Marvel Comics Has Gone To The Movies!
Not that many years ago the public was blessed with a movie called "Batman & Robin",the fourth movie in the once successful "Batman" franchise.If you've seen this movie you no doubt know why it is considered the worst movies based on a comic book ever made.Some people consider it the worst movie ever put to the screen.Until this point only one major comic book company had their characters represented in movie theatres.DC Comics.
DC had quite a few movies based on their characters;Superman,Batman,Swamp Thing,Supergirl and Steel.There was four Batman and four Superman movies.The first Batman movie and the first two Superman movies are to me,classic.All of the other DC movies are pretty much throw away with the exception of "Batman Returns" and "Batman Forever" which were,at least watchable and were decent efforts.
When I was younger however,I loved comics but Marvel was my brand of choice and it seems that the movie studios have turned to them as well.Studios have been churning out flicks based on Marvel characters lately,and somehow they have all been pretty decent.Some I absolutely love.Lets take a look.
Blade.This was the first successful Marvel movie and it is an odd choice as Blade was not one of Marvels more popular characters,but it got the ball rolling.As a comic fan I did not have much enthusiasm for this,Blade was not a popular character,and Wesley Snipes(the actor chosen to play the lead) career at the time this was released was beginning to wane somewhat.I was pleasantly suprised.Instead of making yet another retarded superhero movie,here what we got was a cool vampire movie.It was quite fun to watch and while it's not on my list of favorites I quite like it and had a good time with a friend seeing it.It spawned a sequel but I did'nt like it as much as the first one.
X-Men.Everyone knew it was coming.A movie based on Marvels top selling book "X-Men".Years before this was actually made everyone predicted how bad it would be.No doubt people were jaded by the string of bad superhero movies that preceded it.But director Bryan Singer gave us something we'd had little of before in comic book movies:character development.The plot of the villian Magneto in this movie is quite laughable,but the movie is kept short and takes advantage of the elements that make X-Men such a hot seller.Unique characters dealing with predjudice in the world.The sequel,"X2" is even better.It was extra sweet to see my favorite comic book character,Wolverine,finally make it to the big time.
Spider-Man.The most successful of these movies brings Marvels most recognizable character to the big screen.Oddly it often borrows scenes from both the Batman and Superman movies and also has some forced post-911 patriotism in it,but the character interaction here is wonderful.I like how from the beginning to the end of the movie almost all the major characters have changed in profound ways.The villian,the Green Goblin looks like a rejected "Power Rangers" villian but Spidey himself looks pretty darn cool and Tobey McQuire is perfect for the part.Not my favorite of the Marvel movies,but it was the first movie in direct competition with a Star Wars film that actually made more money than a Star Wars film.That says something about either the quality of of "Spider-Man" or "Star Wars Episode II:Attack Of The Clones".The sequel is on the horizon.
Daredevil.I thought for sure this would be the "Batman & Robin" of the Marvel movies.Everything about it seemed wrong.Almost everyone of the actors in miscast in thier part.Ben Affleck is not my ideal Daredevil,Jennifer Garner looks nothing like her greek counterpart Elektra and Micheal Clark Duncan is a black man playing the Kingpin,who is a white man in the comics.Colin Farrel however can play Bullseye any time he wants to.Despite most of the actors being miscast they all took good care of their roles,and they WERE some scenes in this movie that were cheese but it often made up for it with some really cool scenes.Almost any scene with Bullseye was entertaining and the visualization of Daredevil's "radar sense" was well done.Also has a dark,almost got gothic tone to it.Nice.
Hulk.I saw the trailers for this.The Hulk is rendered by computer graphics in this movie and it is not the most real-looking thing on screen.I thought that the computer graphics in this movie would sink it.I saw it opening day and never before have I seen the Hulk smashing like this!Some people say the beginning moves kind of slow but I like that time was actually taken to tell the story and ,man oh man, I could look at Jennifer Connelly(who stars as Betty Ross) all day.Despite the obvious CGI to render the Hulk I think this movie was really good.Director Ang Lee does some editing here with split screens and other similiar methods to give this movie a unique flavor which very well complements comic book pop art.I thought the numbers game would catch up to Marvel here,once again I was pleasantly surprised.
Next up,The Punisher!We'll see how it goes and I hope DC has one of their characters back onto the screen and into a good movie.Overall these Marvel movies have pleased me,but theres so many of them!They are going to wear people out and people are going to say "Oh no!Not another super hero movie!",but I think at least with the majority of these movies people will look back upon them fondly and even,on occassion say "They don't make those movies like they used to."
