes a much more active role, and seems to have a lot more cooler gadgets to play with.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[LinuxTard]

> Power Pack > Never heard of them. Think of a band of super-powered kids. If we're lucky it's not a "Adults are dumb because they don't listen movie." However, a full link for info is here http://www.marveldirectory.com/teams/powerpack.htm

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

Black Panther
Ah, a hero named after a hyper-racist group. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Are you posting this from the 1950's? Did someone invent timetravel:// and not tell me? Please, that argument isn't even worth responding to.

No, but there are still racists and similar idiots. in our society. Someone will complain about having a movie called Black Panther, the ACLU will get involved on who-knows-which side (the free-speechers or the minorities, flip a coin), the FCC will censor it, the White House will refuse to make a comment, the fundies will say something, the NAACP will be kinda embarrassed, David Duke will issue a statement, Howard Stern will announce Black Panther Day and get into trouble, and Osama will use the whole incident in his next propaganda tape.

It doesn't matter that the Black Panthers are gone. You just can't touch some things.

It's like the story of the university that had a problem with a "picnic" because some black guy heard an urban legend that the word comes from white plantation owners "pick"ing a "nig"ger to lynch for amusement, while they were eating. Even after proving the urban legend false, the university ran into trouble and renamed it an "outing." Whereupon the local gays took offense with that name (who knows if they did it honestly or as a joke) and the university had to leave the event unnamed.

Of course "picnic" has nothing to do with lynchings, and "outing" has nothing to do with the closet. But the general populace is statistically dumber than Slashdot (which is really scary when you think about it).

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[painlord2k]

Captain America is not an Original Avenger. original Avengers are: Thor, Ant-man, Wasp, Iron Man, Hulk. Cap was added around n 5 when they finded him frozen in the artci sea.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[mink]

Heros for Hire would be a good TV series if done right.

Re:Don't get me wrong, but what?

[mink]

"Black Falcon: teamed with Captain America to make a biracial crime-fighting superteam."

Heros for Hire also fit this bill.

very original, a move based on a comic book!

[Anonymous Coward]

looks like the movie industry has been tapped out
of ideas. there just is no more good writers or good movies. I hope and pray that there will be a movie revolution that will change the way movies are made and written. till then i'm stuck with bland crap. IMHO

Action heroes only

[MavEtJu]

Captain America, The Avengers, Nick Fury, Black Panther, Ant-Man, Cloak & Dagger, Dr. Strange, Hawkeye, Power Pack and Shang-Chi.

All actions heroes, no deep story. Boring.

Re:Action heroes only

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

What other kind of heroes were you expecting? This is Marvel, not some Indy publishing "Love and Rockets" or some other alternative book. I understand if you like that (I personally never enjoyed it) but Main Stream (aka Profitable) comics are pretty much all action heroes.

Re:Action heroes only

[DSLabuser]

well antman is wife beater but then you would have to introduce the wasp and I despise that character

Re:Action heroes only

[brouski]

Please, if you don't know anything about the characters, don't say anything at all.

Re:Action heroes only

[Flossymike]

I take it you didn't read Strange recently, very nice on how Dr Stephen Strange became Dr Strange:-

See http://www.marvel.com/catalog/showcomic.htm?id=834 &format=comic for details

You can't top the original Nick Fury

[6502_C64]

In my mind, Nick Fury will always be David Hasselhof

Re:You can't top the original Nick Fury

[einstienbc]

Jeez Somebody remembers!

Re:You can't top the original Nick Fury

[NeuroManson]

To me, it'll always be the animatronic David Hasselhoff, way better acting.

Maybe Marvel Should...

[MattW]

Focus more on making sure the stuff that comes out based on its IP doesn't suck, and spend less time filing frivolous lawsuits.

New compnay name

[Matt Perry]

The company's also changing its name from Marvel Enterprises to Marvel Entertainment.

Marvelous would have been a much cooler name.

Re:New compnay name

[ScrewMaster]

Huh. Looking at this next batch of superhero flicks I'd say that "Marveloss" would be a more apropos choice.

Dagger

[GuyWhoPosts]

If Dagger isn't some serious eye candy, I'm not watching!

Re:Dagger

[meta-monkey]

Two words: Jessica Simpson.

Two more words: self immolation

Re:Dagger

[Gringeaux]

%s/Simpson/Alba

Nick Fury??? Oh Noooooooooo!!!

[$RANDOMLUSER]

If you haven't seen David Hasselhoff as Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. you haven't lived. This turkey leaves "Plan 9 From Outer Space" in the dust as the "worst film ever made". Next time SciFi Channel runs it, make a point of it. You'll have more fun having a do-it-yourself MST3000 than words can describe.

Re:Nick Fury??? Oh Noooooooooo!!!

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

Yea I've managed to avoid that so far. My first hint that it was crap was having David Hasslehoff anywhere near the film.

Thankfully, Marvel is dealing with production personell who have actually made hit movies in the past now, rather than doing direct to DVD crap. Still, I can't figure out how they think Power Pack or Shang-Chi are going to be hits... Iron Fist maybe...

Re:Nick Fury??? Oh Noooooooooo!!!

[Kumkwat]

This turkey leaves "Plan 9 From Outer Space" in the dust as the "worst film ever made"

I think you mean "Manos : The hands of Fate", MYST3K version only if you actually do plan on getting it.

Re:Nick Fury??? Oh Noooooooooo!!!

[zaren]

Yea I've managed to avoid that so far. My first hint that it was crap was having David Hasslehoff anywhere near the film.

Maybe we were watching different shows, but I thought it was really faithful to the books (which I loved). It was campy, but that's how it needed to be handled. Hasselhoff managed to play ol' Nick really well, and all the elements that made S.H.I.E.L.D. great were there - the Helicarrier, the LMDs, Dum-Dum Duggan... good times.

Thankfully, Marvel is dealing with production personell who have actually made hit movies in the past now, rather than doing direct to DVD crap. Still, I can't figure out how they think Power Pack or Shang-Chi are going to be hits... Iron Fist maybe...

I can actually see Power Pack coming across as a decent kid's movie - maybe a la Toy Story and computer animated to accent the toy look / marketing appeal. I thought that series was always looked down on as just being a "kiddie" book, but there was some decent writing and character development in there.

Re:Nick Fury??? Oh Noooooooooo!!!

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

Well as I said, I never actually watched the Hasselhoff "Nick Fury" but I'll give it a shot if SciFi runs it again based on your explaination.

I have to see who plays Dum-Dum.

Re:Nick Fury??? Oh Noooooooooo!!!

[NBarnes]

I'd say that Pixar might actually make a really good Power Pack movie, but after The Incredibles, why would they need to? Not a lot left there for them.

Re:Nick Fury??? Oh Noooooooooo!!!

[graikor]

I have to agree with you - there were a lot of lame things about the Nick Fury, but I didn't absolutely hate it while watching it. Truly, it could have been a lot worse.

Case in point? Well, no list of the worst Marvel Comics-based movies is complete without the stinking pile of swamp muck that is "Man-Thing". Now that is a good contender for worst Marvel movie, and it's a pretty recent effort, too!

which sucks less?

[jspectre]

so i'm guessing out of 10 movies maybe 2 won't suck?

anyone care to guess which two?

Re:which sucks less?

[Rhinobird]

my guess would be Captain America and Dr. Strange.

A la X-men, they can get rid of the surper silly costumes, and then like batman keep the essense of the characters and these could be potentially good movies

Re:which sucks less?

[GeorgeMcBay]

so i'm guessing out of 10 movies maybe 2 won't suck

There you have it, folks... the most optimistic man in the world.

Re:which sucks less?

[vwjeff]

so i'm guessing out of 10 movies maybe 2 won't suck?

anyone care to guess which two?

Well let's see here:

1. The 40 Year Old Virgin (Something many of you fellow /.ers can relate to) jk

2. March of the Penguins (For those of us with girlfriends / significant others)

Oh, I had to choose from the 10 Marvell movies. Well, in that case I choose to remove my eyeballs and donate them for scientific use.

At least if I am ever forced to attemd one of these movies, I will not be able see it. Ok, on to the hearing aspect. Any suggestions?

Re:which sucks less?

[jspectre]

well.. they did have some semi-decent movies.. spider man 1 & 2.. x-men 1 & 2..

then again they had: the hulk, the punisher, elektra, daredevil, fantastic four (the unreleased and released movies), blade 1-9 (give 'em time, i'm sure snipes will do more), i'm sure there's more, thankfully my mind is blotting them out.

there was a dr. strange movie made for tv. ugh. let's pray a remake can't be worse than the original.

elektra was so awesome!

[toupsie]

God this can only one thing, great quality straight to DVD movies!

As a non-american...

[Frogbert]

I never really "got" Captain America, I mean I know people can be patriotic and all but a superhero like him seems so lame to me.

Its like a Politician draping themselves in their countries flag. I mean if someone did something like that in my country, and I'm sure a few have, most people would think they were a tool.

Really I'm not flaming I just want to know why he is so popular? Did parents find buying a comic for their kids a lot easier when they knew he was fighting for American ideals?

Re:As a non-american...

[$RANDOMLUSER]

Captain America only works in the context of World War II in Europe. His only "real" enemy was the Red Skull, who was Nazism personified. You have to think of "Cap" as a historical artifact.

Re:As a non-american...

[ShortSpecialBus]

You need to factor in "Rape Face" Captain America!!

Note: I didn't make the images (I'm not that talented)

Re:As a non-american...

[djpenguin808]

Captain America was created around 1940, and his first arch-nemesis was Agent Axis. In the context of a global struggle with two sides, and he on the losing/underdog side, he makes sense as a character (the Axis sure seemed destined to win in 1940). Without it, he looks kinda like any old doofus wrapped in a flag.

Which is probably the reason his popularity peaked at the end of WW2.

Re:As a non-american...

[unitron]

If the Red Skull was CA's arch-nemesis, who was Nick Fury and the Howling Commandos'?

(After 40 years some memories get mixed with others)

Re:As a non-american...

[CleverNickedName]

The crux of Capt. is that he is the American ideal. Born from WW2 propaganda and thoroughly believing that The U.S. is the greatest nation on earth. Frozen for decades and now reborn, his naive, innocent view of morality now stands in stark contrast to the current reality.
Even Bucky has his place. He shared all of Cap's ideals, but had the benefit (curse?) of growing up through the scandals.

I would love to have seen Kubric take on Captain America as a dissection of patriotism, propaganda and morality.
Unfortunately, I'm much more likely to see a Michael Bay effort with jiggy cameras and car chases.

Re:As a non-american...

[Anonymous Coward]

well you have to understand that Cap fought for the kind of American ideals that the rest of the world really used to admire. He was afterall a new deal democrat...

Re:As a non-american...

[Antique Geekmeister]

Not at all. Cap got amazingly good plotlines when his loyalty to the American ideal, and to real human people, was in direct conflict with his "Yes, sir!" attitude towards authority.

Like a really, really honest cop, digging his way out of the resulting mess led to some good stories. I like to think that Cap would vastly enjoy the freeware development world, where we argue like crazy but generally work peacefully as individuals towrds some pretty lofty goals.

Placement

[michaelmalak]

Yeah, but will I get to see product placements of unreleased Atari videogames?

Capital Man

[MyLongNickName]

There's No Need To Fear! CAPITAL LETTER Man is Here!

Captain America x2.

[Anonymous Coward]

They brought captain america twice already to the screen, same as Punisher.

Re:Captain America x2.

[techno-vampire]

They brought captain america twice already to the screen, same as Punisher.

Actually, three times. Don't forget the 1944 Republic serial Captain America.

Exploiting every last dollar from the content..

[Sv-Manowar]

Ok, so Marvel have secured a deal for these titles, but what happens when there are no more of their series left to take to the big screen? Is it then a case of moving the porfolio onto the next media format and repeating? Surely this money would be better spent on funding original and creative films that could bring something more exciting to our screens than a remake of a comic book story. I mean, its nice being able to see the comics on the big screen, but at the expense of original works?

Re:Exploiting every last dollar from the content..

[Knetzar]

Marvel wants to make these movies for two reasons.
#1) They want to profit from a movie based on their characters.
#2) They want people to see their characters and hopefully buy more comic books.

If you only look at #1, this might not be the best idea, but once #2 comes into play these movies also become advertising for their comic books.

Screw that

[DoctaWatson]

I want to see Spiderman 3: Enter the Stilt-Man!

Why jump the shark when you can step over it with hydraulic lifts?

Seriously

[Anonymous Coward]

You think the current fad of comic book movies is that long-lasting? It's going to be rejected and die sooner or later, how many more movies you think are left? This just feel too much like Lethal Weapon 5 or Die Hard 6 for me.

Marvel not so hip anymore?

[Neo-Rio-101]

So what's up with the US comic book industry? I don't read comics anymore, so maybe someone who does can tell me or something.

The article seemed to hint that Marvel is losing out in comic books these days. Is manga taking over? What gives?

Re:Marvel not so hip anymore?

[tduff]

No, it is just that Stan Lee started doing comics for DC.

Re:Marvel not so hip anymore?

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

Nah. Marvel and DC are back in a big way. THere's some signs that they're looking to repeat the big crash of the early 90's (seeing more and more alternate/incentive covers these days) but for the most part, it's much better and compelling than 10 years ago.

I just got back into buying/reading comics a couple years ago, things are pretty good right now, product wise. I just hope they don't contract retard-itis like around '93 again...

Re:Marvel not so hip anymore?

[Anonymous Coward]

What gives?

bad writing for one...

The Avengers

[SuperBanana]

The Avengers A facless hero clan. I can't even name a single hero in this group.

Uh, I take it we're not talking about John Steed and Emma Peel?

There were four good things about that movie. a)the line "How now, Brown Cow?" b)Emma in her catsuit c)her E-type Jaguar, and d)Emma in her catsuit.

Re:The Avengers

[Andy_R]

"Giant Hamster Balls!"

Not only a description of the best bit of The Avengers, but also a review of the rest of it.

Re:The Avengers

[CamelTrader]

you forgot e) Emma in her catsuit.

NOOOO!!

[DoctaWatson]

"Now, I wish someone would make a movie based on the Vertigo version of Lucifer..."

Last time Hollywood got their grubby little hands on a Vertigo franchise, we got Constantine.

Re:NOOOO!!

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

I belive that Constantine, like Hellboy, was a Dark Horse franchise.

As a side note, I haven't seen Constantine yet, I'll take your comment to indicate that it wasn't particularly good...

Re:NOOOO!!

[DoctaWatson]

Constantine is DC/Vertigo, a character created by Alan Moore et al for the Swamp Thing comic.

He was sarcastic, blonde, and british in the comic.

In the movie, he's Keanu Reeves.

Re:NOOOO!!

[qohen]

No, Constantine is most definitely from a DC/Vertigo title, Hellblazer (though he was invented by Alan Moore during his run on Swamp Thing).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Constantine

Re:NOOOO!!

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

That explains why I haven't seen it. I had read somewhere that he was another character involved witht the Hellboy/BPRD thing.

I've not been a huge Alan Moore fan for the most part, so I guess I missed that character (I certainly didn't read the Swamp Thing comic he did)

Sacreledge I know, but his stuff just never clicked for me.

Re:NOOOO!!

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

Yup, got that. Confused a couple of franchises that came to light while I was not reading comics. Although the name Hellblazer explains why my aging brain thought Hellboy...

Only Vertigo titles I read are "Y the Last Man" and "Fables"

Re:NOOOO!!

[AaronLawrence]

Yes, Constantine was quite enjoyable.

Of course, I didn't come in laden down with a million little details that I would scream about if they changed.

I didn't know anything about the comic, and I enjoyed the movie, and that's perfectly fine. Of course it would be nice if the original fans could be happy as well, but that isn't essential for movie success.

Re:NOOOO!!

[{8_8}]

I'm a fan of the comics, and I thought the movie was ok. They didn't make Constantine's character quite as close to the comics as I would have liked, but I didn't go in there expecting utter fidelity.

Re:NOOOO!!

[Pecisk]

Which actually wasn't failure totally at all, yeah, it was medicore, but somehow I like it. Its biggest flaw is sure that you can't understand not a hell what's happening on the screen, and only after three four views in your home screen you actually get it.

But there lays a problem - how to build and show a complex, difficult world, hero with dark past, and everything like that in the way that common watcher could understand?

Re:NOOOO!!

[IWantMoreSpamPlease]

I liked the film, for one main reason:

They managed to pull off a translation to big screen, a long running comic series that has almost no action in it, just lots of plot and intrigue.

Tricky to make into a 2 hour "big budget" flick.

Brilliant

[Hao Wu]

The company's also changing its name from Marvel Enterprises to Marvel Entertainment.

You know some executive worked really hard and got a bonus for that genius idea. "AT-A-BOY!"

Re:Brilliant

[njfuzzy]

I believe a coveted No Prize would be more traditional than an "At-a-boy".

Bad Films to be followed by Bankruptcy

[DumbSwede]

I see lots of film flops coming our way in the next seven years. These are not the A-list characters from Marvel's holdings -- the more interesting characters have been licensed by Hollywood already. I've noticed a huge void on TV however, there are no ongoing Super-Hero shows I'm aware of. Marvel should start small and syndicate two or three shows that feature lots of the B-list heroes. Then take the characters that capture public imagination to the big screen or give them their own ongoing show.

My prediction: Marvel to go back into bankruptcy ago soon when they find out how hard it really is to make a hit movie with any kind of consistency.

Re:Bad Films to be followed by Bankruptcy

[MavEtJu]

I see lots of film flops coming our way in the next seven years.

It's all caused by piracy! Piracy I tell you!

Re:Bad Films to be followed by Bankruptcy

[qohen]

I've noticed a huge void on TV however, there are no ongoing Super-Hero shows I'm aware of.

How about Smallville?

Re:Bad Films to be followed by Bankruptcy

[Trejkaz]

I've noticed a huge void on TV however, there are no ongoing Super-Hero shows I'm aware of.

Only if you discriminate against animated titles.

On lesser-known heroes

[Red Flayer]

Gotta love the B-list heroes -- it allows for more creative license in plot and character development. Marvel doesn't have as large of a fan base for these characters -- less people to get PO'd when they change the backstory.

That's the plus side -- maybe we'll get one or two excellent screenplays in there that will be produced and directed well.

OTOH, we've got an average budget of 52.5 million for each film. Assuming that a couple of these guys get the lion's share, that leaves us with...

B-movies!!! B-movies that don't have some silly giant snake in the jungle, or intelligent sharks (hopefully), that are marketed to your average (sub)urban potsmoker.

I, for one, welcome the return of our nerd-targeted B-Movie overlords... speaking of which, I have a plot to pitch to Marvel Entertainment...

On a more serious note, what most of the comics have in common is a clear dichotomy between right (the hero) and wrong (often protrayed as a group). Complex heroes? Unnecessary. Maybe Marvel wants to try to tap into today's youth, who are much more exposed to the boogeyman ideal of the bad guy. Or maybe I'm tired and need to go to bed, not sure.

Re:On lesser-known heroes

[Alphax.au]

maybe we'll get one or two excellent screenplays in there that will be produced and directed well

Why not turn them into Musicals?

Re:On lesser-known heroes

[$RANDOMLUSER]

> I, for one, welcome the return of our nerd-targeted B-Movie overlords...

Seriously, what ever happened to the Ed Wood/Roger Corman school of directing? The last really really great, lovingly trashy film I saw was Paul Verhoeven's "Starship Troopers", and that was far too long ago.

We want schlock!
We want schlock!
We want schlock!

Re:On lesser-known heroes

[ErikZ]

A Schlock Mercenary movie?

http://www.schlockmercenary.com/

Now that would be cool.

Re:On lesser-known heroes

[meta-monkey]

On a more serious note, what most of the comics have in common is a clear dichotomy between right (the hero) and wrong (often protrayed as a group). Complex heroes? Unnecessary. Maybe Marvel wants to try to tap into today's youth, who are much more exposed to the boogeyman ideal of the bad guy. Or maybe I'm tired and need to go to bed, not sure.

How complex can you get in an hour forty-five, and still leave time for the action scenes the mass market demands? No good attempt goes unpunished by the slashdot intelligencia anyway. Look at Constantine. Keanu Reeves aside (although I thought he did a decent job), here you've got a comic book hero with a very interesting problem. He's doomed to go to hell for his own suicide, but he's been battling demons on earth, fighting for heaven in the spiritual cold war. No matter, though, because what has he done truly for others in the name of good, and what for himself, trying to "buy" his way into heaven? That's a complex issue. What that we do that is "good" is really selfless, and what are we doing for the rewards that come with goodness? Good plot, interesting characters (Gabriel too), good special effects, decent acting even from Keanu, and the nerds still bash it. Can't win...everybody's gotta be too cool for school.

Re:On lesser-known heroes

[{8_8}]

I liked the Hellblazer series from Vertigo, so of course I wanted to watch the movie. I went into it expecting utter crap, and came out thinking it wasn't too bad. Not the best movie in the world, but it wasn't "Nick Fury" with David Hasslehoff.

Maybe I'm from the wrong continent

[JanneM]

It could be I'm from a different continent or something, but I haven't heard of a single one of those characters.

It lately feels like the movie industry has collectively jumped the shark. I used to go to the movies five or six times in a normal year, and I must have seen twenty b-movies or more every year on video with friends. But the past few years there's been nothing. When the only movie I've looked forward to in the past three years is the next Harry Potter, things are not looking good.

Re:Maybe I'm from the wrong continent

[Anonymous Coward]

: When the only movie I've looked forward to in
: the past three years is the next Harry Potter,
: things are not looking good.

Well, you know... if you look forward to a piece of shit like Harry Potter, don't blame Hollywood - blame your own bad taste!

Old Marvel Heros

[Yehooti]

They're ignoring the geriatric crowd of moviegoers. SHAZAM! Billy Batson to Capt. Marvel--a real old Marvel hero.

Re:Old Marvel Heros

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

/pedantic comic geek mode on

The "Shazam!" Captain Marvel was a Fawcett Comics character that was later bought by DC Comics. it is currently owned and published in comics that DC issues now. There was a lawsuit from Marvel at one point, and while the character can retain that name, when he has a comic of his own, the name can not be used, thus the use of "Shazam!" in the comic title in recent versions of the character.

There is a Captain Marvel in the Marvel Universe, but he is the son of the original, and an alien who (sometimes) exchanges places with his human counterpart with the use of his cosmic bands. The current version is Genis Vell, son of Mar Vell. He's kind of an amnesiac at the moment and calls himself "Photon" I belive.

Re:Old Marvel Heros

[mink]

Don't forget, he was doing the whole dual living thing with good ol' Rick Jones. Sidekick to (and responsible for the creation of) The Hulk, was the original Bucky.
After Marvel dies from cancer (or whatever the aliens called it), we got the Female Lady of Light Marvel.

My comic book heroes..

[Resident Netizen]

...are Reid Flemming and Milk and Cheese.

So I could really give a rat's @zz 'bout Captain 'Merka and his superfriends.

Re:My comic book heroes..

[mr.mighty]

I would pay $100 for a ticket to a Reid Flemming movie, and I would see it over and over again. Except they'd screw it up.

I was hoping for Deathlok the Demolisher

[Rob Carr]

No, not the Robocop wannabe. I'm talking a reanimated computerized corpse with super-strenght and a human brain that takes over and constantly argues with the computer.

I do!!!

[antdude]

Just kidding. Yeah, looking at its comic briefly online looks umm dumb! Ugh! Oh well, I guess I will get to see the cool ants. ;)

Okay, the rundown.

[Anonymous Coward]

Captain America,

Another one? Do they plan on making it good this time? As long as they don't use the wimpy looking actor from the credit card commercial (what was he doing, cleaning his teeth?), maybe.

The Avengers,

Which team? Oh, who cares, all of them are extremely hokey (hokier than the X-Men).

Nick Fury,

Jeez guys, you made a half-okay Punisher film, now you're going back to the prototype? You could do the tough gunman thing, but the secret agent thing? Very hard to do well.

Black Panther,

I was never a fan, but if they can avoid the temptation of blaxploitation, this might be interesting.

Ant-Man,

To quote Sonic the Hedgehog, "That's NO good."

Do a Micronauts film instead!

Cloak & Dagger,

YES! But nothing will ever beat the Dabney Coleman Atari-fest of the old, unrelated Cloak & Dagger.

Dr. Strange,

Yay. Magician. Unless they go the Dr. Orpheus (from Venture Bros.) comedy route, I'll probably be sleeping through this one.

Hawkeye,

I can't get excited about an archery movie. Can you? But if it introduces the Black Widow to the film universe, more power to them.

Power Pack

Excalibur, Alpha Flight, New Mutants (NOT X-Force), or a Morlock movie would have been a better mutie movie choice IMHO, but Power Pack could turn out _great_. Power Pack was a great book, but the family thing's been done now with Fantastic Four. As the only listed film with kids as main characters, Marvel has the chance to do a few things differently.

and Shang-Chi.

How the hell does Marvel expect to diffferentite this movie from every other movie in the martial arts arena? This has the potential for disaster, but at least there's a 50% chance it could turn out okay.

Re:Okay, the rundown.

[mink]

"Do a Micronauts film instead!"

You think they will leave in the (IMO rather graphic) loss of a hand and almost bleading to death inside a space suit (among many other things)?

Hey, what happened to...

[shmlco]

Iron Man.

And why not the Silver Surfer?

Re:Hey, what happened to...

[AndrewStephens]

And why not the Silver Surfer?

I am not sure the movie-going public is ready for 2 hours of a silver man nude.

Re:Hey, what happened to...

[shmlco]

Make him a girl.

And to answer my own question, it seems like an Iron Man is already being forged. Look for a possible 2006-2007 release.

Re:Hey, what happened to...

[ton2fig]

Unless it's the story of how he leads Galactus to Earth.

How's that for the next Fantastic Four movie?

Re:Hey, what happened to...

[danheretic]

Iron Man.

And why not the Silver Surfer?

The subject material is way too heavy.

Re:Hey, what happened to...

[Rakarra]

And why not the Silver Surfer?

The most obvious answer to those who haven't read comic books is the one that hasn't been mentioned here yet. Something that rarely occurs to us because we so like the character and plot that we've overlooked what's been staring us in the face:

The Silver SURFER? A guy who flies around on his intergalactic surfboard? How amazingly lame is that? Forget Galactus, the Fantastic Four, any other cool things that were involved. We're talking about a pacifist surfer dude here. What works in comic form often looks silly on the big screen. Hugh Jackman in a yellow and blue spandex Wolverine outfit? It's a good thing they went with black leather instead.

Not to mention that the look of the character would need an overhaul. It would have to be done with some sort of body paint. A full-body suit or CG would look too unconvincing, and you need to see his eyes..

What the hell is an ant-man? I only see antman II

[zakezuke]

http://www.marveldirectory.com/individuals/a/antma nii.htm

Let me paraphrase the marvel directory.

Scott Lang was an expert in electronics but for some reason couldn't make a buck. So he became a burglar but wasn't very good at it... he got caught and put in jail and got a job with some Marvel invented company that one would know if one ever bothered to read comic books. But he daughter was diagnosed with a terminal illness, probally something to do with all those green screen terminals Scott Lang was forced to used as he coudln't afford a real computer. The only doctor who can help was being helded by some other big evil company the name likely known by anyone who has bothered to read any marvel comics. So he decided to steal AntMan's outfit and magic shrinking gas. Fortunatly the real AntMan had a spair YellowJacket outfit and follows AntMan II and watches him confront the arch villin who's in the business of kidnaping doctors needed by wackos who like to dress up in costume, a common theme in the Marvel world. AntMan II rescues the good doctor who cures his daughter and just when he's about to step up and return the stupid AntMan outfit to AntMan... AntMan says he can keep it so long as he's a good boy.

Sells electronics by day, dresses up as an Ant by night... it's AntMan II!

So, from this I can establish the first AntMan was some guy with magic shrinking gas who liked to put on an ant costume get small and fight crime. And I wondered why I never really bought comic books.

Captain France?

[toupsie]

I never really "got" Captain America, I mean I know people can be patriotic and all but a superhero like him seems so lame to me.

Well, I can completely understand from your perspective. Who would really be interested in Captain France? A guy that dresses up like a croissant, runs away from German bad guys and blames all his problems on Captain America. Would make for a short, annoying movie...

Re:Captain France?

[Frogbert]

Well I'm not French. But I'm sure if a hero like that existed his catch phrase would be:
"But I'm le tired"

Re:Captain France?

[toupsie]

Oh, ok. Your nick is "Frogbert" so I got the feeling you might be. We typically refer to the French as "Frogs".

Re:Captain France?

[kk49]

Speaking of France, has anybody been to subway recently.

http://www.miquelon.org/

Re:Captain France?

[el-spectre]

Bullshit, I'd stand in line for that film :)

Re:Captain France?

[harlows_monkeys]

Who would really be interested in Captain France? A guy that dresses up like a croissant, runs away from German bad guys and blames all his problems on Captain America

Hey, if it weren't for the French, we'd all be living under German rule now. The French serve as bait, luring the Germans into attacking early, before they are really ready, and so the Germans lose in the end.

Because of the French, the Germans are the Kzin of Europe, and the world is safe.

Re:Captain France?

[zippthorne]

I would totally watch that film. But then, I thought "The Specials" was funny too, so YMMV.

Re:Captain France?

[arron_nz]

Yeah well where's Captain Planet god damnit! He will unite them all!

Earth! Fire! Wind! Water! Heart!

Re:Captain France?

[unitron]

"Hey, if it weren't for the French, we'd all be living under German rule now."

If it weren't for the French we'd be known as South Canada and if there were a statue in New York harbor it would be of Queen Victoria.

Re:Captain France?

[Anonymous Coward]

You Sir, are a racist bastard. No one has bashed USA here and certainly not any French people so why bash on them? What's next? Its okay to bash Jews for just being Jews? Why not take some time and read your history. USA would not have been USA without support from France. You would have you afternoon tea and crumpets instead now. Most importantly, you wouldnt have been fat bastards.
And the subject here is superheroes so frankly I think that the interest in superheroes, especially from people who most likely look like the comic book guy (like yourself, Sir), is because your own life is so pathetic.

Re:Captain France?

[skingers6894]

"Who would really be interested in Captain France? A guy that dresses up like a croissant, runs away from German bad guys and blames all his problems on Captain America. Would make for a short, annoying movie..."

I guess that makes Captain America the guy who uses his powers of obesity and mastery of the cable television remote control to smite the evil copyright infringers by securing enough oil for his superpowers through offering democracy or a hell of a good spanking with his oversize bible. Would make for years and years of content on CNN.

Re:Captain France?

[dkf]

if there were a statue in New York harbor it would be of Queen Victoria

Speaking as an Englishman living in a country where there are lots of statues of QV (all of which make her look short, dumpy and thoroughly Not Amused) I have to admit that an alternate history with that substitution would be particularly bizarre.

Re:Captain France?

[unitron]

Imagine "Planet of the Apes" ending with Charlton Heston saying "Well at least they made a good start on burying that ugly thing".

Re:Captain France?

[Anonymous Coward]

No one has bashed USA here and certainly not any French people so why bash on them? Its okay to bash Jews for just being Jews?

It's ok to bash the French because they are French... They are not a race but they are a nationality. Anyone who lives in France can always move to Belgium... I heard they have a tasty super hero called Éclair with her sidekick Blitzen. Being Jewish is more of an ethnic group and it would be wrong to bash them because they can't stop being Jewish. But the French... what can you say. Peppe Le Pew!

USA would not have been USA without support from France

Thanks France... in exchange for your assistance against General Charles Cornwallis we will allow you to thumb your noises at us and be your scapegoats.

Re:Captain France?

[Hydrogenoid]

We do have some thing like that, actually... ;)
http://www.internationalhero.co.uk/s/supdupont.htm
But well... It is more about parody than anything else.

Wonder Twin Movie won't happen

[infonography]

Looks like that one won't be happening. Seems Zan (the boy) died when Wonder Woman emptied her bath water. I will leave that as a Cartoon Network in-joke.

(A note to mods, I quit mod/metamod, so I could care less how you mod me. Now I feel free like not wearing pants..... )

and while we're at it

Brainaic: for the love of god. Please all I want is a decent pair of pants

Solomon grundy: Solomon Grundy wants pants too

Lex: we have been over this. No pants for you

Brainiac and Solomon grundy: aww

Re:Wonder Twin Movie won't happen

[Anonymous Coward]

It always amuses me when a person cares enough about something to make it a point to let others know that they don't care about it.

Re:Old DC Hero

[Anonymous Coward]

oddly enough captain marvel is a really old dc hero

New Universe Films

[TiggertheMad]

...I didn't see any mention of making a 'Star Brand' movie...What about 'Psi-force'? Or, my personal favorite, 'Kickers, Inc.'?

We new univers fans DEMAND equal representation in this new film deal!

Re:New Universe Films

[Doktor Memory]

We new univers fans DEMAND equal representation in this new film deal! ...both of you?

Re:New Universe Films

[zaren]

A movie of The Pitt could be interesting, but probably not in the current "don't nuke major cities" mood of the world...

Cloak & Dagger

[wlovins]

I don't see the need to remake Cloak & Dagger. It is one of Dabney Coleman's greatest roles aside from Hot To Trot. Ok. Bad Joke, but I'm not apologizing, and yes, I do know the comic book http://www.toonopedia.com/cloakdag.htm.

The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[crazyphilman]

Ever since McCarthyism, they've been focused on ridiculous Superhero/Men In Tights nonsense while the rest of the world has moved on to much more interesting subject matter.

On top of that, while Japanese Manga have been giving people 150 - 200 pages of black and white comics on cheap paper for ten bucks, DC and Marvel think they can make their comics into "collectibles" and sell 15 readable pages (if you take out the ads) for over four bucks.

Hmm... Let me see... Top-notch science fiction, 200 pages for ten bucks, with NO ADS, or crappy kiddie "superman" stories at fifteen pages for four bucks... Let me think...

DC and Marvel just don't get it. They think they're competing with each other, but REALLY, they're competing with Japanese and European companies. And somebody's gonna eat their lunch. Like Masamune Shirow, Mamaru Ooshi, Enki Bilal, Giraud, or Frezzato. People who write INTERESTING, ADULT-LEVEL STORIES that don't involve thinly-disguised magical thinking and wish-fulfillment.

The American comics industry currently appeals only to little kids and adults who obsess over the current value of (I don't know) Batman #6. The collectibles market is SMALL. The entertainment market, on the other hand, is HUGE.

Just look at how much bigger Border's manga section is than their superhero section. That'll open your eyes...

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Hobbitgh0d42]

Their(and Barnes and Noble's) manga section is larger because instead of getting in 1 copy of a trade they get in 3-6 copies of any given manga.

If you were to take all the regular comic trades we have(I work at a B&N) and multiple it by 2-3 it would easily equal or surpass the ammount of manga we have.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

Amazing Spider-Man: 32 pages $2.50
Detective Comics: 32 pages $2.50
Action Comics: 32 pages $2.50
Uncanny X-Men: 32 pages $2.50

That does not include the ads.

Marvel also puts out Essential TPB series. Which usually contains 25 issues, 500+ pages for $16.99.

I worked in a comic shop for a while. Most of the people that praised Manga and trashed super hero comics were between the ages of 13-18. They usually bought the juvenile sex fantasy and super tough guy (but he is not a super hero because he has a sword and looks like a woman, that makes it okay) types of Manga.

Most of the super hero books sold to the older folks. They aren't really kids books though. The stories you read in mainstream comics are just like a movie or television show. You get a hole lot of crap, but every once in a while you find something great.

The comic companys target audience is actually around the 20+ area. Kids buy comics, the comics are usually appropriate for kids. However, the people buying most of the comics are adults.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[TomHandy]

You do realize that the American comic industry is larger than just Marvel and DC, right? Certainly they are the lion's share, but there are a ton of independents doing all sorts of interesting things. And frankly, you can find some pretty interesting and different things even from DC and Marvel, or imprints like Vertigo and Wildstorm.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

A lot of these Japanese comics were translated into Chinese. When I was a kid in Taiwan almost 2 decades ago, my dad and I used to spent weekends reading comics rented from manga-rental stores... sort of like a video rental store, except you get series of these 150-200 pg comic books. And it's very inexpensive. The stories were intriguing and interesting and it was very difficult to put them books down.

When I first saw the pathetic state of the comic industry here in the US, I was like.. WTF, who would paid that much money for 15 pages... and horrible stories... and most are based on a concept of a super hero(es), which is interesting at first (superman, batman, spiderman, x-men), but the others are just very uncreative, unoriginal, and have horrible shallow stories. Comic fans in the US seems to me to be mostly focused on the artwork and little other substance. I have nothing against good art, but after drawing Spawn in 500 different angles or poses, it's just not interesting anymore. I must do give credit - there are a lot of great original ideas, but very little development after the great initial ideas... and having just a budget of 15 pages each issue is the main cause.

Unfortunately, most Americans do not know of the existence of Japanese manga... I wonder why the Japanese have not bothered to market it here and sell more English translations. It's actually a great way for kids to learn their languages. I have kept my fluency and literacy in Chinese because of Chinese translations of Doraemon...

In the end, it's probably just a difference in culture and values. Kids here prefer flashy, colorful pages... instant gratification over an investment in reading several hundred pages for a great story... there's probably only a very tiny market for 150-200 page comics here in the US.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

15 readable pages

22 pages last time I counted. But you do have a point here. More would be nice and price is a big factor.

Top-notch science fiction, ... or crappy kiddie "superman" stories...

The superhero genre is what makes comics special. If one wanted to read sci-fi, why not get an actual book? Not that non-superhero comics don't have their place but I like the superhero genre and I think comics and cartoons are good media for it.

ADULT-LEVEL STORIES

Try reading a few sometime. But don't just grab some randomly. Look up who the good authors are. Personally, I like Peter David and Alan Moore. Anyway, the point I'm trying to get across is: a comic is only as good as it's writer and its silly for you to assume there are no good writers in the superhero genre.

the hulk aids issue by peter david

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate to break it to you, but NOBODY is buying the Japanese crap. Go into any comic store. Japanese comics? None. Maybe a handful, if someone like you is working there, and even then they've probably been on the same shelf for months, collecting dust..

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[crazyphilman]

EXCEPT, the reason you have several copies is that they SELL. And the more popular ones regularly sell out.

Look, I'm not trying to attack you or anything. I'm just pointing out that Marvel and D.C. are aiming themselves in the wrong direction (and have been doing so for some time).

They'll either figure it out, or they'll be doomed.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[crazyphilman]

Well, I really like the independents. I think their work is just as interesting as anything coming in from the rest of the world. I was just complaining about the big corporate entities, which I think have totally missed the boat.

Take online manga and graphic novels for instance. There are tons of really interesting, cool ones out there. I discover new ones all the time and stash the link in my bookmarks. Some of them are really amazing. And they self-publish every time they make it to a N*100th strip or so. Look at Megatokyo; they're up to volume 3 already. I got all three books for thirty bucks, which together were something like three years worth of material.

I love the independents, so don't get the wrong idea. I was talking about the American comics *industry*, as in big, corporate concerns, which I think are dead meat. I just don't think they can compete on value or story anymore. Even if it weren't for Japan and Europe, our own independents would wipe them out in a few years.

It's not unlike small independent labels kicking the RIAA in the balls (that's coming too). Decentralization always wins. Guerillas always have the advantage over a large, unwieldy army.

By the way... I'm one of those "independents". I'm going live in a month or two. :)

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

I know what you mean. Most of the U.S. is totally oblivious to Manga and anime. I'm lucky, I live in New York and all our bookstores have big, nice manga displays and anime series for sale. The Borders in my town has two seven foot high by four foot wide shelves and two five foot high by four foot wide shelves crammed with manga on display. They also have some displays scattered around. It's a big deal here (maybe because this is a college town). Where my parents live, in Rockland, an entire japanese bookstore has appeared with a mammoth collection of manga. Much of it isn't even translated; Japanese people come all the way up from NYC to check the place out. Kinda cool.

I love the value manga provides. My current favorite is the two-volume set "Ghost in the Shell" and "Ghost in the Shell: Man-Machine Interface" by Masamune Shirow. Fantastic stuff. It's a little more expensive than most manga, 24 dollars for 310 pages, but it was worth it. Top notch story and artwork...

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

32 pages @ 2.50 => 8c/page

For 10.00 you get 128 pages, BUT you have to wait four months to get those four episodes.

200 pages @ 10.00 => 5c/page

For 10.00 you get 200 pages, all at once. A better value, methinks. DEFINITELY much more convenient.

By the way, kids buy children's manga and adults buy adult manga. For every story about swordplay, there's another about computer hacking, yet another about contemporary life, etc. There's a lot more variety available. Something for everyone, you might say.

Now I'll admit that there are some interesting American comics getting produced here and there. A couple of Matrix comics came out recently. Nice. Nary a leotard or cape to be seen.

But on the whole? Vast fields of suckage. So what if old people are buying up weird superhero stuff? They're probably trying to recapture their childhood or something. More power to them. But they ARE reading kids' books.

"When I was a child, I spake as a child,
thought as a child, understood as a child.
But when I became a man I put away childish things."

Too bad Marvel and DC didn't.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Quadfreak0]

You have to look for the good comics, I know they sell tons of crappy manga, just as much as crappy writers publish crappy books. http://www.dccomics.com/vertigo/ Go read "Y the Last Man" Go read "100 Bullets" Go read "TRANSMETROPOLITAN" And if you like your manga styled thick book with a solid binding buy the graphic novels. And if you feel like American Comics are just for kids, then you havent read any other these. And if you dont understand any of these, then maybe you should go back to the Kids books.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[CAIMLAS]

Slight problem there, bucko. Marvel has owned DC since they made a crossover universe back in oh 1998.

They also own Dark Horse, I believe.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Troy Baer]

You must go to radically different comic shops than I do; the main one I frequent is ~20% manga, I would guess. I've also noticed or so that most mainstream book stores (like Borders or Barnes and Noble) have more shelf space allocated for manga than they do for American comics and graphic novels.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[CFTM]

I would argue that the American Comic industry is doing something fundamentally different than the Japanese and European comic book companies. Let me first say that my exposure to manga and such is very limited and is stuff like "Ghost in the Shell", so I'm going to extrapolate from that; please tell me if I'm painting with too broad a brush. "Ghost in the Shell" is an adult-level story with complex themes but there is nothing mythic about it. There are no porportions of godliness [don't confuse philosophical with mythic, two very different concepts; GitS deals with heavy philosophical concepts regarding existence but I saw nothing mythic occuring]. Marvel & DC are dealing more with mythology. Mythology has ALWAYS been heavily image laden; look at the greek/roman myths. Moreover the process is completely different; mythic creation tap in to a general meme that seems to run through human society.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

Absolutly ... Top Cow is probably the best company in my opinion... Seriously how many people here would not love to see Rising Stars adapted to the big screen (for those who dont know, it was written by J. Michael Straczynski ... think Babylon 5 guy). Probaly the best written superhero story in my opinion.

my 0.02...

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

And the majority of Manga is angsty hero a versus insurmountable odd b, or perhaps the lonely otaku who gets the hot girl who he can't actually get with, or tentacle porn or magical girls/boys... etc etc... Manga is just as vapid and pointless as any American comic. Let's not create illusions for ourselves.

A geeky medium is a geeky medium the world over

That being said, if they made a couple of these [Marvel Films] as animated features, that would be sweet.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

whatever! there are 22 readable pages in today's comics

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[jafac]

Both the Anime, and American comics world are innundated with crap.

The difference with Manga/Anime is, the quality of the art is typically far better - but unfortunately, still VERY rigidly standardized on the Manga style, which was cool back in 1982, but now just makes me nauseous. Even worse; the Manga Style has infected a lot of American comics as well.

What I see on the American comics side, is a whole lot of crap. Art drawn by people who should have their hands cut off. Especially buttloads of Frank Miller imitators, who think that the essence of good comic drawing is to be mindlessly messy and gritty.

I think that American comics were, in the 1980's fairly interesting, they had a vibrant independent scene. But that seemed to kind of fade away towards the end of the decade, when DC and Marvel caught on, and decided they needed to cash in on the trend, and flooded the market with their own faux-independent crap.

European comics, particularly French, have always intrigued me, having really cut my comics teeth on Heavy Metal magazine in the 1970's and 1980's. Cheval Noir was a breath of fresh air - but very costly to buy every issue, as a college student.

I don't think that the appeal of these movies has anything to do with this, of course. It's just more Hollywood trying to cash-in on retro nostalgia culture. Nothing more. When they're making movies of comics like Ant-man, how (culturally) irrelevant do you think things can get?

Honestly, I think that the field in America is just plain dominated by "the majors" - and they DO make some excellent stuff, because they attract very good talent. (ie. Sandman). But it's been years since I've seen anything that would compell me to buy one issue, let alone follow a series. They're content to flood the market with crap, flinging their feces against a wall, hoping some will stick. Same with the movie industry, and it's media connection with the book publishing industry. Seems to me that it's driven by high-risk investment strategies, and that's a good thing, because a lot of people are employed producing the crap, which creates a larger pool of skilled people which can cultivate better talent, over time. But it seems that even crap can succeed - there's no accounting for taste anymore.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, dude! Computer hacking! That's way better than Spider-Man! I'd rather read Sand Man than Ghost in the Machine, thanks. Maybe you never studied philosophy in college so manga has something to offer you.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure I studied philosophy. I didn't see any in your silly men-in-tights spider-bullshit, though. Hey, here's a question: if spiderman is really a spider, how come his webs don't shoot out of his ass?

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[zakezuke]

You do realize that the American comic industry is larger than just Marvel and DC, right?

I never realized that. That's not entirely true... I just never gave it much thought.

There was a time when comics where impulse buy items at your local mini-mart... perhaps something you could also find on a magazine rack. They were an item that you could buy as a kid with pocket change along with your favorite candy and sugar carbonated drink. And even when these were impulse buy items... unless you went out of your way to hit a specality shop chances are the only options would be Marvel or DC for the most part. While I had heard of the statement superhero x would never meet superhero y because one is marvel and the other is DC, keep in mind that the read would actually have to pay attention to the logo on the front... which you might not notice as retail comics had barcodes in the place where a stand alone logo would be.

These days... the whole comic book scene seems pretty exclusive to specality shops. I don't know of a kid who has ever taken the time to buy a comic book. For example, I know of kids who watch Static Shock. I'm told it was a comic book that was produced by some adult independant comic publisher before being bought by DC.

My point is... if someone knows of DC and marvel i'm somewhat impressed. If they know X hero comes from marvel and y from dc, i'm very impressed. But if someone speaks of Vertigo or Wildstorm... I'd have no idea where one would even buy them.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[crazyphilman]

Ok; I'll grant you Vertigo looks interesting. Perhaps one day the big American companies will gradually shift their mix to favor more interesting subject matter. But the movies they're choosing to make lead me to believe they aren't ready to do that just yet.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[crazyphilman]

Well, BUCKO, that makes them look even WORSE. It means they're sticking with the "men in tights" thing because they can't see past the end of their own noses.

At least I gave them credit for fighting over a specific market. Looks like they're not even fighting; they're just being lazy.

Dark Horse isn't that bad.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[crazyphilman]

The ancient Greek gods dressed in the standard clothing of their time (e.g. togas and tunics, etc).

The Roman gods dressed like Roman citizens.

The Norse gods dressed like Norse warriors.

All of this was dignified and majestic.

So, why do American comic artists paint their "gods" in leotards? With funny little boots and capes? It's like a gay musical number for cryin' out loud.

Not dignified.

Not majestic.

Why? If it's about "mythic creation" that is...

And, why isn't a cybernetically enhanced special forces chick with mad hacking skills mythic? Because it's realistic? The ancient greeks and romans felt their gods were perfectly realistic.

I sense a hole in your argument...

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[crazyphilman]

Well, there are different types of manga with different styles and different traditions. In fact, they're laid out fairly specifically. There's Shonen, Yaoi (don't get me started on THAT weirdness, or why girls seem to be stuck on it), bishonen, etc. You generally pick one or two genres you're interested in and concentrate on what you like.

Me, I get more into the adult sci-fi stuff, the more serious-minded the better. Blame, Ghost in the Shell, Planetes, stuff like that. I also like Genshiken and Comic Party when I'm in the mood for something funny and light.

European graphic novels are pretty good too.

And I'm sure there are SOME American graphic novels that aren't bad, but it's hard to find them if you aren't into haunting a comic shop.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[TomHandy]

Vertigo at least has had a tremendous amount of success in the mainstream book market (led by the Sandman trade paperbacks).

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[jafac]

I'm aware that there are some really great Manga titles (and that there are some distinct subgenres).

I'm just saying that the typical person going into a typical comic store or bookstore is unlikely to find the good stuff buried in with all the crap. That goes for American too.

I've seen some really great European stuff, what the European (French) scene does not seem to have the same problem (incredible diversity of crap).

This is more of a problem for the typical american potential comic consumer, than, I suppose for the fanboi type, who knows how to dig for what he or she likes.

Re:The PROBLEM with American comics is...

[crazyphilman]

I agree with your post. Even among manga, the stuff I like is maybe 10% of what's out there, and some of the other stuff is way out of my area of interest. I saw something really strange today: a police story involving people who were half cat and half human, with cat ears and tails and so on. This caused me to have a flashback to the whole "cracky-chan" thing, which reminded me of "furries" and I almost whoofed my cookies right there in the bookstore. Ugh.

I self-medicated with a browse through a Masamune Shirow art book. Boy, he sure likes pinup girls. And motorcycles. And guns.

Some combination!

Ten better films

[PMuse]

Captain America (but should it be pro or anti)
Bullseye (Colin Farrel can do it)
Spiderman (Venom or Kraven)
Wolverine (Hugh Jackman, baby!)
Thor ...
(actually, Marvel may be out of A-list and B-list properties to develop)

yes, my words were a thinly veiled slap

[circletimessquare]

monotheism is monoculture

it's enemy is individualization

and just as you allude to, individualization, individualism and the diversity of ideas that comes with that also comes with a wide range of bad ideas as well, just as you allude to: things like selfishness, arrogance, shallowness, lack of responsibility, etc.

so which is worse for society?

the monoculture and stagnation that monotheism promotes

or individualism with it's range of good ideas... and accompanying ankle weight of bad ideas

Re:yes, my words were a thinly veiled slap

[Anonymous Coward]

You sir, need sleep.

Re:yes, my words were a thinly veiled slap

[GreyWolf3000]

You've been totally outposted.

Besides, watch any of these super hero movies for the emotional parts. It's all about generosity, courage, good versus evil, and, most importantly, self sacrifice.

Gee, could that have come from the Judeo-Christian roots of our society?

Well, it's almost approaching Odin's Day. I must be getting to bed...

Re:yes, my words were a thinly veiled slap

[king-manic]

monotheism is monoculture

it's enemy is individualization

and just as you allude to, individualization, individualism and the diversity of ideas that comes with that also comes with a wide range of bad ideas as well, just as you allude to: things like selfishness, arrogance, shallowness, lack of responsibility, etc.

so which is worse for society?

the monoculture and stagnation that monotheism promotes

or individualism with it's range of good ideas... and accompanying ankle weight of bad ideas

Hilarious false dichotomy. I sure hope that was all sarcastic.

Re:yes, my words were a thinly veiled slap

[mskfisher]

For a more thorough understanding of the parent poster, I refer you to THE TIME CUBE.

Well, maybe not him exactly, but an allophone...

Re:yes, my words were a thinly veiled slap

[scowling]

Gee, could that have come from the Judeo-Christian roots of our society?

The ideal of self-sacrifice for a worthy cause predates the Judeo-Christian tradition. So: no.

Re:yes, my words were a thinly veiled slap

[GreyWolf3000]

I don't think this is a matter of "which came first," because the real question is "why do we like these superhero movies?" I'd say these superhero movies are well received by western audiences because they play on the western traditional values.

I never suggested that some sense of self-sacrifice was embedded in mankind (indeed, I'm not trying to defend the Judeo-Christian faiths), but, rather, the fact that we like these movies because they adhere to our value systems.

I would think that pagan cultures which value self sacrifice above all else would equally enjoy such movies, but cultures which do not value it would have the opposite response.

I wish DC get money and have more control

[nounderscores]

Because unlike marvel, DC has one property that will make an awesome movie: Uncle Sam.

There's no way to do that without doing it with idealism and integrity, and it would be a hell of a lot less annoying than mike moore.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[meta-monkey]

Tripe. The whole "America is bad, Republicans are evil liars and thieves" thing is so overdone, it reminds of me of art school photography courses, where every kid thought he was so "daring" and "on edge" by taking photos of his penis for a project. I'm not talking about truth or falsehood, artistic content or not here...it just isn't creative or original. Just for novelty's sake I'd love to see a movie or a comic about the triumph of free-market capitalism and individual liberty over group identity and power-hungry socialists. Again, I'm not talking truth or falsehood...just a refreshing change of pace.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[techno-vampire]

Just for novelty's sake I'd love to see a movie or a comic about the triumph of free-market capitalism and individual liberty over group identity and power-hungry socialists.

So would I, but as long as Hollywood is controlled by liberals it's not going to happen.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[meta-monkey]

Wow, what an abuse of mod points. A Troll mod for pointing out that the "america is bad" angle is overplayed in modern media. Mod me down all you want, but I speak truth...it just isn't shocking anymore.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[meta-monkey]

Others would argue:
Capitalism = Individuals acting in their own self-interest serve the needs of the community at large in the most effecient manner, and the greatest contributors to society reap the greatest rewards.
Socialism = Corrupt individuals use the police power of the state to take goods from the hard-working to bribe those who keep them in power

You're not wrong...the truth lies in-between the extremes you and I have each presented. However, my point was that movies condemning capitalism and far out-number those extolling it.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[nounderscores]

It's true. I did enjoy Barbarians at the Gate a film that begins "Billions and Billions of dollars ago...".

I guess the thing is that we need to pull out the most extreme stories out there and make them into great films. I think Uncle Sam is one such story - It's not all corporate america bashing. It's actually about the basic truths of democracy forgotten in exchange for a simulacra of patriotism. The way Sam finds himself again is subtle, satisfying and nothing short of inspired.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[brucifer]

Well said.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[YOU LIKEWISE FAIL IT]

I guess I should get started on that Manga adaption of "Atlas Shrugged", eh?

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[blackicye]

Oh yeah and the "America is good" angle is so poorly represented in the news and mass media globally.

Frankly neither angle is shocking at all, and hasn't been for years.

But its the global impression which they inferred from observing the policies and actions of the United States, that it is "no good."

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[Fnord]

DC has a few that I'd kill to see in movie form. Transmetropolitan being top of that list.

On the other hand Hellblazer was on that list too before that abomination with Keanu Reeves.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[qeveren]

What about Kingdom Come...?

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[1u3hr]

Just for novelty's sake I'd love to see a movie or a comic about the triumph of free-market capitalism and individual liberty over group identity and power-hungry socialists.
So would I, but as long as Hollywood is controlled by liberals it's not going to happen.

WTF? Hollywood is controlled by giant corporations. What flaky actors do in their spare time has no impact on what movies get made. Any films about the "triumph of ___ism", whatever the ___ism, is going to be a preachy bore. But if it turns you on, Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead was filmed in 1949, and Atlas Shrugged is supposedly in pre-production. More abstractly, what do you think The Terminator and sequels was about (aside from the eye-candy, that is)?

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[Princeofcups]

> However, my point was that movies condemning capitalism and far out-number those extolling it.

We're off topic here, but I would argue that 99% of Hollywood movies extoll the virtues of capitalism. Since we are part of the system (I am American), we do not recognize it. When looked at from the outside, our propoganda is no less blatant than that of Communist Russia. Just not directly controlled by the government.

jfs

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[TheoGB]

Yes, very true. Mod that comment (parent) up!

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[pinopino]

"and Atlas Shrugged is supposedly in pre-production." State your source. Casting/Crew/Studio? At least the marketing would be easy. "Who is John Galt?" in 30-foot capitals on billboards across America. Enough to make Greenspan weep with joy. Unfortunately I'm not sure the message of atheist individualist terrorists would sell well in our current sociopolitical climate.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[soft_guy]

Socialism = Corrupt individuals use the police power of the state to take goods from the hard-working to bribe those who keep them in power

Socialist, eh? Sounds like Congress to me.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[techno-vampire]

WTF? Hollywood is controlled by giant corporations. What flaky actors do in their spare time has no impact on what movies get made.

No, it doesn't. But the political opinions of the people that have creative control does, and from what I can see, they're all liberals. Why do you think there have been no movies made supporting Bush or that Fahrenheit 911 got so much publicity and was pushed into so many theaters?

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[drsquare]

I can't speak for America, but in Britain at least:

Socialism = Hard working people get taxed to the hilt so that scroungers with 6 kids by the time they're 20 years old who haven't worked a day in their life but have a government-supplied house can live off benefits and handouts.

Seriously though, that is NOT an extreme exagerration, it's actually true. Makes you sympathetic for people who exploit every loophole they can find to get out of being taxed.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[Golias]

Okay, I hate Michael Moore as much as anybody, but you are looking for conspiracy where there are none.

Bowling for Columbine did extremely well, as documentary films go, which justified the wide release of F-911. Once released, the film was a huge draw (again, by documentary standards) and toally deserved the wide release.

He's a crap film director, but he's a popular crap film director. Saying that the wide release of F-911 is evidence of Hollywood liberal bias is like saying the wide release of "Armageddon" is evidence of meteors-hitting-the-Earth bias.

Yes, Hollywood is an industry which is thick with liberals, but it is first-and-foremost an industry (like any other) thick with people who like to make money.

Just look at all the positive buzz "The Passion" started to get once people in Hollywood started to notice how much money it was taking in. You simply can't get more "Red State" than that movie was. It was a movie which featured pretty much none of the things liberals really like about Jesus, and all of the things which hard-core evangelicals & Catholics consider to be the Main Point of the Gospels. When it hit number 1, Hollywood execs couldn't stop talking about how much they loved it. Greed knows no political boundries.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[doconnor]

I think you got it mixed up

Capitalism = Corrupt individuals use the corporate power of capital to take labour from the hard-working to bribe those who keep them in power
Socialism = Individuals acting together to serve the needs of the community at large in the most effecient manner, and the greatest contributors to society reap the greatest rewards (ie respect).

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[1u3hr]

and Atlas Shrugged is supposedly in pre-production." State your source

Here.

POUGHKEEPSIE, NY, May 13, 2003--The Atlas Society is pleased to announce that a new project to film Atlas Shrugged has just been launched. Crusader Entertainment, LLC, a Beverly Hills-based production company, announced on May 12 that it had acquired the film rights to Ayn Rand's great novel. The company also announced that it has signed veteran screenwriter James V. Hart, whose film credits include the ambitious adaptation of Carl Sagan's science fiction novel Contact, to write the screenplay.

I used the word "pre-production" advisedly; lots of film projects never get further.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[1u3hr]

But the political opinions of the people that have creative control does, and from what I can see, they're all liberals.

The studios finance those they think will make popular movies. If non-liberal movies (for want of a better term) were popular, they'd find someone to make them in a minute. Hollywood is full of unemployed talented people. If they can find "artists" to make porn, they can find people to make anything. But to me, nine out of ten popular movies have nothing to say at all, and the tenth is usually right wing, so it seems we have a radically different world view. Meanwhile, get some John Wayne DVDs.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[techno-vampire]

Okay, I hate Michael Moore as much as anybody, but you are looking for conspiracy where there are none.

No, nothing so organized as a conspiracy. Just people preferring to fund movies that say what they want to hear, and not wanting to fund those they disagree with. Human nature is a much simpler explanation than conspiracy.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[techno-vampire]

There's another great patriotic moment in Scrap Happy Daffy, a 1943 Warner Brothers cartoon that's almost never shown anymore because its message is too pro-American. If nothing else, we need to start hearing again, "Americans don't give up!"

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[meta-monkey]

You have a few words wrong there.

In the capitalist society, you can't "take" labor from someone. You buy it. In the socialist society, however, labor IS taken from people at the end of a gun barrel, forcing the more productive to work for the less productive.

You're also very mixed up about that whole "most effecient manner" deal. Taking from the productive to hand out to the unproductive is very ineffecient. Oh, and respect doesn't put food on the table.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[doconnor]

In the capitalist society, you can't "take" labor from someone. You buy it. In the socialist society, however, labor IS taken from people at the end of a gun barrel, forcing the more productive to work for the less productive.

While technically true, the fact is almost everyone is forced, on pain of poverty, to give their labour to a capitalist in exchange for survival. In essence labour must be given by the more productive to the less productive (the less productive being the investors who fritter away their time trying to get more money and power)

You're also very mixed up about that whole "most efficient manner" deal. Taking from the productive to hand out to the unproductive is very inefficient. Oh, and respect doesn't put food on the table.

There is nothing inherently inefficient about "taking from the productive to hand out to the unproductive". The problem is the lack of motivation for the productive ones. Respect can go a long way to motivate people to produce food. There are lots of ways to modivate people without taking things away from others.

I believe that we have the technology so that we could maintain a comfortable standard of living using only the people who are willing to work, if it where not for the wasted effort lost to competition, consumerism, finances, marketing, business law, recessions, commuting, etc... that capitalism requires.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[meta-monkey]

While technically true, the fact is almost everyone is forced, on pain of poverty, to give their labour to a capitalist in exchange for survival. In essence labour must be given by the more productive to the less productive (the less productive being the investors who fritter away their time trying to get more money and power)

Not true in the slightest. People choose the amount and type of work they wish to do in order to support the lifestyle they desire. My aunt cares nothing for material things, so she went to live in a commune in California. My father works in government service. I'm self-employed, with no employees. None of us were forced to sell our labor to capitalists. In a capitalist society, you are free to do whatever you wish with your labor, and are compensated as such. Oh, and if you think business owners (investors) are the least productive, then you are badly misinformed. Investors create companies which provide goods and services to society, and jobs to their communities. They work longer hours, under more stress, and with greater risks than the nine-to-fivers they employ. They reap rewards proportionate to how well they serve the community. Produce something that makes a lot of people happy? You earn a lot of money. Produce something nobody wants? You lose your investment.

There is nothing inherently inefficient about "taking from the productive to hand out to the unproductive".

That's almost the definition of inefficiency. Taking resources from those who produce to support those who don't. There's absolutely nothing effecient about that.

I believe that we have the technology so that we could maintain a comfortable standard of living using only the people who are willing to work, if it where not for the wasted effort lost to competition, consumerism, finances, marketing, business law, recessions, commuting, etc... that capitalism requires.

Right. That worked so well in the Soviet Union.

Re:I wish DC get money and have more control

[polysylabic psudonym]

(getting into this discussion late - saw it while M2ing)
There is a happy medium. Sure, Socialism means the workers support the non-workers, but Capitalism to the same extreme means that the workers support the owners.

The difference is that in Socialism the workers get the same advantage as the non-workers: if they loose or leave their job, they get the government provided home etc. In Capitalism if the worker loses their job do they get the benefits of the owner they spent their life-so-far supporting? Ha!

In reality, in socialism as it is practiced in the UK and as it was until recently practiced in Australia, there are sufficient disencentives to keep the vast majority from abusing the system.

Talk about a poor selection of titles...

[Regnard]

Most of the selected titles can be considered 3rd-tier heroes. Only the Captain America and Doctor Strange movies have a chance of making a good box-office run. While taking relatively unknown heroes does not have the big risk of alienating hard-core fans, I seriously doubt whether Nick Fury or Ant-man can even make a ripple on the casual moviegoers' minds.

Re:Who owns the rights to the Wonder Twins?

[bombadier_beetle]

There is, but it's rated XXX and their "powers" can't be described on a family-oriented website.

I think you have it backwards

[Anonymous Coward]

Comic book movies do well at the box office even if they aren't very "true" to the title itself BECAUSE PEOPLE WHO DON'T READ COMICS GO TO THE MOVIES.

One need not be very familar with X-Men to enjoy the X-Men movies. (I'm sure that some of you purists will pull your hair out at this.)

My wife never read comic books, and she's quite likely to enjoy a Marvel(ous) movie even though it's not "right".

Case in point: Daredevil. Fun movie to watch. Nice date movie... pretty people, doing nifty stunts, with just enough plot to (almost) justify the cost of the popcorn.

Electra: my wife LOVED it. I know the critics panned it, but again, nice date movie. Eye candy & martial arts for me, women's empowerment for her.

And before you dismiss my comments - yes, I'm quite familar with comics - at my peak, I collected 24 titles a month, about 80% Marvel, 20% DC. Most of the X-Men titles, Daredevil, Hulk, Trom (anyone else remember Trom?), The Warlord... lots of 'em.

BUT, that being said, even though I knew the movies weren't going to be very faithful to the original comic... movies NEVER are. It's a DIFFERENT MEDIUM. GET OVER IT.

That's like complaining that a Michaelangelo sculpture isn't being "faithful" to the Da Vinci painting. Same subject matter, different method of expression.

[/highhorse]

ADDITIONAL:
I take it back. Not even LOTR had sufficient plot to justify theatre popcorn costs. My apologies.

Re:I think you have it backwards

[cpt kangarooski]

Trom? Do you mean Rom: Spaceknight? I don't remember a comic or character named Trom, though.

Re:I think you have it backwards

[sumbry]

>I take it back. Not even LOTR had sufficient plot to justify theatre popcorn costs.

The same technology that tells you how many tickets were sold and how much money was made opening weekend also ensures that most of the money from ticket sales goes right back to the studios.

Theater owners get little to nothing from actual ticket sales so the overpriced popcorn is the only way they make any money. When you realize that you'll spend as much on food as tickets sometimes this actually makes sense. We all know Hollywood is greedy as hell tho so it's not real surprising.

Re:I think you have it backwards

[Professor_UNIX]

Trom? Do you mean Rom: Spaceknight? I don't remember a comic or character named Trom, though.

Oh man, Rom was the best! I remember when I was starting my comic book collection I was able to get the entire line of Rom comic books for pennies on the dollar. That's a life saver for a 12 year old without a lot of money wanting to build an extensive comic book collection BTW! Ah, back in the days when I thought more was better.

Re:I think you have it backwards

[Trick]

I *loved* Rom! Back when I was 16 and got my first car, I had my big plastic beeping Rom sitting up proudly on my dashboard.

Jeezus, I was a dork.

I still have all my old Rom comic books, from issue #1 all the way to the end.

Funny, though... I looked them up a few months back, and almost none of them are even worth what I paid for them in the early 80's. You could probably pick up the whole set now for less than you got it for then.

I suspect the three of us that bought Rom: Spaceknight have all posted to this thread. It is good to know, though, that I wasn't the *only* one.

I work for the company that brokered the deal...

[flicman]

...and I pretty much agree that the slate sucks the way it's laid out. But consider this: Marvel has never before made their own films and had controlling interest in them. They've never had creative control to hire/fire screenwriters or directors, and they've only ever gotten a cut of the profits of the movies they make.

This deal is important because it brings a new angle to the way movies get made in Hollywood - we created a mini studio out of a defunct has-been of a comic company, and we're going to do it again. All I'm saying is that you can bash the films all you want, but this is a good precedent because it's putting creative control for the first time in the hands of the creators. I know that in this case, there's no one left who helped create Captain America, but from a company standpoint, we're at the source. Who do you think is working on a deal with Image? Those cats aren't so old - there's a very real chance that they'll get to executive produce (at the very least) their own movies like no comic book geek has ever done before.

Lastly, remember that the slate can (and will) change. I'm hoping that '300' can invigorate the hobbled historical epic genre because the script is good and the concept excellent. Sorry I'm late to the party.

Finding the right director is key

[rinkjustice]

I'm hoping Mr.Stan Lee will take a few moments and read this recent article at Salon entitled:
How to make a superhero movie that doesn't suck

I particularly agree with rule #1: Find the right director. When I heard Sam Raimi was doing Spider-Man, I knew he was the right guy for the job. He should also get the Dr. Strange film if he's not too busy with S-M#3. However, Raimi would not be right for, say, Captain America. I would give that project to Wes Craven since it seems he's stretching out into action/suspense territory.

Ah... I could go on for days on this one. Any suggestions anyone?

Re:Finding the right director is key

[tholomyes]

Unfortunately most of the directors I like the best don't seem to work too often, but I would venture to say David Fincher could make a truly great Dr. Strange film.

McG, in general, would be a good choice for a superhero flick; the direction in the Charlie's Angels movies is anything but boring.

Sell Sell Sell!!!

[uncoolcentral]

Looks like I've got a tentative schedule for selling some old comic books! I missed out on the market peaks for a few movies/titles, (Batman,) but made a few bucks when the first X-Men movie came out. Pull those comic books out of the attic and dust off that eBay login!

Ant-Man: Script treatment

[sootman]

from SNL, The Early Years: Superman's Party

The Flash ... Dan Aykroyd
The Hulk ... John Belushi
Antman ... Garrett Morris

[Doorbell rings, the Flash moves to answer it.]

The Flash: I'll get it, Lois. [opens door, grunts and crouches as if putting his arm around someone] Sue Storm, the Invisible Girl! [laughs] Come on right in! [Spider-Man, looking rather thin, enters and shakes hands with Flash] Hey, Spider-Man! All right... [Antman, wearing a helmet with antennae, enters and shakes hands, but the Flash doesn't recognize him] Ah... Excuse me, I'm not sure if I remember your name. I'm really bad with names, you know.

Antman: [high-pitched voice] You don't remember me? We met several times. I is Antman. A-N-T-M-A-N.

The Flash: Oh, right, right.

Antman: Yeah.

The Flash: Uh, Antman.

Antman: Yeah.

The Flash: What are your super powers again? You - you - you talk to the ants, is that it?

Antman: Well, partly. But, mainly, I shrink myself down to the size of an ant while retaining my full human strength.

The Flash: Really?

Antman: Yeah.

The Flash: [sarcastic] Oooh, that's really impressive. Size of an ant with human strength. You must be able to clean house on those other ants, huh? [chuckles] Hey! Hey, Hulk! Hey, check this guy out.

[The Hulk joins them. He and the Flash can barely keep from laughing at poor Antman and can't help chortling in-between their heavily sarcastic remarks:]

The Hulk: Ooooh!

The Flash: He's got the strength of a human!

Re:Ant-Man: Script treatment

[Anonymous Coward]

IDIOT! Flash is a DC Comics character! Antman and the Hulk are Marvel!! NEVER SHALL THEY MEET, FOOL!!!

Now back to posting 'worst episode ever' and running my comic book shop.

This is awesome!

[Sinner]

And by "awesome", I mean that Marvel is going to make 10 superhero movies that will all suck. That's a 100% suckage ratio! That's awesome!

Can we please go back to making sci-fi movies that suck please? Or how about another Beastmaster?

Re:This is awesome!

[Anonymous Coward]

beastmaster vs highlander!!!1!

The Avengers?

[JANYAtty.]

Avengers- Thor, Iron man, Power man, the wasp, the vision, scarlet witch. Hey they also had the hulk, spider man. wasnt the she-hulk a member for a while?

Dr. Strange could be a real trip.

Cloak and Dagger

[Conspiracy_Of_Doves]

I have an issue of Cloak & Dagger somewhere. Nice premise. It should make a very interesting movie if they do it right.

Re:Cloak and Dagger

[magarity]

Cloak and Dagger was exceptionally dark. I hope the movie version does well; I have the complete original mini-series and about a dozen issues of the first year. A very C&D-like series was done in animation called Princess Miyu. It's pretty good.

Re:Cloak and Dagger

[Antique Geekmeister]

I'd give a lot to Dagger in that pretty-white-girl-skimpy outfit, being folded into Cloak's big scary black folds and spurting little white things at people, just so I can laugh like crazy at the mixed sexuality and why people feel so strange at every step watching it. But it's enough confusing sexuality that it will never, never, never hit the big screen without all the good stuff being ripped clean out.

Re:Cloak and Dagger

[Osiris Ani]

When I was much younger, Cloak and Dagger was my favorite Marvel title. If done well, sticking somewhat close to the source material, it should be great. Anything less could easily be cringe-worthy. There's probably a fifty-fifty chance that they'll actually manage to pull it off, depending, of course, on whomever they tag as screenwriter and director.

The Matrix?

[Frankie70]

I will admit, there is an occasional breakout hit: The Matrix, Sin City were amazing,


Was the Matrix a comic book or a video game before
it was made into a movie?

They didn't raise anything

[Anonymous Coward]

"Marvel has raised $525 million"...

They didn't raise anything... RTFA.. they borrowed it.. as in debt.

Breakdown on the tiles or Why oh Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Captain America: Ok doable depending how handled
2. The Avengers: Meh could go either way depending on casting along the lines of FF
3. Nick Fury: Neutral on this since it could go either way hardcore spy film or more superheroesque could determine it's audience
4. Black Panther: Why?
5. Ant-Man: Geebus why?
6. Cloak & Dagger: This a joke? no?
7. Dr. Strange: meh supernatural limited audience so all the goth freaks will flock to it
8. Hawkeye: Again why? Yeah I can shoot a bow and arrow, just watch Ted Nugent then.
9. Power Pack: kiddie audience so probably could do well
10. Shang-Chi: who?

no horrible directors

[Anonymous Coward]

Thats cool just as long as they dont get that one director that did Daredevil and Elektra. HE KILLED IT

Cloak & Dagger and Power Pack

[ToAllPointsWest]

Hey, two of my childhood favorites! I can't wait!!!

Summary

[Lord Bitman]

Yay! Who? Yay! Who? Who? Who? Yay! Who? Who? Who?

Ah! That's right!

[Anonymous Coward]

Rom!!!

I got Rom:Spacenight and Tron mixed up!

Captain America's War on Terror

[Knetzar]

All they need to do is replace the Red Skull with Osama Bin Laden and Marvel will have a hit on their hands.

Re:Captain America's War on Terror

[CAIMLAS]

They'd never do it. Hollywood hates American politics (and the ideals of "Middle America") too much to do something like that.

And if they did a "retro" WWII version, they'd somehow work "America == Nazi/evil" or some such rot.

Re:Captain America's War on Terror

[soft_guy]

They'd never do it. Hollywood hates American politics (and the ideals of "Middle America") too much to do something like that.

I don't know. I heard somewhere that they also like money.

Re:Captain America's War on Terror

[Scudsucker]

Can you say...bullshit? True Lies, a 911 type movie if there ever was one, was a big hit, almost ten years before 911.

classic atheist arrogance

[circletimessquare]

you need spirituality in your life

what you don't need is organized religion

mankind cannot survive without a spiritual, humbling component to his life

atheism is just another form of religious fundamentalism

what you need in life is strong individualism, and strong spirituality

spirituality is older than monotheism and hero worship

it's the most essential element of man's relationship with his world, it's pre-intellectual, and inescapable

it's relating to the world in emotional ways, rather than logical ways

spirituality will cease to be important to your life when you become a pure machine

i hope that day never comes

Re:classic atheist arrogance

[Anonymous Coward]

you need spirituality in your life

You need a "Shift" key in yours.

Re:classic atheist arrogance

[pboulang]

Spirituality is what you have left when you stop thinking.

You are obviously a spiritual person. Many years of practice, I'd guess, judging from the disconnected blather you call a post. But thank you for posting. It makes the people reading it feel really smart.

Re:classic atheist arrogance

[Moofie]

Well, I'm sure glad we've got you to tell us what humanity needs.

I happen to be a spiritual person, but I find your assertions overbroad and silly. What works for you might well not work for somebody else. Shocking concept, no?

Re:classic atheist arrogance

[scowling]

Show me compelling evidence for the existence of a 'spirit' and we'll begin to talk about whether I need a spiritual life.

So far, there isn't and I don't. You are implying that one requires sprituality to deal with the world emotionally, which is an utter crock and not worth further consideration or debate.

"Classic atheist arrogance"? I'm not telling you that you don't need spirituality in your life. It's pretty clear that you're the arrogrant one.

Re:classic atheist arrogance

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

Well, it's funny when someone argues with FACTS.
I'm not telling you that NOBODY needs "spirituality", i'm telling you that i DON'T. Who are you to know more about myself than me?
So, you need spirituality, i don't. Some people needs a weelchair, some people need glasses, i don't, Guess who's stronger, and who is weaker and
needs from external accesories?
(Disclaimer: It's just an example, i'm not discriminating anyone or saying that people with protesis is inferior, please don't be a dick, if you think i'm nazi, just save your opinions for yourself.)

Re:classic atheist arrogance

[hazah]

you need spirituality in your life

What is this thing you call "spirituality"?

what you don't need is organized religion

What is this thing religion, and what is wrong with the oranization thereof. If you have a point, specify. At the very least, rephrase to "What *I* don't need is organized religion"

mankind cannot survive without a spiritual, humbling component to his life

I don't know what the component you speak of is; it's safe to say I am alive and well. Maybe I'm not this mystical "Mankind"?

atheism is just another form of religious fundamentalism

This is where your entire post shines. What do you know of atheism? I refuse to personify the system that is our universe, that much is true. Prey tell what this means to my existance. I suggest you familiarize yourself with the original Buddhist philosophies, as they may shine some light on the subject.

what you need in life is strong individualism, and strong spirituality

What I need in life is be with other people, who I can love, who I can share with, laugh with, talk to, and who can return all of those things. How old are you? There are some dependancies you cannot ever hope to escape. You should get over it.

spirituality is older than monotheism and hero worship

I take it you've been there?

it's the most essential element of man's relationship with his world, it's pre-intellectual, and inescapable

No, sorry. The most essential element of man's relationship to the world is his existance. To think of it in any other way puts an unessesary limit on one could expect from a human. That being in terms of thinking, acting, believing, etc. In clearer terms: "Free Will".

it's relating to the world in emotional ways, rather than logical ways

I hate to break this to you, but a human will always do "both" and these are "inseperable". It's safe to say that the brain uses chemicals communicate thought and emotion. At any given time those chemicals are communicating something. My personal speculation is that logic is always emotional and that emotion is always logical

spirituality will cease to be important to your life when you become a pure machine

What about when you stop thinking for yourself?

i hope that day never comes

Don't worry.

Re:classic atheist arrogance

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, it's nice to hear from you again, i thought you had your head inserted so deep up your ass that you coudln't even post. It's good to know you are alive ... or not, whatever.

The one hero missing from this list of winners

[mr.mighty]

The one obvious hero they missed out of this bunch of 'winners' is ... Dazzler.

Roller skates, disco and laser beams. How could it miss?

Re:The one hero missing from this list of winners

[BewireNomali]

Don't forget the omnipresent WALKMAN, used to provide the sound she needed to have to generate the lasers.

Crap crap and more crap.

[Azreal]

The only ones with half a story might be Dr. Strange and the Avengers, and the avengers better have, at the least, Iron Man.
    Cloak and dagger will only be a half success if they have some complete knock out playing Dagger running around all movie with almost nothing on, a la comic.
    The rest basically sucked as comics and will suck as movies. I mean come on, Power Pack? The best thing about that comic was when it had cameos with like the Punisher and even then it wasn't enough to redeem the series.
    If I were going to make a movie out of marvels stable of comics that hasn't been done before, I'd probably choose the New Mutants (pre x-force). I would've said generation-x but that was done in my opinion fairly poorly and the timing wasn't right. Had it come out after the x-men movie it would've probably faired better.
    Since marvel is now about pimping itself out, I wouldn't be surprised to see x-factor and maybe even x-calibur being set up after the backstory is filled by the x-men series.

Captain Chaper 11....

[midnighttoadstool]

...to the rescue....soon or later....

Serious answer?

[PCM2]

Both have already been optioned by other studios.

The Amazing Captain No Name

[bigsexyjoe]

Ant-man? Who the hell is going to see a movie about Ant-man. It seems that these movies are all about no name heros, many of whom don't even have a comic anymore. Sure Spiderman and the X-men made money. But when their movies about second-tier heros like Daredevil and the Punisher didn't fare so well. This bunch seems to be all second and even third-tier heros. They better not plan on spending $52.5 million on each of these or its back to bankrupcty court for Marvel.

Re:Captain France!

[zakezuke]

Who would really be interested in Captain France? A guy that dresses up like a croissant, runs away from German bad guys and blames all his problems on Captain America.

I don't know what's more troubling, the fact that I laughed at your joke or the fact that someone took it upon them selfs to make a "Captain France".

http://www.chambrook.org/captainfrance/index.php?s trip_id=1

Re:What the hell is an ant-man? I only see antman

[circusboy]

ant man I was henry (hank) pym, who at various times was also goliath, yellowjacket, giant-man, husband to the wasp, just hank pym and various others. definitely a hero with an identity crisis, (and unreliable source of drugs.(himself)(it was the same drug that made him both big and small))

generally he was a member of the Avengers (east coast) and like tony stark, (iron man) was one of the wealthy ones that allowed the super team to be able to afford the things like quinjets that he designed.

I can't believe I remember all that...

here, a link... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hank_Pym

get kevin smith to direct all 10!!

[Anonymous Coward]

snoogins!

Cloak to Dagger: You sucked how many dicks?

Silver Surfer

[Anonymous Coward]

besides Cap. America and Dr. Strange they should do Silver Surfer... the other individual ones might not have been drawn for as long

What's in a name?

[interstellar_donkey]

The company's also changing its name from Marvel Enterprises to Marvel Entertainment.

The important thing is that the acronym, which spells out Marvel's primary focus, remains intact.

I think I speak for Comic Book Guys everywhere...

[stand]

...when I say...

Worst. Idea. Ever.

Re:What the hell is an ant-man? I only see antman

[Onikuma]

From your link:

Dr. Sondheim was indeed being held prisoner by Darren Cross, president of Cross Technological Enterprises, who needed her expertise to correct his own heart condition. Rescuing her and defeating Cross...

So, let me get this straight. Ant Man defeated a guy with heart problems? Wow. That movie sounds like a real winner...

flawless

[circletimessquare]

and therefore cold and unapproachable

Re:flawless

[swillden]

There are a few religions that view God as cold and unapproachable. Most don't.

Re:flawless

[circletimessquare]

how can you be flawless and warm?

warmth implies a level of approachability, equality, shared experience

an omnipotent, omnipresent flawless being can be nothing BUT cold and unapproachable

Re:flawless

[swillden]

warmth implies a level of approachability, equality, shared experience

Such as Christ obtained while on earth? And an omniscient being who is also deeply loving and empathetic can't be anything but warm.

Re:flawless

[cyborg_zx]

Such as Christ obtained while on earth?

Assuming such a man existed and was the son of a god. I'll let the Christians fight about triune gods and whether or not an omniscient being needs to obtain such knowledge. I'll just maintain there's no particular reason to think the Gospel's are historical and their claims of divinity should have any credance.

And an omniscient being who is also deeply loving and empathetic can't be anything but warm.

Except since most Christians apart from believing in an omnibenevolent god also think the same god is going to punish everyone who doesn't follow his rules correctly or believe in him with firey pain. That's not the kind of warmth I'm looking for.

Power Pack

[StarKruzr]

I know I have terrible taste, but I LOVED that book.

Maybe they'll surprise us and do something cool with it. They surprised the hell out of me and made Daredevil suck. It was also a surprise when X-Men and X-Men 2 didn't suck. ::shrug::

Re:Power Pack

[The Wooden Badger]

I'm with you. I actually read Power Pack and enjoyed it. But at the time it was being published I was the age of the characters and I was just getting into comics. I won't say it was the best comic, but I enjoyed it and I welcome a potentially good movie that I can take my kids to. Most of the movies targeting kids these days are horrible (with the exception of Pixar stuff).

Re:Power Pack

[palndron]

My favorite X-Men is 204 ( I "think", lost the book ), which is an wolverine, who has been betten back to the stone age ( can't speak ) by Lady Deathstrike and here minions, being saved by the smallest girl from the PP.

Safe investment, but ... mixed feelings

[cpu_fusion]

I agree with the previous posts that Marvel movie rights are worth a ton. And I love comic books, having spent many lazy days of my youth flipping through them. But I'd like to take a moment and complain about this deal anyways:

I predict many of these movies will be more Hulk than Spiderman. In other words, most of them will be crap, with few gems. And that is disappointing.

The thing is, even with a great, established comic book franschise, it takes some real talent in writing, acting, directing to pull things off; it takes a lot of individual, creative miracles to produce something worth spending $7.50 ticket + $3.50 popcorn and two hours of your life on.

I really, really hope the studios focus on getting the right people in there at every step of the production process, because lately they haven't been doing so hot, and all these nostalgia-based scripts are hollow and boring.

A good, core plot is a 100x more valuable, in my mind, than a recognized icon. I hope that the writers can provide us with interesting, SURPRISING plots, because without it, this is all fluff.

Sweet!

[rsilvergun]

I can't wait to see him paired with Dan Hibiki in Marvel vs Capcom 3: Hyper Salad Bowl Fighting Champion Edition!

The big movie

[TheAdventurer]

Take all ten of those franchises and make a single, bombastic movie. I would pay money to see that.

It'd be worth it just to see Nick Fury accidentally step on Ant Man.

The American Response

[lheal]

Cap is less a superhero than a super hero, if you'll pardon the wordplay. His strongest "power" is leadership. His only weapon is a defensive one. He acquired his combat skills fighting in a land war that makes Iraq look like a couple of kids on a playground. His work ethic is unmatched.

Captain America symbolizes what any one of us could become, if we persevere.

I was looking at my 42-year-old body the other day, and recalled a Captain America snippet from a 1970's Avengers comic. It showed Cap working out, tirelessly preparing himself for whatever lay ahead. That thought motivates me to work on self-improvement, since you never know what's coming at you next.

Re:The American Response

[anothy]

Captain America symbolizes what any one of us could become, if we persevere.

and, y'know, get injected with a super-soldier serum as part of a government experiment to create the ultimate weapon. don't forget the drugs. gotta have the drugs.

Re:The American Response

[FurryFeet]

Captain America symbolizes what any one of us could become, if we persevere. ...and are injected with an experimental "supersoldier serum". Sorry, that doesn't fly. I think you're thinking of The Atom (The Golden Age one, of course)

Let's hear it for the cat babes!

[Anonymous Coward]

What? No "Avengers West Coast"? At least they had class! Iron Man, Hawkeye and Tigra. You can't go wrong with a hot cat babe in a bikini!

Hey, it could always be worse. They could have the Great Lakes Avengers with Big Bertha, Mr. Immortal, and Door Man. :-P

Re:Who owns the rights to the Wonder Twins?

[Anonymous Coward]

There is, but it's rated XXX and their "powers" can't be described on a family-oriented website.

Form of a tampon!
And I'll just sit in her purse and wait.

Re:Who owns the rights to the Wonder Twins?

[emurphy42]

Oh My God. And the monkey! Where does the monkey fit in?

They're not doing Silver Surfer because....

[Anonymous Coward]

...Will Smith declined to do the lead role.

Still waiting on a Transmetropolitan movie... nt

[Anonymous Coward]

nt= no text

PA link...

[tattoi.nobori]

Gabe and Tycho over at Penny-Arcade had this to say about the production of Fantastic 4... Pretty darn funny.

Re:Who owns the rights to the Wonder Twins?

[bleaknik]

Since when is /. a family-oriented website?

I'm a nerd. And by that... I mean my family has disowned me.

The thing about Hollywood is...

[Coyote65]

'Great' movies do not sell tickets. Example, The Pianist: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0253474/awards, was not the top earner for 2002, http://us.imdb.com/Sections/Years/2002/top-grossin g. Instead it was Spiderman. Hollywood is not interested in making 'Great Movies', it is interested in whatever gets a warm body in a paying seat. Looked at another way: Given the largest source of revenue (for any product) is the 'lowest common denominator', I don't think we can expect any form of 'Great Movie' out Major Hollywood anymore. And possibly any major industry, such as games: http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/08/21/ 1529232&tid=187&tid=10

Shang Chi, Master of Kung Fu

[Humorless Coward.]

This film should have been made eight years ago,
in the style of the original comic.

Why?

It's a cross between what became Batman Begins
(after some flakes rewrote Batman's origin
to include the League of Assassins)
and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, complete
with philosophical interludes, grand fable
storytelling, and dramatic romance.
For those who have NFC, Shang Chi was a
warrior poet raised in the house of his
father, Fu Manchu (the character reference
for Ra'as alGhul in the Batman films) who
left to find himself and later joined those
who stood opposed to Fu Manchu's schemes.
Think the old classic Fu Manchu and not the
Peter Sellers comedy one, btw.

Now, I don't understand why some people are
so against this ten-picture deal. Lest
ye forget, "Blade" was a third-tier character
with limited potential from a second-rate
Marvel title, "Tomb of Dracula" in the early
1970s who received a minor brush-up, about
fifteen years ago, and nobody even thought
to link him to martial arts until Wesley
Snipes took interest. It was a poor concept
taken in a new direction and got turned into
three action films which made plenty of
money (and at least the first one was
entertaining enough that, during which, I
didn't feel compelled leave the theater).

I can understand how some people might look at
Daredevil and just see the Ben Affleck
role, or the Eric Bana Hulk, and say,
"Marvel needs to stop making movies like
these," but with good acting and direction,
a good script, and a novel twist here-or-
there, Marvel's tremendous store of pre-
developed character ideas and plots just
begs for screen development.

Heck, change enough things, and...
Hey, didn't "Mutant X", a Marvel property
derived loosely from the X-Men (but without
the "silly" costumes and code names)
run for four seasons?

It was a Marvel property, and evidently didn't
make people too upset. ;)

Re:Shang Chi, Master of Kung Fu

[megrims]

Journalist,
are
you?

Re:Shang Chi, Master of Kung Fu

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the twentyfirst century
We're all journalists.
 
;)

Why each film will fail.

[Quadfreak0]

Captain America, They made this movie before; it wasnt too great. I've tried to erase the bad parts from my memory so I dont remember it too well.

The Avengers, Although I'm sure it would be cool to see these characters in live action lets face the fact the Avengers are a joke in the marvel universe.

Nick Fury, Hasselhoff stared in a short lived TV series of this title... It was bad. The character is BORING.

Black Panther, Second string super heroes sell comics right? I mean thats why they're so damn popular and comicbook icons right?

Ant-Man, See the Avengers comment, on another note DC's The Atom had similar powers and predates ant-man

Cloak & Dagger, well the title gives it all away not much to it really. although i'm sure if you through enough CGI at crap you could sell it.

Dr. Strange, It would be cool but honestly I get bored when I see him in the book, magic/powers are cool and all but do you want to watch him for over 60 minutes?

Hawkeye, could be real cool but again he is a side character, It would be like making a movie based on catwoman... oh wait thats right they did.

Power Pack trust me you dont want to know about this, basicly a kids title.

and Shang-Chi guy has no super powers, think Kung Fu the Movie... but by marvel; so it'll be a british guy playing shang-chi.

Business Proposal for Ant Man

[patio11]

Hideho, Marvel. I'm the world's biggest fan of Ant Man. Granted, until I read this Slashdot article I have never heard of him -- but, now that I have and actually had a positive reaction I think this qualifies me for the job. Here is my proposal. You give me $50 million to make a movie. I will spend $2000 on a video camera and $10 on an ant farm, and I will make a movie of Ant Man's early days. I will put the other $49,997,990 in a 5% interest bearing CD for six months. At the end of six months, I will give you your $50 million back, skim off the interest as my "director's cut", and post my interpretation of Ant Man on the Internet for all to see and download for free. Maybe they'll share in my Ant Man fandom, maybe not. But you'll have $50 million dollars. This is the only one of the ten movies which will get you your money back, take this offer while you still can!

Captain America is more than propaganda

[DoctaWatson]

All the replies to this post rightly point out that Captain America was a childish piece of WWII propaganda. When the war ended, so did his popularity.

In the 60's Marvel brought the character back, and the most popular theme in his storylines is his rejection of being used as a tool for the government. He's supposed to stand for all of the American Dreams of the people- and not a piece of propaganda for the politicians.

Check out the wiki for Captain America, they explain it way better than I can.

not those - should do Green Goblin & Thunderbo

[Scudsucker]

They should do a Green Goblin movie, and I don't mean one featuring any of the Osborns. I mean Phil Urich, nephew of reporter Ben Urich, a kid who finds one of Norman's safehouses, complete with a spare suit and glider. The comic was about a stoner type kid who had lots of cool gizmos to play with but no real idea how to use them, and he keeps getting his ass handed to him by more experienced supervillians, and good guys who think he's one of the bad goblins. It was a nice little comic, but they killed it because that shithead John Bryne wanted to bring back Norman Osborn, THE ONE GUY IN COMICS WHO ACTUALLY STAYED DEAD, and didn't want two Green Goblins running around NY.

The Thunderbolts were a new superhero team that popped up after most of the MU heros were "unavailable" due to a horrible storyline. However, at the end of the first issue, it turns out they're actually the rather lamely named Masters of Evil. But the premise would could be cool, bad guys posing as superheros.

Braveheart

[fvdham]

What about making another Braveheart or LOTR?
These are movies people like ;).
There are plenty of battles left to shoot.

Re:What the hell is an ant-man? I only see antman

[zakezuke]

generally he was a member of the Avengers (east coast) and like tony stark, (iron man) was one of the wealthy ones that allowed the super team to be able to afford the things like quinjets that he designed.

This would explain why Stark Labs is spoken of often by "true believers". To be honest I wouldn't know Marvel from DC or any of the other guys.

I was never too into comic books. I read a few, I did enjoy them to a degree... but only when I could make it to a real comic shop and buy a sequence and even then I couldn't get more than a few months worth. Each comic book was well 24ish pages long and didn't have much on the way of a story... and i'd be waiting a year for basicly a short story... and rather than wait a year and shell out what was $20ish at the time I could visit walden books and buy a real book for $5ish.

Not to poke fun at comic book fans... i'm all for a good short story or a good series of short stories, but I liked the patience then. I'm all for the idea of collections of these being strung together into large graphic novels and am often more than happy to watch film editions of these classic works of the silver age... not that i'd know when the silver age was.

Re: OT response Mod me troll

[Anonymous Coward]

> Black Panther
> Ah, a hero named after a hyper-racist group. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Doupt you have any real knowledge of the Black Panthers - some were thugs but the 'racist' tag doesn't stick. Do some reading (or did Jesus save you from that, too?) /. isn't (or shouldn't be) the place) to flamebait Christers but, frankly, your ideology and religion are bankrupt.

Re:Captain America for real

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, and Captain America will be a fat man with his gut sticking out of the outfit. His IQ will be low and he will think every black man is going to commit a crime.
When someone shoots at him, they will aim outside his sheild--super speed was never his power.

No...

[Anonymous Coward]

But Wachowski brothers are plagiarists.

Example: http://www.fortunecity.com/tatooine/niven/142/recy cleb/rb40.html

cool!

[db10]

Hoary hosts of Hoggoth!

Bollocks

[Anonymous Coward]

It was crap.

Re:FF

[circusboy]

agreed,

I actually think they had good actors for the 4, (not doom) but such lousy writing.

sad... it could have been good, there were a couple of moments, but the whole romance...

A couple of days editing, I'm sure I could clean it up...

Re:What the hell is an ant-man? I only see antman

[circusboy]

Stark Enterprises, S.T.A.R. labs, two different things. former is Marvel, I think the latter is DC, though I could be mixing it up with the B.R.A.N.D. corporation... It gets so confusing... You can tell, perhaps, I had a bit of a solitary childhood?

the thing is, when I started collecting comics, they were on newsprint paper, and less than $.50 each. you could afford to follow a bunch of different series, and get a couple of new ones each week.

the saddest days were late in high school, when all the comics went to 'baxter' paper, and the prices went up... Walt Simonson pointed out once that the annoying thing about the 'nice' paper was that all the printing screens were set up for news print, which allowed the ink dots to spread a bit, and blend. the baxter paper did not, so you got very obvious dots in the 'special' reprints.

btw, if you want one of the best series ever, 1973-74, Manhunter, Archie Goodwin and Walter Simonson. Revolutionary comic artwork, widely copied (and as a result, regrettably cliched) Started as series of 8 page backup stories in Batman Digests, and finished with a 22 page batman episode.

simply one of the greatest bits of comic book construction ever. bar none.

Re:I work for the company that brokered the deal..

[CodeBuster]

The Silver Surfer was a Marvel character who first appeared in the Fantastic Four #48, which was part of the "Coming of Galactus" three-part series conceived by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby as part of their work which really launched the silver age of comics, although most people mark the official beginning of the silver age with the appearence of the Barey Allen Flash. I have not heard of Legion of Superheroes, although DC did have their own super hero team, which they launched in response to the Marvel team, including many of their most popular characters as the "Justice League of America".

You're forgetting...

[BJH]

...the Mighty Maggot.

Re:Who owns the rights to the Wonder Twins?

[gg3po]

...can't be described on a family-oriented website.

/. == family oriented!? Oh, I see... You must be new here :-)

Remaking Money

[Propaganda13]

That's why they're
1. remaking foreign films
2. remaking old films
3. making films from comic books
4. making films from books
5. remaking old films made from books
6. making movies from TV

I'll let you provide examples. What happened to the good old days of Hollywood when they just took an idea (like ninjas) and made a ton of "original" movies based on ninjas. /sarcasm

Re:What the hell is an ant-man? I only see antman

[zakezuke]

the thing is, when I started collecting comics, they were on newsprint paper, and less than $.50 each. you could afford to follow a bunch of different series, and get a couple of new ones each week.

I honestly don't remember what they cost when I was, only that even at 50cents per and a paperback under $5.00 to me a paperback represented more bang for the buck.

I know at some point silly puddy stopped working on comicbooks and newsprint. I assumed that this was due to a switch over to vegitable based dye rather than petrolium based dye.

I think I know what you mean as far as baxter paper is concerned. I spent a little tiny bit of time at a place owened by Mike Myers who bought comics wholesale from the big guys and sold them to chain stores in bags marked 3 for a dollar, 4 for a dollar... pissing off "true collectors". But I noticed that much of the 70s and 80s comics were dotty news print and the more modern ones were a slick treated paper. I would have never noticed the transision period. I may have noticed when prices jumped above and beyond $2.00 each.

One thing I found somewhat annoyed with was the the film "Big" showed a adult/kid character presenting the idea of comics on disc. Given the availablity of standard tools like the myst series used I don't see why this is not a reality. As an adult I found many of the theme games like Spiderman II to be most enjoyable... very much enjoyed playing syberia... so why doesn't marvel or DC take a step forward and use their artists and design some basic games with a decent plot.

Please do the Silver Surfer!

[CMBologna]

I really like the Silver Surfer story (even though it's a bit pacifist for these ages but that's good right?) Anyhow this news from 2003 gives that the movie in production after the Fantastic Four should be the Silver Surfer. http://www.comicbookmovie.com/news/articles/932.as p

Hollywood Rubbish

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems everything coming from hollywood is a remake, a comic made into a movie or some other safe formulaic rubbish for the masses.

Can't they think up anything new and original. That's why I'm not interested piracy, hollywood junk isn't worth the bandwidth free or not.

how about Ambush Bug, Groo, or Cerebus?

[db10]

eh?

Name change

[pandrijeczko]

Presumably Marvel Enterprises' name change to Marvel Entertainment is to serve as a reminder to us that that is what Marvel is trying to do - entertain us - and failing pretty damn dismally at it.

With the exception of the very good Spider-Man movies, every other Marvel superhero movie has been very sub-standard - even with the X-Men, I found absolutely nothing likeable about any of the characters who are just a bunch of miserable, arrogant people.

If we're talking comic-book adaptations then Marvel should take a good hard look at "Sin City" which, IMHO, was the best movie I've seen this year so far (although I'm hoping it will be surpassed by "V For Vendetta").

As for super-hero movies "Hellboy" is undoubtedly the best of the genre, a grossly under-rated movie that has an excellent balance of action, humour & good characterisation.

Marvel has always been a company that "plays it safe" when it comes to comics but with the advent of the smaller independent comic companies & the rise in popularity of Anime in the western world, they are now just a tired old company producing tired old movie adaptations - the Spider-Man movies were an exception but as had more to do with Sam Raimi's excellent direction than Marvel's tired old content.

Re:Name change

[nagora]

I'm hoping it will be surpassed by "V For Vendetta"

All signs indicate that it'll be lucky to beat "Highlander II", I'm afraid.

TWW

None of the above

[petrus4]

I won't be seeing movies based on any of the properties listed. Captain America in particular is nothing more than a walking American flag, a la Superman, and thus is these days likely to simply be offensive outside the US itself.

I'm not going to name the one act of specific American heroism that the rest of the planet is now eagerly awaiting the performance of...I'm sure Slashdot's readers know what I'm talking about, here. Until that particular act is performed, however, any other attempts at making anything or anyone American appear heroic will ring hollow.

Re:None of the above

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, you. Go fuck yourself.

Re: Dr. Strange

[Anonymous Coward]

It's too bad more people aren't familiar with this comic. (Yeah I'm biased, owning well... just about everything in which he's appeared - many were in The Amazing Spiderman). But his character deals with things that are so far BEYOND the "normal" realm of superhero responsibilities that it really leaves a lot open for creative writing.

His background was that he was a surgeon who lost the use of his hands, and sought a cure in Tibet. That's where he met the Ancient One and learned the mystical arts, and eventually took his place as Sorcerer Supreme of Earth.

I could see a Dr. Strange movie hitting a nerve with some of the hardcore Christian fundamentalists in the U.S., if such a movie ever really got popular. That's bound to happen anytime you're talking about mysticism and godlike beings from other universes. For the rest of us, if the movie had a good writer - someone who really read and understood Strange, then the story could be very interesting.

Jesus, Hollywood's like a vampire on Marvel's neck

[Fastball]

I know this is something of a comic book fan community, but I've just about had enough comic book movies for one millenium. I mean some of these come off okay, but is this it anymore? Buy rights to a comic book universe, hire some CG folk, and retell the story?

I want something new. Different. Un-comic book.

Extending the brand

[Cabby]

I saw a presentation from Marvel recently at a mobile entertainment conference. They were very much looking to extend their brand beyond being a comic book supplier. Movies are just a natural extention for them. They were actually mainly pushing their new offerings on mobile phones, mobile games and digital comics but it all comes down to making the most of the characters that they own. Movies get to make money and extend brand recognition - twice the reason to push them.

Re: Dr. Strange

[Anonymous Coward]

My two favorite Dr. Strange moments:

0) Galactus, who eats planets, had come to try (again) to eat Earth. Dr. Strange used a necromantic spell to summon the souls of everyone Galactus ever killed--my brain hurts, trying to imagine how many ghosts that would be--and Galactus goes down for the count. (Then Reed Richards, acting on nothing more than a hunch, convinces everyone not to kill Galactus because "he has a Purpose"... that was a big "HUH? moment for me.)

1) An enemy grabbed a major magical artifact belonging to Dr. Strange; Dr. Strange then pointed out that, unlike (for example) a gun, this artifact doesn't simply do what you want it to. The enemy, thanks to the artifact, winds up being forced to face the truth about himself; he had been telling himself for years that he was basically a good guy, but deep down he knew it wasn't true. He breaks off his attempts to fight Dr. Strange and flees.

Yawn....

[Charcharodon]

Yawn....

Different cities? Where?

[SysKoll]

They're just remaking the same movies over and over, with different names for the characters, different actors, and in different cities.

Not even. Most movies are set in New York these days. For super-duper originality, you can make your characters take the subway, ooooh, that has never been done before...

Make it stop!!!

[InsaneLampshade]

Please...make it stop!!!

I've had enough of all these crappy comic book movies, they're polluting the cinema's!!

I shouldn't have to travel 20 miles to go to some posh arty cinema just to watch a decent movie, all because my local cinema only plays what the ignorant masses want to watch.

I want my local cinema to show good movies, not any more of this crap, "all special effects and no story" comic book tripe!!

Marvel, and all who support them in their movie making endeavors deserve to die!!! Painfully!!

Sick of comic book movies

[TrentL]

I'm just getting sick of comic book movies, even the good ones. They're becoming so predictable:

First 15 minutes: Hero(s) is a normal person
Next 5 minutes: Hero(s) is exposed to some type of trauma/radiation
Next 10 minutes: Everything's normal, except the hero realizes he can suddenly a) jump over buildings b) smash cars c) shoot flames
Nest 60 minutes: Lot's of stuff blowing up and getting destroyed as the hero tries to defeat his nemesis with comparable powers.

Must haves:
- Members of the public that are afraid of the hero (allegories for racism)
- Hero is misunderstood and thought to be evil
- Boring romantic entanglements
- Setup for a sequel

I really can't take one more damn "origin story" in another comic book movie. If they make an Iron Man movie or a new Superman movie, they should start the movie 5 years into the hero's career. This was my major complaint with Fantastic Four. I actually *would* like to see a sequel to this movie where they could just go all-out with the characters right from the start.

Re:Sick of comic book movies

[Grab]

Did you watch X-Men 1 and 2? Considering Wolverine has spent 2 movies trying to find out who screwed him over and still isn't close, that's not bad going, eh?

And as for members of the public that are afraid of the hero - well, if I saw three foot-long blades come out from between some guy's knuckles, I'd not be exactly happy, you know!

Grab.

Re:Sick of comic book movies

[Minna Kirai]

I'm just getting sick of comic book movies, even the good ones. They're becoming so predictable:

Funny, I can't really manage to fit Sin City into that pattern. Maybe you meant to say "Superhero" in there someplace... but if you find the movie versions predictable, then they're just being true to the source material! The original comics are, if anything, much more predictable, because the writers of individual issues have less freedom to make permanent changes to any character. They're just turning the crank: "Crime, fight, escape, repeat".

they should start the movie 5 years into the hero's career. This was my major complaint with Fantastic Four.

Try "The Incredibles"

Re:Sick of comic book movies

[soft_guy]

I really can't take one more damn "origin story" in another comic book movie.

That's exactly why I liked "Ghost World". No origin story for Enid.

Re:Sick of comic book movies

[TrentL]

I'm talking more about the typical Marvel/DC mega-franchises based on 40-year old comic book characters, not graphic novels like Sin City. I agree that The Incredibles was very good.

She-Hulk

[Back Slider 1969]

They should seriously do a She-Hulk movie with Serena Williams in the title role. She's got the physique for it.

What? No Brother Voodoo?

[aapold]

Can't get any love...

The Simpson's are on Slashdot!

[DragonHawk]

Comic Book Guy? Is that you? What are you doing posting on Slashdot? ;-)

This all Marvel has left?

[Anonymous Coward]

Since I guess they've sold all their A list title rights already to other studio's this is all they have left?

Most of these had small fan bases to begin with and many have no modern day fan base at all in the younger age groups. This along with the fact Marvel is not exactly a great movie studio or anything and can barely do a decent job in the comics biz I'm not expecting much from most of these.

If Marvel had a clue they would listen more to their fans at one of the many CON's that go on all year for ideas on which titles and story lines to use.

Personally I'd go this route:
Iron Fist - much better Kung-Fu asian choice to go with over Shang-Chi.

Starjammers - Wow, what potential do have there.

A ton of choices still out there in the X-Universe that aren't X-men. X-Force (New Mutants), X-Factor, Cable!!!, X-Man, X-Caliber, etc. The X-Men are just a small part of what makes the X-Universe great.

Personally I've always enjoyed the Avengers and picked it up off and on over the years. I would hope they would go for an ensable of the more unique characters like She-Hulk, Scarlet Witch, Captain USA, Vision, Submariner, Spider Woman, Hercules, etc.

What about Captain Marvel?

[Anonymous Coward]

He rocked!

Re:I work for the company that brokered the deal..

[imr]

You know, i wouldnt have believed you until sin city.

Find a new genre to exploit

[flibbertygibbet]

It's understandable that Hollywood wants to roll out one after another of a proven genre, but at some point don't people go to movies to see something new? Here's an old idea that never gets old: a story with believable characters, based in reality, in which things happen which makes one think. Barring that, go exploit some other form of serial fiction. Please!

Cloak & Dagger woo-hoo!

[syntap]

I always thought Cloak & Dagger would make a great movie... I can't friggin wait.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloak_(comics)

Superheroes for kids, what a great idea!

[Anita Coney]

For that little bit of money these movies will obviously NOT be intended for adults (like Batman Begins) but will be fully intended for kids. As a father to two kids who both LOVE superheroes, this is great news.

SubMariner

[stickytar]

At least we may get to see prince Namor on the big screen. http://www.countingdown.com/movies/260279

Angelina Jolie with an eypatch!

[objekt]

I'll never look at Nick Fury the same way...wait, that sounds wrong.

Re:Jesus, Hollywood's like a vampire on Marvel's n

[Anonymous Coward]

want something new. Different. Un-comic book.

Try this then. Japanese indie low budget, yet very interesting. Surprise hit at FantAsia festival.

...Radioactive Man? ...Uncle Ant?

[Psyqlone]

...Disgruntled Goat?

...Ku Klux Klam?

Re:I work for the company that brokered the deal..

[gorbachev]

Didn't anyone tell Marvel that it might be a good idea to phase the movies out a little bit?

10 movies in 7 years is a new super hero movie every 8 and a half months.

They're either have to have at least two different teams work on these movies (which might be a good idea anyway), or really crank them up assembly line style.

Seems kinda rushing it to me.

Much better heros out there.. like Flaming Carrot!

[foniksonik]

He's a man, he's a carrot, his hair is made of flame... and he's angry! Angry at crime!!!!! No not criminals, they are the innocent bystanders who have fallen victim to crime's insidious ways... and junk food, he's angry at junk food (because it contains so many empty calories, calories that could be put to use in any number of useful ways).

Flaming Carrot is a Dark Horse comics production, see it at a theater near you, coming soon!!!! DON'T BUY POPCORN! It's the emptiest of empty calorie containing junk food... it makes me sooooo angry!@%##!&* Yes, multiple punctuation marks angry.

(Wouldn't you rather see a movie about a crime fighting carrot man? I need money for booze so I can fight crime at the bar tonight. Please go see the movie if you hate crime, otherwise you're part of the problem, not the solution.)

Captain America made already!!!!!!

[sxmjmae]

They did Captain America already... It is really crapy... try to find it at your video store and make sure to pick up a couple of cases of beer to what it with (you will need it!).
Marvel (the cosmetic company, owners of marvel comics at the time) had too much control and as a result it sucked.

They need to sell the rights to someone who can make it good. IE Spiderman, X-men. Or even the forgetable Hulk which I am sure made money.

Sequel Loading

[kcarlin]

I believe it was the first time Hollywood greenlighted 2 sequels to be filmed simultaneously

The first two Christopher Reeve Superman films were greenlighted and filmed simultaneously in the late 70's.

Antman but no Carrot

[nightsweat]

Sure it's a different publisher, but Antman gets a movie and still no Flaming Carrot film?

Actual conversation about the Hulk movie overheard

[soft_guy]

I was in line to see something else overhearing the conversation of two teen girls in line. The Hulk was playing at the theater.

White Teen Girl: What about "The Hulk"?
Asian Teen Girl: I heard that the movie had a lot of jumping in it.
White Teen Girl: Jumping?
Asian Teen Girl: Yeah, like the hulk jumps a lot.
White Teen Girl: OK.
Asian Teen Girl: I don't like movies with jumping.

Re:Actual conversation about the Hulk movie overhe

[circusboy]

I was leaving 'Casablanca' one night, and overheard:

"I don't see what was so great about it, it was all so cliche..."

And who should play Doctor Strange ??

[Salgak1]

. . . well, on Graffe's Wizard Compilation, we've sort of hit on a candidate:

Bruce Campbell as Doctor Strange

By the Hoary Hosts of Hoggoth, indeed !!!

Re:And who should play Doctor Strange ??

[mink]

I'd suggest Christopher Lee or anyone who can look/sound like Dr. Orpheus (a Dr. Strange parody) off of venture brothers.

look who is doing it

[oldbenway]

I think what no one has touched on , is look who has control. I think Marvel is less likely to completely bone a comic movie than producers who view hollywood as a business. Since they are actually putting their necks out and risking the worth of their "brands", perhaps they will put the kind of care and attention into it that the films deserve. Less attention on the SONY logos, more attention to the radioactive spiders! Keep greedmeister Sam Raimi the hell out of it, and some of these might turn out all right.

Howard the Duck !!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

They have the SFX now, they could do it properly.

Please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please Marvel.

Re:hold on there a moment

[Anonymous Coward]

The point is that the famous 'Sandman' series is basically 90% angsty touchy-feely stuff, 5% action and 5% WTF. Yet you can bet your pants that if Hollywood gets their hands on it, those percentages are going to turn around by the second script revision. Which is why no movie is being made of it -- Neil Gaiman makes a decent living as an author anyway, and he's kind of picky about not letting his name be used on crap.

Re:Actual conversation about the Hulk movie overhe

[masdog]

You're user ID is way too low for someone who saw Casablanca in the theater.

Other Indy comics with better plots

[databank]

I wonder if they ever the movie industry will ever think about doing more indy titles like Rising Stars or The Darkness?

Rising Stars would be great for its plot, and the darkness is kinda kewl as the anti-hero (along the lines of Sin City) with a hit-man trying to deal with his dark powers and still be honerable to himself. ... And how about stuff like Mage (A Hero discovered). It would be kewl if its done right. Although I think that personally part of the appeal of that comic for me is the artwork.

What would even be cooler would be if they did 10 movies like how Cross-gen does it's 'comic universe'; each comic is independent but reveals something about its relationship to every other comic. A movie about the Negation, The First, and then maybe Mystic, Sojourn, Crux and Sigil would be pretty slick. So long as each movie had some element that showed crossover with every other movie, I think the appeal to viewers overall would increase.

Cloak & Dagger's been done...

[danheretic]

and it was awesome!

Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Surely Ant Man would be a Java programmer?

All I can think is...

[FurryFeet]

They should make three films, with a $175 million budget each.

Re: beastmaster vs highlander!!!1!

[Sinner]

That's a terrible idea. Make sure you get Connery.

Holy shit!

[StarKruzr]

I REMEMBER THAT! It was the girl with the Destroyer power (could turn matter into energy and then blast it at people).

Damn. Memories.

If I could have any of their abilities, it'd have to be the gravity kid. I mean, come on - how flexible is THAT?

Re:What the hell is an ant-man? I only see antman

[mink]

Look up Infocomics for an attempt at what was in Big.