It’s not been confirmed but the line up for the new Justice League movie Warners Bros has slated for a 2015 will be: Batman, Superman, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, and The Flash.
This seems likely as while there have been others in the Justice League at various times, these five are perhaps the most notable, which is a good thing seeing as there is no word yet if Henry Cavill and Ryan Reynolds will be reprising their roles as Superman and Green Lantern. We already know Christian Bale will not be reprising his role as Batman as the JL movie will be removed from Nolan’s Batman universe and Batman could be rebooted as early as 2017. So, assuming Cavill and Reynolds are back, then their movies would be the ‘set up’ or ‘phase one’ of the DC Film-Verse which would culminate in the Justice League movie, but three out of five major characters will not have an origin movie.
Good thing these characters are recognizable… but are they really anymore so than the Avengers cast before the ‘Phase One – Avengers Assembled’ films were released:
The Avengers poster by Mondo
Batman and Superman are basically Iron Man. It could be argued that when Iron Man came out he wasn’t that recognizable beyond people knowing his name but the first movie catapulted his status to that of Bats and Supes. Phase One hadn’t really started yet so that movie counts. When Phase One really got going, you’d have to have been living under a rock not to have heard of Iron Man.
Wonder Woman is pretty much The Hulk. Both had wildly successful tv series, but ever since they’ve had issues with getting a decent movie off the ground and/or getting decent people to play them. They’re fairly recognizable characters though no one can name a single person in these character’s rogue’s gallery or their origin story beyond a few tidbits, unless they were already fans.
Green Lantern is Captain America. You can’t not have heard of these guys if you poked your nose anywhere around the comic-verse, but other than having one crappy movie (Captain America in 1990, Green Lantern in 2011) and being in other character’s animated shows, they haven’t gotten much love outside the comic-verse.
Flash, well, he really is Thor. They are two characters who people have heard of but get confused with other characters (mythology, Flash Gordan, Venom (true story!)). Also, they’re two characters who have had tv shows and movies no one remembers.
As for Black Widow and Hawkeye, they will be represented by whatever little-known-outside-the-comics characters end up getting picked for the supporting cast. They will then see skyrocketed comic book sales, their own solo titles, and possibly their own movie.
But again, only two of these characters (possibly one if they want to strike the tragedy that was Green Lantern off the record) will have introduction/origin movies. Will this help or hinder the effort?
Let’s look at the Phase One movies, here is a breakdown of how much money they made at the box office thanks to Box Office Mojo:
2008 – Iron Man – 318mil domestic – 585mil total (for comparison)
2008 – Incredible Hulk – 135mil domestic – 263mil total
2010 – Iron Man 2 – 312mil domestic – 624 total
2011 – Captain America – 177mil domestic – 367mil total
2011 – Thor – 181mil domestic – 449mil total
2012 – Avengers – 623mil domestic – 1.5billion total
Not only did the individual origin movies not come anywhere near Iron Man (save maybe Thor’s total take), even Iron Man fell into the shadow of the Avengers film itself.
Why is this so? Was Avengers just that much better than all the other movies?
While it was quality, you also have to take into account that Avengers pulled together fans of every single one of those characters. Those who watched Iron Man may not have cared to see Thor. Those who watched Captain American possibly didn’t care about The Incredible Hulk.
So the question now becomes… how are the sequels going to do? How many people who didn’t care about Thor and Loki went out and watched Thor after they watched Avengers? How many of those will be going to see Thor: The Dark World when it comes out? We won’t really know for sure until we see the numbers.
Superman’s_Profile_picture by ~Agustinus
How does this affect the Justice League movie?
Avengers may have needed to let you get to know the other characters because it couldn’t rely on the draw of Iron Man and comic readers alone, but Batman and Superman are guaranteed to be a big draw. Not only do they have masses of individual fans (which goes well beyond the comics) who want to see them, but they want to see them interact. No matter the quality of the movie, we can expect to see very large numbers out in mass for opening weekend.
But what if the Justice League movie is terrible?
Then back to the drawing board with no money lost on origin films that went nowhere, but also, like Green Lantern, it might be years before they touch on the character ever again. Though they could go the route of making tv shows like Arrow and Amazon which is in pre-pre-production. They have a lot of options, only a few we’d actually like to see.
But what if the movie is actually really good?
Those who went to go see Bats and Supes are introduced to three other characters that, if they are done right, will basically have the ‘Hawkeye effect’ and people will want to see them in their own movie. This means when WB sinks money into a WW movie with the same actress, in the same universe, then they are guaranteed better returns than if they tried to go solo before Justice League, an idea that they had but seems to have been dropped.
The only issue would be that they couldn’t do prequel movies because that would be annoying, but it would be easy enough to put their origins in there as either a quick 15 minutes at the beginning or parceled throughout the film (as long as it’s done right).
So, is it a smart move by Warner Brothers to work backwards?
They’ve already been accused of trying to ride on the back of the Avengers box office smash… but then Batman and Superman are literally much bigger characters in their own right and could carry a team-up movie with so much ease it should be criminal. The fact they haven’t done it before now should be punished as a capital offence. Maybe it took a kick in the pants for them to get around to it but it was a long time coming.
As for GL, WW, and Flash… I think the fact that Green Lantern made 116mil domestic, half of that on opening weekend before the news came down of its quality, proves that the audience is there for these movies, maybe not 300mil domestic like Iron Man right now, but they are there. But really, as long as they start putting out good films, they will be able to hold against Disney/Marvel, if not surpass them… but with a rash of really bad superhero movies in Green Lantern and Superman Returns, and the retirement of the Nolan-verse Batman movies, they need a shining beacon of ‘yes, yes we can make good movies!’.
We do have Man of Steel coming up later this year, but will that be enough? We were already let down by a Superman movie and so wary eyes are on this film. If it’s a great film then it will definitely help the cause, if it terrible then at least it could be kicked under the rug.
In the end, the Justice League movie is the crux of the entire DC film franchise. Supes and Bats will always have their place on screen but if Justice League fails then it will take everything else down with it. If it succeeds then it is a literal blank check for Warner Bros to bring all our favorite DC characters to life.
So yes, this really is the best move by Warner Bros. Marvel’s Avengers had a fairly blank slate to start with while Justice League has a lot of recent history with most of the characters, either through failed movies or the failure to make a movie. They need a reset button, they need a point to start, and this is it.
Granted, the reset button does look an awful lot like the self destruct button… but that can be entertaining in its own right.
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