Movie Heroes Per Decade?

[ZE_501]

Probably just coincidence but it got me thinking; in terms of movie heroes that captured the general public's imagination via a blockbuster film, we seem to get one every 9-10 years ...

1980 -- Luke Skywalker (Indiana Jones was around in '81 but Star Wars was a cultural juggernaut)
1989 -- Batman ... for those that remember, the hype was very real and that bat symbol was *everywhere*
1999 -- Neo from The Matrix ... no one had seen anything like it at the time.

(2001-2003 had Jackson's LOTR as the big event, but unless you're a Tolkien/Fantasy nerd, not sure any single character stands out for general audiences)

2008 -- Iron Man ... although to be fair I don't think anyone realized how big the MCU was going to be.

2017 - 2018 ... was it just a matter of the MCU's peak era (Civil War etc.) or am I forgetting someone?

2026 - 2027 ... what's on the horizon now that Superhero Fatigue seems to be a real thing, and we haven't had a bona fide action hero in a while or so it seems? Who was the last one, Craig's Bond? Bond is a legacy character with history but I'm not sure Craig made an impact like say ... Connery did, for a lot of reasons such as shifting media landscape etc.

Any thoughts on where the zeitgeist is headed?

 

[Mondragon]

Start at the beginning
1920

First Blockbuster star and pretty much invented the action hero genre:
Fairbanks- Mark of Zorro:

Went on to influence a whole other genre of Heroes still thriving today in comics and movies:

Jerry Siegel: "I loved The Mark of Zorro, and I'm sure that had some influence on me." ..."When writing the script, I had Douglass Fairbanks very much in mind in the athletic stunts that he did too, so the influence of Douglass Fairbanks was not only in the art but in the visual action."

Joe Shuster - "I was a great fan of Douglas Fairbanks, and so was Jerry and I tried to use his stance, the way Douglass Fairbanks looked, ...with his hands on his hips, in Robin Hood and Mark of Zorro, in all those he had those marvelous attitude..." " [His costume] was inspired by the costume pictures that Fairbanks did: they greatly influenced us. He did The Mark of Zorro, and Robin Hood, and a marvelous one called The Black Pirate - Fairbanks would swing on ropes very much like Superman flying... the feeling of action as he was flying or jumping or leaping - a flowing cape would give it movement.

Bill Finger - "Batman was a combination of Douglas Fairbanks [who played Zorro] and Sherlock Holmes."

Bob Kane -"Zorro’s use of a mask to conceal his identity as Don Diego gave me the idea of giving Batman a secret identity…Bruce Wayne would be a man of means who put on a façade of being effete. Zorro rode a black horse called Tornado and would enter a cave and exit from a grandfather clock in the living room. The bat-cave was inspired by this cave in Zorro. I didn't want Batman to be a Superhero with superpowers…So I made Batman an ordinary human being; he is just an athlete who has the physical prowess of Douglas Fairbanks, Sr., who was my all-time favorite hero in the movies."

Then again into 30s-40s Movie Serials like Zorro's Fighting Legion and Rides Again, still influencing the next gen of creators and heroic action films of (Lucas & Spielberg) into the 70s-80s where your list begins...

 

[ZE_501]

Start at the begining

1920

Fair enough ... so who's got 1920?

 

[ironwez20]

Ummm from 2002-2007 it was definitely raimi Spider-Man, lotr and Harry Potter. Those ran the 00s til about 2011

 

[ZE_501]

Ummm from 2002-2007 it was definitely raimi Spider-Man.

I had thought of him but wasn't sure. No one else comes to mind.

Start at the beginning
1920
First Blockbuster star and pretty much invented the action hero genre:
Fairbanks- Mark of Zorro

Yeah, didn't know when his first appearance was, but that tracks. Directly after I'm thinking Robin Hood and maybe a bunch of Westerns (Errol Flynn comes to mind) but I'm not well-versed.

1920 - Zorro

30's
40's
50's
60's


1977 - 1983 -- Luke Skywalker
1989 -- Batman
1999 -- Neo
2002 - 2007 Spider-Man (Raimi)
2008 -- Iron Man ... although to be fair I don't think anyone realized how big the MCU was going to be.

2017 - 2018 ... was it just a matter of the MCU's peak era (Civil War etc.) or am I forgetting someone?

 

[Mondragon]

Movie Heroes Per Decade?

30's

Assuming we are mostly going with Action/Adventure Movie Heroes.
30's
Tarzan - Weissmüller era (most today are likely oblivious to the cultural phenomena this was)

or Flash Gordon Serials - Buster Crabbe era (Lucas borrowed from everywhere, yet without it we don't have SW, we know he was trying to remake this for the eternal kid in him), no denying the ongoing impact it still has today.

60's

I'de give 60s to Connery era Bond, did at least 6 Bond films that decade, pretty much defined the action hero star for that era.

Though at the other end of the spectrum were anti-heroes like them Man With No Name, so have fun choosing between them.

70's

70s gave me:
Fist of Fury, anything with Bruce Lee
Mad Max Rockatansky
Shaft
Rocky
Ellen Ripley
Dirty Harry
Luke Skywalker (Leia & Han Solo)
Superman (Reeve)

and more....
Don't even make me chose.

80's

Luke, Leia & Han (again)
Indiana Jones
Snake Plissken
Rambo
Tony Montana Scarface
Conan the Barbarian (Schwarzenegger
Connor MacLeod & Juan Sánchez-Villalobos Ramírez
John McClane
Batman (Keaton)
and way to many more to chose from

(though if we are going by witch single character sold the most toys, it's Batman!

 

[chrisstbh]

Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine surely? He was basically the face of Fox for almost 2 decades.

 

[ironwez20]

Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine surely? He was basically the face of Fox for almost 2 decades.

So would it be. 00s wolverine,Spider-Man , lotr and Harry Potter.
I’d say Spider-Man was a bit bigger during that time tho. The Spider-Man 3 hype was insane

 

[chrisstbh]

So would it be. 00s wolverine,Spider-Man , lotr and Harry Potter.
I’d say Spider-Man was a bit bigger during that time tho. The Spider-Man 3 hype was insane

It’s a tough one for sure. Even though my love for Spidey is unmatched I gotta give it to Wolverine personally.

Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine was so huge that he’s been playing the role for 25 years, nobody dared make a movie featuring the character without him in the role.

Tobey has great movies and he will always be my Spider-Man, but he’s not THE Spider-Man. Jackman is THE Wolverine.

 

[ZE_501]

Well, there are two ways to approach this ... list popular action/genre blockbuster type films that made an impact on pop culture, or narrow it down to a specific character/hero that dominated by decade where possible.

I want to say Raimi Spider-Man was bigger than Jackman's Wolverine, particularly early Jackman appearances ... hadn't even thought of Harry Potter because I'm not a big fan, but no denying that impact ...

 

[ZE_501]

It’s a tough one for sure. Even though my love for Spidey is unmatched I gotta give it to Wolverine personally.

Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine was so huge that he’s been playing the role for 25 years, nobody dared make a movie featuring the character without him in the role.

Tobey has great movies and he will always be my Spider-Man, but he’s not THE Spider-Man. Jackman is THE Wolverine.

This is a good point, now I'm kinda torn between the two. I think Jackman made more impact on general audiences later in his career though.

 

[ironwez20]

It’s a tough one for sure. Even though my love for Spidey is unmatched I gotta give it to Wolverine personally.

Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine was so huge that he’s been playing the role for 25 years, nobody dared make a movie featuring the character without him in the role.

Tobey has great movies and he will always be my Spider-Man, but he’s not THE Spider-Man. Jackman is THE Wolverine.

I know but during that time and era Spider-Man was so huge. It was groundbreaking seeing Spider-Man on the big screen. I don’t know if you were there but the hype for Spider-Man 3 was through the roof. Venom was probably the most anticipated marvel villian to be adapted back then.
Yes wolverine was huge and he is the definitive wolverine but those raimi Spider-Man movies were absolutely huge especially after spidey 2 dropped.

 

[ZE_501]

So going by the One Hero method: dominated pop culture or was in some way groundbreaking, seemingly appearing approximately once per decade but that last part's pretty loose-y and goose-y:

1920 - Zorro
1930 - Flash Gordon
1940 -
1950 -
1960 -
1977 - 1983 -- Luke Skywalker
1989 -- Batman
1999 -- Neo
2002 - 2007 -- Spider-Man (Raimi)
2008 -- Iron Man
2017

 

[a-dev]

Can actor popularity come into it?

If so Hugh Jackman's Wolverine definitely has to be in there. Who doesn't love that man, even in these divisive and intensely tribal times, he somehow manages to be loved by everyone. I haven't seen Deadpool & Wolverine yet but I have watched clips and he's brilliant once again from what I can tell.

Keanu Reeves is similarly a well-liked guy, he's got Neo and John Wick. Also Jack Traven in Speed and Johnny Utah in Point Break, albeit only one film each for those characters.

 

[Mondragon]

Can actor popularity come into it?

40's

If we are switching from single heroic character, to actor popularity now superseding the character they played, then I'd give the 40's to Bogart, though not so much an Action Hero, more dramatic, pulp/noir anti-hero persona;
That decade he did; Starting with The Maltese Falcon's (Sam Spade), Casablanca (Rick), To Have and Have Not (Steve Morgan), The Big Sleep (Philip Marlowe), Sierra Madre, Key Largo, etc...

 

[ZE_501]

If we are switching from single heroic character, to actor popularity now superseding the character they played, then I'd give the 40's to Bogart, though not so much an Action Hero, more dramatic, pulp/noir anti-hero persona;
That decade he did; Starting with The Maltese Falcon's (Sam Spade), Casablanca (Rick), To Have and Have Not (Steve Morgan), The Big Sleep (Philip Marlowe), Sierra Madre, Key Largo, etc...

Can actor popularity come into it?

If so Hugh Jackman's Wolverine definitely has to be in there. Who doesn't love that man, even in these divisive and intensely tribal times, he somehow manages to be loved by everyone. I haven't seen Deadpool & Wolverine yet but I have watched clips and he's brilliant once again from what I can tell.

Keanu Reeves is similarly a well-liked guy, he's got Neo and John Wick. Also Jack Traven in Speed and Johnny Utah in Point Break, albeit only one film each for those characters.

 

[ZE_501]

Back at it. So what I'm trying to pin down is a singular character that dominated pop cultural consciousness or heavily influenced it, in cycles running approximately every 6-10 years.

1920 - Zorro

1930 - Flash Gordon (3 film serials, '36, '38, '40)

1940 - According to Wikipedia, sales of Superman comics likely peaked in this era.

1950 - Buck Rogers (comic strip seems to be cited as hugely influential on spec fiction in the '50s but was actually created in 1929, a year before Flash Gordon)

1960 - James Bond (Played by Connery from 1962 - 1983 across 7 films)

1977 - 1983 -- Luke Skywalker

1989 -- Batman

1999 -- Neo

2002 - 2007 -- Spider-Man (Raimi)

2008 -- Iron Man

2017 -- ??


Where do Tarzan, John Carter of Mars, and Conan factor in? I feel like at least Tarzan shouldn't be discounted but not sure the other two characters were ever 'household names'.

Looking at the quick list above, it's also a combination of comic strips, pulp fiction and film, from the serials to the modern day blockbusters they inspired.

 

[Mondragon]

1940 - According to Wikipedia, sales of Superman comics likely peaked in this era.

Well if you need movies to represent it, the Fleischer Superman theatrical cartoons and then the Superman Columbia Pictures Fillm Serials, coincides with that decade.

As far as influence Bruce Timm's animated works still influenced by Fleischer, and we all know from whose adopted father Stan Lee, "borrowed" his most impactful sentiment.

1950 - Buck Rogers (comic strip seems to be cited as hugely influential on spec fiction in the '50s but was actually created in 1929, a year before Flash Gordon)

Again if looking for movie specific, and are generous with your definition of hero, you can give the 50s to Godzilla , helped influence the whole atomic age, giant monster + alien invasion craze, though there are many others, he was god amongst them, impact is still influential today.

In that vein you can just as well give the 1930s to King Kong, or the Universal Monsters, Dracula, Frankenstein, their movies impacts still being felt today.

 

[chrisstbh]

2017 -- ??

Nominees:

• Caesar (Planet of the Apes)
• Logan
• Spider-Man again
• Rey lol kidding)
• Thor got his time to shine in 2017 too.
• Deadpool (2018 for DP2)

 

[ironwez20]

Ceaser is highly well known . Maybe him? Or black panther?