Superhero Overkill
Am I the only one who thinks the new Spiderman looks a little corny? It also just doesn't look quite right visually either. I would suppose they are trying to distance themselves from the original, which is good, but I don't feel this is the right way. I may be way off on this, but until I hear otherwise, I have no desire to watch the new Spiderman flick.
I also saw The Avengers recently. Yeah, it's been out for almost two months, but I kept dragging my feet (combined with the fact a 2 year old doesn't allow much Mommy and Daddy time). I wasn't real thrilled about all the superheroes being lumped together. I figured there would be too much going on.
So after it broke numerous box office records, I finally went to see it. I got to say, after about 30 minutes I was bored to tears. Why did it take so long to get into the action? Aren't these characters already established from their solo movie(s)? The movie did get better fortunately, but I will say if they replaced Iron Man with some other Marvel hero, the movie wouldn't have done it for me at all. (I will call myself an Iron Man nerd. Or, am I just a Robert Downey Jr. nerd? The dude has charisma. Definitely something worth pondering.)
I think most people are giving it a perfect "10", whereas I'm thinking more the 7-7.5 range. I can't figure out why all these superhero movies (of late) that are unanimously praised by all, come up short in my mind. Obviously you can immediately assume that I'm a cynical asshole, which may be partly true, but the rest of the truth dawned on me while having this conversation with a friend.
"I think I'm getting burned out on superhero movies." I instantly felt guilt along with that revelation. My mind raced back to the year 2000 when my sister and I went to see X-Men and I remember thinking, "This movie is either going to be terrible, or awesome." (Keep in mind, this was the first superhero movie of prominence in many years, and the genre would be officially kicked off 2 summers later, with ironically, Spiderman.) Well fortunately for 14 year old me, I loved it. Hugh Jackman was my new hero, and I couldn't wait for a new X-Men movie.
Now here I am in 2012 wanting a change. Why? As my wife so eloquently put it, "All you watch is superhero movies and comedies." Which if true, (it is), why would I make such a dramatic statement? The more I thought of it, the simpler the answer was: OVERKILL.
Yes I said that Spiderman looked "Corny", but part of my lack of interest has to come purely from sentiment. I love '02 Spiderman. If I made a top 5 superhero list it would probably be number 5. I don't want to see that replaced. Also, after the atrocity known as Spiderman 3, I think everyone needs a break from Spidey.
So issue one is "reboots" I understand that all the "hardcore" nerds defend reboots by saying that the comics get rebooted every so often, so the movies should too. OK, I get that, but I'm sure these same nerds would be rioting in the streets if they remade Star Wars: A New Hope with Justin Beiber playing Luke. (Hey he has the same haircut as Luke!)
Joking aside, the Batman reboot of '05 is/was abso-fucking-lutely incredible. Batman Begins is my favorite movie ever, and the realism added to it gave it a whole other dimension. I will call a spade a spade here. Batman may be the one character iconic enough to pull off these transformations if done correctly, Hulk conversely, is one that failed miserably.
Hulk got a makeover in '08 due to the extreme crappiness of the '03 version. Which in all fairness it was a better movie, but I would hear questions from people that would pretty much go like this: "So is this a sequel, a re-do or what?"
Which is another point against reboots; you confuse the audience. If you think the Avengers was made to please the comic book nerds, then you got another thing coming. Avengers was made to sell a shitload of toys, Halloween costumes, and in general just to make 100 trillion dollars. My point is, the superhero genre at the end of the day want to appeal to the mainstream audience, not the hardcore nerds. (Sorry guys, put down your dungeons and dragons for a minute and pay attention.)
So a reboot of Spiderman a mere 10 years after the first one came out (and five years after the last), is overkill. Which is probably a good reason why Batman actually succeeded. Begins came out in '05, Batman '89 came out in, you guessed it! 1989! Think how much time changed in that span with computers, cell phones, Nirvana, Tickle Me Elmo, Titanic, Britney Spears, Allen Iverson, etc. It had been long enough that it didn't feel like it was cramping Keaton's style. Or too a much lesser extent Val Kilmer. (I refuse to acknowledge that other guy.)
Even though Batman Begins succeeded well beyond imagination, it too suffered from the aforementioned confusion factor. (Sequel? New one?) And the only reason it overcame it is due to the brilliance of Christoper Nolan. And of course later Heath Ledger. Smaller characters, like say Thor couldn't do this in my opinion. I'm sure they will try anyway in 10-15 years, but won't have the success they would like to have. (X-Men could probably get away with numerous reboots just because there are so many characters to play with. I'm sure they would never get away from the Magneto/Wolverine/Professor X mainstays though. Not that they should.)
So my second issue, and most important, is the sheer number of superhero movies coming out now. Reboots tie into this obviously, but even taking away those, there are too many released every summer. "Back in the day" it used to be one, maybe two were released a summer. (Probably the former) Let's look at what last summer looked like: X-Men First Class, Thor, Green Lantern, Transformers 3, and Captain America, and any more that I may have forgotten. That's five! I guess for movie buffs that is a good deal, but I would think the mainstream audience would be burned out on superheroes by summer's end. I know I was.
Bringing it back around though, superhero flicks are a genre of their own now, and as long as they are breaking box office records I don't see them going anywhere. I don't think they should either. But I'm just subscribing to the theory that too much of anything is a bad thing. Think how many sucky superhero movies there have been in the last five years, compared to the five years before that? Try and tell me that some of that doesn't have to do with too many being released that shouldn't have been in the first place!
And to prove I'm not anti-superhero now I will say this. I'm really looking forward to The Dark Knight Rises. [Just not anything else :)]
Anybody else think it's become overkill?
I also saw The Avengers recently. Yeah, it's been out for almost two months, but I kept dragging my feet (combined with the fact a 2 year old doesn't allow much Mommy and Daddy time). I wasn't real thrilled about all the superheroes being lumped together. I figured there would be too much going on. So after it broke numerous box office records, I finally went to see it. I got to say, after about 30 minutes I was bored to tears. Why did it take so long to get into the action? Aren't these characters already established from their solo movie(s)? The movie did get better fortunately, but I will say if they replaced Iron Man with some other Marvel hero, the movie wouldn't have done it for me at all. (I will call myself an Iron Man nerd. Or, am I just a Robert Downey Jr. nerd? The dude has charisma. Definitely something worth pondering.)
I think most people are giving it a perfect "10", whereas I'm thinking more the 7-7.5 range. I can't figure out why all these superhero movies (of late) that are unanimously praised by all, come up short in my mind. Obviously you can immediately assume that I'm a cynical asshole, which may be partly true, but the rest of the truth dawned on me while having this conversation with a friend. "I think I'm getting burned out on superhero movies." I instantly felt guilt along with that revelation. My mind raced back to the year 2000 when my sister and I went to see X-Men and I remember thinking, "This movie is either going to be terrible, or awesome." (Keep in mind, this was the first superhero movie of prominence in many years, and the genre would be officially kicked off 2 summers later, with ironically, Spiderman.) Well fortunately for 14 year old me, I loved it. Hugh Jackman was my new hero, and I couldn't wait for a new X-Men movie.
Now here I am in 2012 wanting a change. Why? As my wife so eloquently put it, "All you watch is superhero movies and comedies." Which if true, (it is), why would I make such a dramatic statement? The more I thought of it, the simpler the answer was: OVERKILL.
Yes I said that Spiderman looked "Corny", but part of my lack of interest has to come purely from sentiment. I love '02 Spiderman. If I made a top 5 superhero list it would probably be number 5. I don't want to see that replaced. Also, after the atrocity known as Spiderman 3, I think everyone needs a break from Spidey.
So issue one is "reboots" I understand that all the "hardcore" nerds defend reboots by saying that the comics get rebooted every so often, so the movies should too. OK, I get that, but I'm sure these same nerds would be rioting in the streets if they remade Star Wars: A New Hope with Justin Beiber playing Luke. (Hey he has the same haircut as Luke!) Joking aside, the Batman reboot of '05 is/was abso-fucking-lutely incredible. Batman Begins is my favorite movie ever, and the realism added to it gave it a whole other dimension. I will call a spade a spade here. Batman may be the one character iconic enough to pull off these transformations if done correctly, Hulk conversely, is one that failed miserably.
Hulk got a makeover in '08 due to the extreme crappiness of the '03 version. Which in all fairness it was a better movie, but I would hear questions from people that would pretty much go like this: "So is this a sequel, a re-do or what?"
Which is another point against reboots; you confuse the audience. If you think the Avengers was made to please the comic book nerds, then you got another thing coming. Avengers was made to sell a shitload of toys, Halloween costumes, and in general just to make 100 trillion dollars. My point is, the superhero genre at the end of the day want to appeal to the mainstream audience, not the hardcore nerds. (Sorry guys, put down your dungeons and dragons for a minute and pay attention.)
So a reboot of Spiderman a mere 10 years after the first one came out (and five years after the last), is overkill. Which is probably a good reason why Batman actually succeeded. Begins came out in '05, Batman '89 came out in, you guessed it! 1989! Think how much time changed in that span with computers, cell phones, Nirvana, Tickle Me Elmo, Titanic, Britney Spears, Allen Iverson, etc. It had been long enough that it didn't feel like it was cramping Keaton's style. Or too a much lesser extent Val Kilmer. (I refuse to acknowledge that other guy.)
Even though Batman Begins succeeded well beyond imagination, it too suffered from the aforementioned confusion factor. (Sequel? New one?) And the only reason it overcame it is due to the brilliance of Christoper Nolan. And of course later Heath Ledger. Smaller characters, like say Thor couldn't do this in my opinion. I'm sure they will try anyway in 10-15 years, but won't have the success they would like to have. (X-Men could probably get away with numerous reboots just because there are so many characters to play with. I'm sure they would never get away from the Magneto/Wolverine/Professor X mainstays though. Not that they should.)
So my second issue, and most important, is the sheer number of superhero movies coming out now. Reboots tie into this obviously, but even taking away those, there are too many released every summer. "Back in the day" it used to be one, maybe two were released a summer. (Probably the former) Let's look at what last summer looked like: X-Men First Class, Thor, Green Lantern, Transformers 3, and Captain America, and any more that I may have forgotten. That's five! I guess for movie buffs that is a good deal, but I would think the mainstream audience would be burned out on superheroes by summer's end. I know I was. Bringing it back around though, superhero flicks are a genre of their own now, and as long as they are breaking box office records I don't see them going anywhere. I don't think they should either. But I'm just subscribing to the theory that too much of anything is a bad thing. Think how many sucky superhero movies there have been in the last five years, compared to the five years before that? Try and tell me that some of that doesn't have to do with too many being released that shouldn't have been in the first place!
And to prove I'm not anti-superhero now I will say this. I'm really looking forward to The Dark Knight Rises. [Just not anything else :)]
Anybody else think it's become overkill?
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