by Mike Lunsford, Editor

Hello again ComicsOnline readers! It’s your man, Mike Lunsford back again with another editorial.

When we look back on 2016, it will be remembered as the year of great comic book movies.  We’ve already had Deadpool, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Captain America 3: Civil War, X-Men: Apocalypse and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: Out of the Shadows and we still have Suicide Squad later this summer and Doctor Strange this fall. The biggest titles by far are Cap 3 and B v S: DOJ. No matter what Suicide Squad does, those two will always be intertwined because of their nature. They’re essentially the same in the story they tell: two heroes known thus far as friends fight each other with the undertone of government involvement in superhero/vigilantism. And because of that, people will debate which one was better until the end of time.

“Batman v Superman was darker and more intellectual, whereas Cap 3 was full of plot holes and was too cheesy.”

“That’s garbage! Civil War executed properly in all the ways it could have. It was a better version of the same thing.”

To quote a great wrestler…

“IT DOESN’T MATTER WHAT YOU THINK!”

First things first:  B v S was not more intellectual. Both movies told the same story, Cap 3 just managed to do it without boring its audience to death. I hate to break it to the DC sycophants, but a 2 ½ hour Easter egg hunt is not intellectual.  As far as DC/WB is concerned, even though it was critically panned, Batman v Superman made nearly $900 million as of this writing. That’s impressive. There was an expectation to make $1 Billion, but that’s asking a lot for any film, especially one that many people were not happy seeing the first time, let alone second viewings.  It missed on things like keeping the story streamlined: it felt like the producers were so concerned with trying to cram a ton of characters and mentions to things in-universe that they missed that there was a story to tell. Batman v Superman had its moments, but they were few and far between. Much of the movie was uninteresting and certain characters were bafflingly unfamiliar (WTF was up with Jesse Eisenberg’s Lex Luthor?). 

Marvel fans: your movie wasn’t without flaws either.  I thought Civil War was much more entertaining; however…what a garbage ending!

***SPOILERS FOLLOW***

To have Cap and Iron Man duke it out in the end of the movie, go their separate ways and then…Cap writes a letter to him saying “if you need me, call me” takes all of the impact away from their fight in the first place. Look, I get that Captain America is all about “doing what’s right,” but that doesn’t take away that he is still a rogue vigilante who refuses to follow international law.  To set such a great tone throughout the entire movie only to end it like this was a bit disappointing.

***SPOILERS END****

That all being said, it truly doesn’t matter which one of these movies you thought was better. Marvel/Disney can take pride that their movie “won,” but they’ve been doing this a little bit longer than DC has. This was DC’S first attempt at a world-building film, so for there to be missteps is not worth condemning them.  We still get to see the Avengers AND the beginnings of the Justice League on the big screen! Our childhood dreams are finally becoming a reality. 

That being said, DC/WB is in a unique situation with the Justice League staples of Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman. With Batman and Superman, it is nearly impossible to ruin these characters so that people won’t go see another movie with them involved. Seriously, think about it. Batman & Robin is universally thought of as one of the worst superhero movies ever. It has an 11% on Rotten Tomatoes. Dolph Lundgren’s Punisher has a 28%!!! Let that sink in for a moment. It took 8 years, but there was another Batman movie (Batman Begins in 2005). Christopher Nolan’s trilogy of Bat films gave the franchise new life, and arguably one of the best comic book movie adaptations ever seen, in The Dark Knight.

Superman shares the same fate. Superman III and Superman IV had 28% and 12% respectively on RT and people still saw those movies. People still TALK about those movies today, often fondly. It took a while for another Superman film: nearly 19 years.  Even with Superman Returns being a respectable ‘love song’ to Richard Donner’s original Superman, Bryan Singer was unable to catch the excitement DC/WB was looking to inspire. They reset Supes again, with 2013’s Man of Steel. It was successful enough to spawn the current keystone Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

The two biggest names in superheroes have been trampled on, disrespected, insulted with horrible adaptations…yet they keep coming back. These two comic book heroes are unsinkable. This gives DC/WB the flexibility to try something different with these characters and not be stuck doing exactly what the comic books state. Say what you will about Zach Snyder’s interpretation of these characters but he was not scared to try some new things. He brought his uniquely dark vision to the DC pantheon and was unapologetic for not doing things “how the fans wanted to see it.” Good for him. I personally thought it made for a movie that dragged at points, but it was ambitious. My aforementioned “WTF moment” with the Lex Luthor interpretation is a perfect example of not sticking to previous conventions on “how a character should be played.” Yes, Warner Bros might be freaking out a bit now, saying they are changing things for the rest of the franchise, but they know that there isn’t much that can really sink their two cash cows.

Now…let’s talk about Wonder Woman. She fits into the category of “Justice League staple,” even though her screen time was limited in B v S. People were so excited to see an awesome on-screen depiction of her that the limited face time was forgiven. We finally have Wonder Woman in a movie! For someone who is such an integral part of the Justice League to FINALLY be getting some big screen attention is well overdue. I can’t wait to see what Gal Gadot does as the Amazonian princess Diana. They can even take a page from Captain America: The First Avenger and do her first movie as a period piece, setting up her history and showing how she came to be at the point she was in B v S. This leads to another ranting point for me…

I am so over this whole “females don’t make good action hero leads,” thing. I’m so sick of the people who think that the only reason we’re seeing so many movies going to a female lead is because of societal pressure (they’re mostly young males and chauvinists). The Star Wars fanboy outrage is a great example of this. There were people who were mad that Rogue One: A Star Wars Story was going to have another female lead after Daisy Ridley was set as the main protagonist in the new Star Wars Trilogy. Just so you know the score would now be “Females who are the primary protagonist in Star Wars movies” 4 to “Sausage Fest Star Wars and Star Wars Prequels” 6.  And that’s not even mentioning the newly announced Han Solo one-shot, which makes another dude-centric movie for the Star Wars saga. This was a franchise that had less than a dozen nameable female characters in their first 6 movies! If you’re a man and can only respect men in action movie roles, you have a whole bigger set of issues you need to work out. You are no different than the racists who were mad that Star Wars was going to have a black main character. If you’re one of those guys, as a representative of the inclusive nerd population, let me show you the door.

Back to my main point: It doesn’t matter which one of these movies was better.  Civil War and Batman v Superman told the same story but from different points in the overall timeline. Civil War is taking place well into the established Marvel Cinematic Universe whereas Batman v Superman is the second in the DC Justice League storyline. We can hope that the future installments will be more palatable but here’s some food for thought: when people had issue with Man of Steel and its orgy of death and violence, Zack Snyder made sure that was addressed in Dawn of Justice. Now that Geoff Johns is a co-head of DC Films, I’m sure that his experience with these characters will help give them some much needed depth.

This is a great time to be a comic book geek. All the biggest characters in the comic book world are involved in movies! What more could we ask for?

Oh yeah, a decent Green Lantern flick.