Super Heros and Super Zeros

 

Let's take a break from video games for a week. It does say above that this blog is about video games, movies, music, and video games, and I'm pretty sure there's just a little bit of variety in that list.

I'm sure a fair share of gamers also enjoy their movies, especially ones that are tailored to their overlapping interests. Geek culture does span quite the distance in many directions, and the one direction I'm referring to above is comics and superheroes. The Dark Knight was one of the greatest movies I've ever seen and in my opinion one of the greatest movies of all time.

Before I go on, I'll say that I am much, MUCH less of an expert on movies and film than I am on video games. I am a gamer first, and I am a semi-frequent moviegoer second, but I am no expert or professional. I'm merely stating what I'm seeing in front of me, and you should take it for what you will.

Remember this movie? Well, you might remember it for different reasons depending on who you are. If you're a general person wanting an action-filled superhero movie, then you probably didn't mind this movie a lot. A little rough around the edges, but you got what you came for I suppose. However, if you're a fan of The Green Lantern with knowledge of his comic book storyline and you waited with great anticipation up to the moment you saw it on the big screen, then you'll probably remember it as the worst piece of crap to ever happen to superhero movies in recent memory.

Now, both Green Lantern and The Dark Knight were made in Warner Bros. Studios, who have the rights to several of DC Comics' roster of superheroes like Batman and Green Lantern. Why is it that they can kick out a 24-karat diamond of a movie like The Dark Knight, but come around and release a pile of manure like Green Lantern? To me, my first impressions are telling me that they may not know entirely what they're doing when it comes to telling the story of a well-known superhero. There is the obvious exception in Batman, but let me go off on a tangent for a moment.

Above is probably my most anticipated movie right now, The Avengers. Over the past several years, Marvel opened up their own movie studio to only make movies about their superheroes. A handful of movies later, a plot has revealed itself for this upcoming movie, and in a nutshell, everything that happened in all the other movies so far is canon. That's right: An entire movie universe is being made of some of our favorite Marvel heroes. Not only is this the coolest damn thing ever, but every one of their movies in this series so far has received generally positive to very good reviews, so The Avengers is looking very, very good right now.

Why does this matter? Marvel is making their own movies in their own studio and essentially doing all the hard work themselves. Because they know of generally everything that's happening, the movies can keep the flavor of the heroes that we know and love and we generally enjoy them. Warner Bros. did a terrible job with Green Lantern because they very well could not have possibly understood the years of backstory and lore found in the comics. In my opinion, the reason they only seem to make decent Batman movies is because his backstory really isn't that complicated and it makes a good, dramatic movie, especially with so many well-known and compelling villains at their disposal for him to fight. That's not to say every Batman movie by them was good (remember Batman Forever?), and all Marvel films are good (Spiderman 3...ugh...) but the pattern follows for the most part. Superman is getting a reboot from his last disaster of a movie, and several lesser-known DC series were met with confusion or bad reviews as well, like The Losers from the Vertigo series or the recent Jonah Hex movie.

Either way, hopefully they can find a way to make a good superhero movie other than Batman. I do love Batman, and The Dark Knight Rises looks amazing so far, but sometimes I wish something like this would happen again...and to be honest, I don't know if it ever will...