Re: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice
I can see where Rory is coming from, but I think you can look at it on two levels. Yes, at this point most comic movies are variations on a theme. GOTG seems to be a riff on the quirky lovable scamps that Tony Stark made work in a comic film. Cap was simply superimposing a political espionage type theme on top of a fairly traditional comic narrative, and Thor 2 was (IMO) an advancement in making a fun, action comic movie that embraced what it was, and wasn't held down by unnecessary exposition/origin stories, and awkward/uneven pacing. But that is an evolution, that could only occur by having other films come first that established precedents and failed or succeeded by trying things a bit differently. And I think that evolution is a positive thing, unlike, say, Spidey 3, or X3, or Man of Steel, which was total devolution.
But sure, another way to make things even more exciting and fresh is to try and reinvent the wheel in some way. That's what Iron Man did, and X-Men and the Nolan films before it. I would love to see Dr. Strange do some of that. If I had any faith whatsoever in WB, I would hope for that with Sandman, but I don't, so I don't. There are different kinds of comic stories that we haven't seen done, or done well on the big screen--Vertigo stuff, mystical/magic stuff, space stuff (maybe GOTG will succeed there), trippy stuff like the Invisibles, post-modern stuff like Planetary, neoclassic stuff like Supreme, manic, over the top comedies like Deadpool, allowing an auteur like Wright, or Wes Anderson, or Cronenberg, or the Coens to take on a comic property, etc. And I do hope we will see more experimentation on that front. But at the same time, in my mind, we are seeing innovations and improvements on a smaller scale, which give us better films, and keep these franchises from becoming more genuinely stale.
Can't wait for Superhero movies to end and Videogame movies take over.
I don't really see that happening. Videogame franchises, with a few major exceptions (Mario, Zelda and the like) have a shelf life. They aren't as universal over time like comics, and they run their course, and folks move on to the next idea. Which makes some sense as an analogy for the short-attention span you can stereotype to folks playing videogames. Furter, they usually don't create the same level of iconic, memorable characters (talking long term here) as comics, and I'm not sure they connect with younger audiences in a way that tugs on the nostalgia strings the same way comics do. Particularly now that major videogames seem primarily tailored to teens and young adults. I think the time for a great run of videogame movies would have been about a decade ago, when guys like many of us who grew up playing NES/Genesis/etc. as really young kids would have loved seeing smart, updated, film versions of, say, Legend of Zelda or Castlevania. Now? Sure, you can get a hit out of something like Halo, Metal Gear, Res. Evil, or what have you. But I think it misses some critical components that make comic movies successes.
I do hope though, that one day we'll finally get a videogame movie that doesn't blow.
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