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Subject: "Speaking of movies I haven't seen" Archived thread - Read only
 
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Gryphonadmin
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May-10-17, 10:34 PM (EDT)
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"Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
 
   Are the two Superman films that have come out since 2012 as hot garbage as the trailers make them look? My Superman itch is flaring up, but I've never had a Zack Snyder itch, so there's an IRQ conflict.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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  Subject     Author     Message Date     ID  
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Droken May-11-17 1
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Kendra Kirai May-11-17 2
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Gryphonadmin May-11-17 7
         RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Mephronmoderator May-11-17 10
             RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Gryphonadmin May-11-17 11
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen SilenRevered May-11-17 3
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Bushido May-11-17 4
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Phantom May-11-17 5
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Gryphonadmin May-11-17 8
         RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Kendra Kirai May-11-17 12
         RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Phantom May-19-17 25
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Mister Fnord May-11-17 6
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Pasha May-12-17 20
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen twipper May-31-17 37
         RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Gryphonadmin Jun-01-17 38
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Pasha Jun-02-17 39
         RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Gryphonadmin Jun-02-17 40
             RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen pjmoyermoderator Jun-02-17 41
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Arashi May-11-17 9
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Verbena May-11-17 13
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Wiregeek May-12-17 14
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Kendra Kirai May-12-17 15
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen mdg1 May-12-17 16
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen CdrMike May-12-17 18
         RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen mdg1 May-12-17 19
             RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen ebony14 May-12-17 21
             RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen CdrMike May-12-17 22
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen jhosmer1 May-12-17 17
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Star Ranger4 May-13-17 23
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen StClair May-14-17 24
  hm Gryphonadmin May-22-17 26
     RE: hm StClair May-23-17 31
  RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Mercutio May-22-17 27
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Kendra Kirai May-22-17 28
     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Gryphonadmin May-23-17 29
         RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen mdg1 May-23-17 30
             RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Kendra Kirai May-23-17 32
             RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Gryphonadmin May-23-17 33
                 RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Mercutio May-25-17 35
                     RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Gryphonadmin May-25-17 36
         RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen Star Ranger4 May-25-17 34

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Droken
Member since May-6-08
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May-11-17, 00:05 AM (EDT)
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1. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   I've only seen one of them but it was...

Well...

Best I can say is that I did not enjoy myself. At all. Your mileage may absolutely vary, but I definitely think Snyder did an exceptionally poor job on them.

-Droken

"If at first you don't succeed, bull-
riding is not for you."


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Kendra Kirai
Member since May-22-16
566 posts
May-11-17, 00:46 AM (EDT)
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2. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   Man of Steel and Superman/Batman Giant Monsters All Out Attack (as Linkara puts it)?

They're terrible.

Or at least, I found them so.

And I have a low threshold for 'enjoyable movie'. I unironically love Howard the Duck and even enjoyed Superman Returns.

BatSoup was better than I thought it would have been, but that was a pretty low bar.


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Gryphonadmin
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May-11-17, 11:45 AM (EDT)
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7. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #2
 
   >Superman/Batman Giant Monsters All Out Attack

I tell you what, I would watch the hell out of that actual movie, though. I mean, seriously, how could that be anything other than awesomer than shit? Also Superman: Final Wars.

>And I have a low threshold for 'enjoyable movie'. I unironically love
>Howard the Duck

Heh, wow. I saw Howard the Duck in its original theatrical release, and I liked it too, although that was largely because I had a giant thing¹ for Leah Thompson.

>and even enjoyed Superman Returns.

Superman Returns had its moments, and I liked it well enough the first time I saw it. Although I re-watched it on DVD just the other day and was surprised to find that it hasn't aged well despite not being very old at all. Bits of it still stand up (the first action sequence, for instance, which has a direct call-out to one of my favorite parts of the Superman: The Animated Series pilot, always makes me smile), but I had kind of forgotten how weird it is. The fact that it's got a running B-plot which is a direct sequel of one of the strangest, most questionable bits of the '70s film series (Superman erasing Lois's memory after getting jiggy with her) creeps me the fuck out.

Superman's costume being composed entirely of tiny Superman logos is also pretty friggin' strange, but that was costume design in the noughties for you. The uniforms in the 2009 Star Trek film were the same way, only with the Starfleet insignia. Makes me wonder if the same designer was involved.

--G.
¹ if I do say so myself
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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Mephronmoderator
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May-11-17, 04:20 PM (EDT)
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10. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #7
 
   >>and even enjoyed Superman Returns.
>
>Superman Returns had its moments, and I liked it well enough
>the first time I saw it. Although I re-watched it on DVD just the
>other day and was surprised to find that it hasn't aged well despite
>not being very old at all. Bits of it still stand up (the first
>action sequence, for instance, which has a direct call-out to one of
>my favorite parts of the Superman: The Animated Series pilot,
>always makes me smile), but I had kind of forgotten how weird
>it is.

The whole plane sequence is great for me, and if you close your eyes at the end of it, you can hear Christopher Reeve's vocal cadence telling you that statistically speaking, air travel is the safest way to travel...

...and there's there crooks with minigun sequence, which is just funny.

--
Geoff Depew - Darth Mephron
Haberdasher to Androids, Dark Lord of Sith Tech Support.
"And Remember! Google is your Friend!!"


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Gryphonadmin
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May-11-17, 04:38 PM (EDT)
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11. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #10
 
   >>Bits of it still stand up (the first
>>action sequence, for instance, which has a direct call-out to one of
>>my favorite parts of the Superman: The Animated Series pilot,
>>always makes me smile)
>
>The whole plane sequence is great for me

The only thing that's missing is Superman grumbling to himself, "Nice job, Clark," after he inadvertently tears the wing off. :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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SilenRevered
Member since Mar-7-12
30 posts
May-11-17, 06:09 AM (EDT)
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3. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   LAST EDITED ON May-11-17 AT 06:11 AM (EDT)
 
I've heard that the directors cut or what ever of Versus is better because a lot got cut out of the theactrical version that makes the plot make more sense or something.
That said, I wouldn't pay money to watch them. If the Wonder Woman film isn't at least ok, I'll have lost all faith in DC movies. At least the TV shows are good.


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Bushido
Member since Apr-8-10
376 posts
May-11-17, 09:11 AM (EDT)
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4. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   You're better off solving that itch with some of the DC Animated movies that have been released in the past few years.

--------
Wedge Defense Force General
Order 12: "Try to avoid
freaking the mundanes."


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Phantom
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May-11-17, 11:29 AM (EDT)
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5. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   G,
I agree with the over all sentiment. Man of Steel and Batman v Superman are not good flicks at all. There are lots of problems with them, both in the core story and characters (not just that they are different) and the overall world.

While dated now, I recommend Superman and Superman II (Christopher Reeves).
And most of the DC Animated movies are way better than those two live action entries. For the new 52 vibe there are couple of decent movies. I can check my Netflix for their titles.

Phantom
"When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." - Sherlock Holmes


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Gryphonadmin
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May-11-17, 12:00 PM (EDT)
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8. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #5
 
   >While dated now, I recommend Superman and Superman II

Can I make a little confession here? Two of them, actually. OK, in chronological order:

1) I never really cottoned to Superman II, at least partially because of the feature I mentioned in my previous post about Superman Returns. That, and it never quite seemed to know where it was going narratively, although that's probably a function of Fired Director Syndrome as much as anything else.

2) On the other hand, I... oh this is embarrassing... I think Superman III is probably my favorite of the Christopher Reeve Superman movies. No, seriously. Yes, I know it's one of the dumbest films ever made, but I was 10 when it came out and I thought it was hilarious, an impression which has stuck with me even now that I'm old enough to know better. I mean, come on, the scene where the little guys in the Walk/Don't Walk sign start fighting? 0.57% tar? Tellin' you.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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Kendra Kirai
Member since May-22-16
566 posts
May-11-17, 05:36 PM (EDT)
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12. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #8
 
   LAST EDITED ON May-11-17 AT 05:39 PM (EDT)
 
Don't feel too bad about Superman III, Gryph; a FUN movie can stick with you better and longer than a GOOD movie.

I recently watched the entire Harry Potter series, and I'll be damned if I can remember half of what I watched, yet I can still, despite not having seen it in years, remember pretty much the entirety of Super Mario Bros., which, let's face it, is *kinda crap*. But it was FUN crap, and despite the clear superiority of the Potter flicks, I didn't find them fun.

(for that matter, I can remember shows I watched, once and only once, on Saturday morning when I was FOUR, just because I had a blast watching them. Yet I sometimes have trouble remembering my own goddamn name.)


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Phantom
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160 posts
May-19-17, 10:54 AM (EDT)
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25. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #8
 
  
>1) I never really cottoned to Superman II, at least partially
>because of the feature I mentioned in my previous post about
>Superman Returns. That, and it never quite seemed to know
>where it was going narratively, although that's probably a function of
>Fired Director Syndrome as much as anything else.
>

I agree with you on the Narrative piece. Absolutely, it was not stellar.
But I still found it better than Man of Steel.

>2) On the other hand, I... oh this is
>embarrassing
... I think Superman III is probably my
>favorite of the Christopher Reeve Superman movies.

Nothing wrong with that all. There are several movies that I like that fall into that same category. Like the western Silverado. In retrospect, not the best western ever told on film. But it is one of the few movies I can re-watch and enjoy time and time again. I can't tell you exactly why.

And Richard Pryor did a great job in that movie.

Now if you said Superman IV the Quest for Peace, then perhaps that would be a confessional.. :)

Phantom

"When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." - Sherlock Holmes


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Mister Fnord
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May-11-17, 11:43 AM (EDT)
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6. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   Man of Steel is... flawed in a lot of different ways but there are bits and pieces in the movie where you can tell that somebody on the production<1> got Superman. It's probably worth watching right up to the point where things start exploding, then imagine your own third act resolution.

Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice (Really, guys? Really?) is just a mess from start to finish, trying to staple together one of the critically-acclaimed Batman stories from the 80s and the most-overrated-but-bestselling Superman stories from the 90s. The director's cut sort of fixes some of this, but at the expense of making the thing even longer. Not really worth it, IMO.


<1> Almost certainly not David Goyer.

--
Mr. Fnord is still holding out hope for Wonder Woman, but JL's a lost cause at this point.


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Pasha
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May-12-17, 05:16 PM (EDT)
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20. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #6
 
  
>Mr. Fnord is still holding out hope for Wonder Woman, but JL's a lost
>cause at this point.

I'll probably watch JL, but really only to ogle Jason Momoa.

--
-Pasha ("Everyone in this trailer is in the same movie, except him. He's in a cologne commercial.")
"Don't change the subject"
"Too slow, already did."


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twipper
Member since Jan-8-03
279 posts
May-31-17, 02:05 PM (EDT)
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37. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #6
 
  
>--
>Mr. Fnord is still holding out hope for Wonder Woman, but JL's a lost
cause at this point.

See, I can't even be interested in JL. I like tv Barry Allen. I like tv Kara. I like tv Arrow.

And now you're asking me to invest in all new versions, just because you have to have flashy movie actors rather than go ahead and use the folks you've spent several years developing in the other media type?

No.

Brian


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Gryphonadmin
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22375 posts
Jun-01-17, 06:42 PM (EDT)
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38. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #37
 
   >See, I can't even be interested in JL. I like tv Barry Allen.
>
>And now you're asking me to invest in all new versions, just because
>you have to have flashy movie actors

As it were.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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Pasha
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1018 posts
Jun-02-17, 06:33 PM (EDT)
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39. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #6
 
   >Mr. Fnord is still holding out hope for Wonder Woman, but JL's a lost
>cause at this point.

I went and watched that last night with my wife and it was lots of fun!
There was ass kicking and awkward sex talk and a crying singing drunken scotsman.

--
-Pasha
"Don't change the subject"
"Too slow, already did."


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Gryphonadmin
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Jun-02-17, 07:15 PM (EDT)
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40. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #39
 
   >>Mr. Fnord is still holding out hope for Wonder Woman, but JL's a lost
>>cause at this point.
>
>I went and watched that last night with my wife and it was lots of
>fun!
>There was ass kicking and awkward sex talk and a crying singing
>drunken scotsman.

What about the movie, though?

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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pjmoyermoderator
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1854 posts
Jun-02-17, 11:15 PM (EDT)
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41. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #40
 
   >>>Mr. Fnord is still holding out hope for Wonder Woman, but JL's a lost
>>>cause at this point.
>>
>>I went and watched that last night with my wife and it was lots of
>>fun!
>>There was ass kicking and awkward sex talk and a crying singing
>>drunken scotsman.
>
>What about the movie, though?

I enjoyed Wonder Woman, myself. It was solid. And some aspects gave me a strong City of Heroes vibe.

--- Philip






Philip J. Moyer
Contributing Writer, Editor and Artist (and Moderator) -- Eyrie Productions, Unlimited
CEO of MTS, High Poobah Of Artwork, and High Priest Of the Church Of Aerianne -- Magnetic Terrapin Studios
"Insert Pithy Comment Here"
Fandoms -- Fanart -- Fan Meta Discussions


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Arashi
Member since Mar-12-10
118 posts
May-11-17, 01:01 PM (EDT)
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9. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   While I didn't mind Man of Steel on it's own merits, in functioned great as a summer block bluster, it sat very poorly when set against the other Superman movies. (though better then Superman Returns).
BvS was.... bad. Plot holes abound, poorly flowed narrative and I firmly believe that we did not need over 30 minutes of flashback/dream sequences that added nothing to the 'plot'. The best I can say for that one is it looked pretty.

When in Danger, or in Doubt.
Run in circles, scream and shout.


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Verbena
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May-11-17, 08:56 PM (EDT)
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13. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #9
 
   https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2016/04/01

All I have to say.

------
Fearless creatures, we all learn to fight the Reaper
Can't defeat Her, so instead I'll have to be Her


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Wiregeek
Member since Mar-13-14
159 posts
May-12-17, 02:53 AM (EDT)
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14. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   Yes, but they're _aromatic_ hot garbage. The Director's Cut of Batsy Vs. The Underwear Kid helps quite a bit, but I have to go against the zeitgeist and recommend them.

They're dark, but not in a "all that exists is pain, mom! I have to drive a MINIVAN" sort of sense. There's a (fairly ham-handed compared to Civil War, OK, sure) nice look at what it means when super-powerful folks go a fightin' and a fussin' in down town freaking Metropolis.

Other folks aren't necessarily wrong - I have to admit that I have a spectacularly low bar for cinematic happiness, and yes the DCAU stuff is better.

BUT

They were certainly worth my bandwidth, and I've gone back and rewatched them more than once.


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Kendra Kirai
Member since May-22-16
566 posts
May-12-17, 05:08 AM (EDT)
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15. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #14
 
   (Spoilers for Man of Steel below!)

My problem with the 'physical gods fighting and the little people getting trampled underfoot' thing is that Superman *would have tried to steer the fight away from Metropolis*. Instead he *purposefully* took the guy into the part of the city that was *miraculously undamaged* by the giant Dubstep bass cannon.

Avengers: trying like mad to keep civilian casualties to a minimum.
Man of Steel: IMMA PUNCH YOU INTO THIS HIGH RISE AND LASER EYE YOU WHOOPS MISSED I'LL KEEP TRYING

The Superman depicted in Man of Steel is a sociopath who only cares about people if they're right in front of him.


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mdg1
Member since Aug-25-04
1327 posts
May-12-17, 06:15 AM (EDT)
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16. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   The biggest problem with the DCEU, as I see it, is that they LOVE to explain HOW Batman, Superman et al BECAME heroes... they just don't want to waste time showing them BEING heroes.

It's all "what does being a hero mean?" "Should I be a hero?" "Are heroes realistic in this day and age?" and very little actual heroism.

When the most heroic costumed character in your movies is friggin DEADSHOT, you have a problem.

Mario


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CdrMike
Member since Feb-20-05
889 posts
May-12-17, 05:02 PM (EDT)
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18. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #16
 
   >The biggest problem with the DCEU, as I see it, is that they LOVE to
>explain HOW Batman, Superman et al BECAME heroes... they just don't
>want to waste time showing them BEING heroes.
>
>It's all "what does being a hero mean?" "Should I be a hero?" "Are
>heroes realistic in this day and age?" and very little actual heroism.
>
>When the most heroic costumed character in your movies is friggin
>DEADSHOT, you have a problem.

This is the problem that Marvel pretty neatly nipped in the bud with the MCU: Make the origin stories their own films, then when you start to weave them together, don't waste time rehashing stuff that was already covered. We already spent two movies seeing how Tony Stark became Iron Man and what his motivation is for wearing the suit, let's not spend time in The Avengers going over again how he got shrapnel in his chest and the arc reactor's the only thing keeping him alive. People came to see these heroes team up to beat a big bad, let's focus on that instead.

But the reason it's a problem for DC is they see Marvel raking in all that sweet, sweet cash and think "I want a piece of that action!" Yet Marvel A) didn't actually start out with the plan to make a cinematic universe and B) even when they did start putting it together, they did it over a period of years. DC doesn't want the slow and steady path, they want to jump straight to "Look at all these awesome heroes punching villains together! Pay us huge amounts of money to see that!" Except then people go to the films and wonder "Who's that guy with the beard? And the one in the suit, what's his deal? Why do I care about these people?"

--------------------------
CdrMike, Overwatch Reject

"You know, the world could always use more heroes." - Tracer, Overwatch


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mdg1
Member since Aug-25-04
1327 posts
May-12-17, 05:11 PM (EDT)
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19. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #18
 
   I like to call it "Wikipedia plotting". Warner Brothers doesn't bother explaining anything, because "everybody knows" the backstory. And if they don't, they can look it up.

Case in point, from BvS: Why are Lois & Clark living together? Because "everybody knows" Superman loves Lois. Even though, ON SCREEN, they'd spent what, 10 minutes together in MoS, and had almost no chemistry whatsoever....

Mario


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ebony14
Member since Jul-11-11
437 posts
May-12-17, 05:30 PM (EDT)
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21. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #19
 
   >I like to call it "Wikipedia plotting". Warner Brothers doesn't
>bother explaining anything, because "everybody knows" the backstory.
>And if they don't, they can look it up.
>
>Case in point, from BvS: Why are Lois & Clark living together?
>Because "everybody knows" Superman loves Lois. Even though, ON
>SCREEN, they'd spent what, 10 minutes together in MoS, and had almost
>no chemistry whatsoever....

I offer this fine illustrated comparison between the MCU and the DCCU, as put forth by British wit, Phillip M. Jackson, aka jollyjack. It is both concise and accurate, in my opinion.

Warning: Mr. Jackson is also a producer of fine illustrated pornography. Straying away from the direct link above might be NSFW. But, it's Deviantart; you should know that by now.

Ebony the Black Dragon

"Life is like an anole. Sometimes it's green. Sometimes it's brown. But it's always a small Caribbean lizard."


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CdrMike
Member since Feb-20-05
889 posts
May-12-17, 05:33 PM (EDT)
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22. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #19
 
   >I like to call it "Wikipedia plotting". Warner Brothers doesn't
>bother explaining anything, because "everybody knows" the backstory.
>And if they don't, they can look it up.
>
>Case in point, from BvS: Why are Lois & Clark living together?
>Because "everybody knows" Superman loves Lois. Even though, ON
>SCREEN, they'd spent what, 10 minutes together in MoS, and had almost
>no chemistry whatsoever....

While Marvel directors and writers will put in easter eggs to Marvel mythology that Marvel fans will recognize, but are otherwise unimportant to the plot so the plebes in the audience don't feel as if their intelligence is being tested. And that's on top of the heavy hints they always throw into one film to the ones they have in the pipeline.

Hell, they promoted one post-credit teaser character to a speaking role in the film proper for GotG Vol 2. No, I won't say who for those who haven't seen it, but those who have know who I'm talking about.

--------------------------
CdrMike, Overwatch Reject

"You know, the world could always use more heroes." - Tracer, Overwatch


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jhosmer1
Member since Jan-11-07
185 posts
May-12-17, 07:24 AM (EDT)
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17. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   I didn't see Man of Steel, so maybe that hurt my impression of BvS (though I doubt it).

The most damning things I can say about it is that BvS killed an iconic Superman character in the first 5 minutes and couldn't even be arsed to make us care about him first.

Oh, and the whole Lex vs. Kryptonian computer security has me thinking "Kryptonian super-intelligence? Myth busted."


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Star Ranger4
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May-13-17, 03:27 PM (EDT)
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23. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   >Are the two Superman films that have come out since 2012 as hot
>garbage as the trailers make them look? My Superman itch is flaring
>up, but I've never had a Zack Snyder itch, so there's an IRQ
>conflict.

Well, G, lets put it like this... Folk who's opinion I respect had enough issues with it that they wrote something about it.

http://catwoman-cattales.com/ct/71-the-knight-of-the-mirrors-00.htm

Of COURSE you wernt
expecting it!
No One expects the
FANNISH INQUISITION!

RCW# 86


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StClair
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May-14-17, 10:53 AM (EDT)
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24. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #23
 
   That was great. Thanks for the link.


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Gryphonadmin
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May-22-17, 07:49 PM (EDT)
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26. "hm"
In response to message #0
 
   LAST EDITED ON May-22-17 AT 07:49 PM (EDT)
 
OK, I know I've said some pretty unsupportive things about Zack Snyder's filmmaking sensibilities, but fuck, that didn't mean I wanted it to go down like this. :/

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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StClair
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May-23-17, 07:27 AM (EDT)
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31. "RE: hm"
In response to message #26
 
   Same. :(


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Mercutio
Member since May-26-13
942 posts
May-22-17, 11:14 PM (EDT)
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27. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #0
 
   LAST EDITED ON May-22-17 AT 11:14 PM (EDT)
 
>Are the two Superman films that have come out since 2012 as hot
>garbage as the trailers make them look? My Superman itch is flaring
>up, but I've never had a Zack Snyder itch, so there's an IRQ
>conflict.

Huh, I somehow missed this thread until now.

So okay. Don't see either of them. They're very bad movies.

I could give a long, long litany about why they are, but many if not most of the problems stem from a very simple core issue, which is that Superman is incredibly badly characterized.

Basically, he comes across as this vaguely alien, otherworldly presence who is by turns inscrutable and threatening, and who seems to be helping people and saving lives out of nothing more than a sense of slightly aggrieved moral obligation. He seems inhuman. He's written to be inhuman. His decision to become Superman is something that is imposed on him, not something he chooses, and he resents the fuck out of it.

And to round all that out, he's deliberately written as a loose cannon. We, the audience, and the people in-universe, are meant to be just a little bit terrified of him. To for-real think "everything about this guy says there's like a five percent chance he could just fucking go off and start leveling cities." That's not my interpretation; that comes from Goyer and Snyder themselves.

And this is without even getting into the gross abuses heaped upon Batman in BvS. I can boil that one down even more succinctly: Batman uses guns. Batman kills a bunch of people using guns. Batman pegs a round into a guy with an assault rifle and then quips about it.

Batman does this.

Seriously. Fuck the DC Murderverse.

-Merc
Keep Rat


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Kendra Kirai
Member since May-22-16
566 posts
May-22-17, 11:57 PM (EDT)
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28. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #27
 
   I've said it before, this Supes is a sociopath who only cares if the people he's saving are RIGHT in front of him.

At one point he even has to be reminded to save *Lois*.


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Gryphonadmin
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May-23-17, 00:18 AM (EDT)
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29. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #27
 
   LAST EDITED ON May-25-17 AT 02:52 PM (EDT)
 
>Basically, he comes across as this vaguely alien, otherworldly
>presence who is by turns inscrutable and threatening, and who seems to
>be helping people and saving lives out of nothing more than a sense of
>slightly aggrieved moral obligation. He seems inhuman. He's
>written to be inhuman.
(snip)
>And to round all that out, he's deliberately written as a loose
>cannon. We, the audience, and the people in-universe, are meant to be
>just a little bit terrified of him. To for-real think "everything
>about this guy says there's like a five percent chance he could just
>fucking go off and start leveling cities." That's not my
>interpretation; that comes from Goyer and Snyder themselves.

Hmm. Well, there's always been that undercurrent of conflict in the Superman mythos, as to which of two fundamental interpretations of the character a particular writer works from. In one school of thought (which is, for what it's worth, pretty much how he is in the very early comics and the Fleischer cartoons), Superman is the real guy, he basically does whatever the hell he wants, and Clark Kent is just a disguise Superman uses to get hot tips on stuff that's happening in town (presumably because Twitter hasn't been invented yet). He's not as frightening as modern-day Superman would be with that temperament, because he's only(!) strong enough to pick up a car and smash it against a rock, but he still operates pretty much entirely by going around intimidating the shit out of everybody with his strength, indestructibility, and immunity to iocaine (seriously, "Earth poisons have no effect on my physical structure" is a plot point over and over again in the early Action issues).

In the other, more modern interpretation, Clark Kent, the Decent Fella from the Midwest, is the real guy, and at least at the start of his career, Superman is the colorful outfit he puts on to distract Bad People and prevent them from finding out it's him and murdering everyone he knows. As he develops into a sort of elder statesman of the superheroing world, the Superman persona obviously takes on more of a life of his own, but at heart he's still the Midwestern farmboy doing the best he can.

One of these interpretations is approachable; the other is Awesome and Godlike. Different writers, and different readers, have their own ideas about which of those two things makes for the better story. Me, I like the latter. Jerry Siegel seems to have preferred the former, and it sounds like Snyder was at least partly trying to call back to that—kind of in the same way that the writers of Casino Royale tried to take James Bond back to something closer to the cynical, rather cruel, really-not-very-suave-at-all character in Fleming's novels.

>And this is without even getting into the gross abuses heaped upon
>Batman in BvS. I can boil that one down even more succinctly: Batman
>uses guns. Batman kills a bunch of people using guns. Batman pegs a
>round into a guy with an assault rifle and then quips about it.
>
>Batman does this.

Again, this reads to me like a misguided attempt at reaching back to the character's earliest roots. Bob Kane's original Batman was basically The Shadow in a bat costume—he knew what evil lurked in the hearts of men and had no compunctions about wasting those who had a sufficient amount of it in theirs. It was only the generations of later writers, particularly those laboring under the long, long shadow of Frederic Wertham, that decided he'd be more palatable (and, I suspect mostly as a side effect, more interesting) if he followed a stricter moral code. (Superman's persona was probably tempered in similar ways for similar reasons.)

The problem there, in both cases, being that there's (I would argue) too much water gone under that bridge at this point. Their continuous publication histories mean they've been carried into the present day in a way that literary characters who still "live" in their original periods (e.g., Sherlock Holmes) haven't. We expect Sherlock Holmes to be a Victorian because he still "lives" there. Batman and Superman don't get that luxury, especially when not presented in a period context. Returning either of those characters—indeed, practically any Golden Age character—to their very earliest characterizations doesn't really work, because a) those characters have evolved too much to go back cleanly and b) the literary sensibilities that created those earliest characterizations were... not very sophisticated.

Of course, that's all my opinion, and in no way constitutes an endorsement of what's going on in those films. Or, to put it another way, I think I get what they might've been trying to do, but that doesn't change the fact that it was a dumb idea that didn't work. :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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mdg1
Member since Aug-25-04
1327 posts
May-23-17, 06:33 AM (EDT)
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30. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #29
 
   You may be right that going back to the Golden Age is the primary motivation for the characterization of Bats & Supes in the DCEU (although I suspect Frank Miller's DARK KNIGHT RETURNS was a bigger influence), but it's a bizarre choice, given that the cultural image of the two heroes is shaped more by the 70's & 80's incarnations.

Plus, you know, the whole murder thing.

Personally, I see the whole concept as Yet Another Attempt to inject "realism" into superheroes, which usually translates into crippling character flaws, anti-social behavior, and a bluish-gray tint over everything. :P

Mario


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Kendra Kirai
Member since May-22-16
566 posts
May-23-17, 01:58 PM (EDT)
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32. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #30
 
   That doesn't work well with DC Heroes, who have always been much more IDEALISTIC (in both senses of the term) than their more 'real' Marvel counterparts.

No, I think it's simply more the writers and director don't LIKE the Eternal Boy Scout and are dragging the rest of the CDCU (cinematic DCU) down with them. After all, if the worlds most moral guy is tarnished, that means everyone else has to be worse to keep things relative, right? Superman can't be the ONLY one who's a murderous sociopath. He still had to be the BEST of them!

Hasn't Snyder or some other higher ups said flat out they thought the goody two shoes Supes was boring and 'unrelatable' or some such nonsense? Apparently they think sociopathy and 'angry god' are more relatable than 'guy who always wants to do the right thing and protect people'...


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Gryphonadmin
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22375 posts
May-23-17, 02:24 PM (EDT)
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33. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #30
 
   >You may be right that going back to the Golden Age is the primary
>motivation for the characterization of Bats & Supes in the DCEU
>(although I suspect Frank Miller's DARK KNIGHT RETURNS was a bigger
>influence), but it's a bizarre choice, given that the cultural image
>of the two heroes is shaped more by the 70's & 80's incarnations.

Oh, I don't think it's the primary motivation—I think the primary motivation is that Snyder's own career has proven to his satisfaction that Gritty Violence puts more butts in seats—but it's in the mix.

As for DKR (and Watchmen), my views are already on record. And I'm sure that's exactly where the "Batman in power armor vs. Superman" fight visual comes from, although at least in DKR they had known each other for years and there was an underlying reason for their being so explosively at odds, besides "peculiarly manic teenage Lex Luthor wanted to see a huge fight scene".

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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Mercutio
Member since May-26-13
942 posts
May-25-17, 02:37 PM (EDT)
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35. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #33
 
   LAST EDITED ON May-25-17 AT 02:39 PM (EDT)
 
>As for DKR (and Watchmen), my views are already on record. And
>I'm sure that's exactly where the "Batman in power armor vs. Superman"
>fight visual comes from,

It does, yes. BvS doesn't just homage DKR; it lifts a lot of its dialogue verbatim. Which is very annoying because it decontextualizes it in a way that makes those sentiments appalling and indefensible in a way in which they weren't, or at least weren't as much, in DKR.

>although at least in DKR they had known each
>other for years and there was an underlying reason for their
>being so explosively at odds, besides "peculiarly manic teenage Lex
>Luthor wanted to see a huge fight scene".

To be fair, in BvS they do have a reason for being explosively at odds beyond that.

They're just bad reasons. Batman is at odds with Superman because Superman won't let him murder and destroy as he sees fit and also because Batman is an explicit and open adherent of the Cheney Doctrine ("We have to treat 1% threats as 100% threats") and Superman is at odds with Batman because of the aforementioned murder and destruction, although he certainly does not want to kill Batman.

He's just kind of an idiot, because given ample opportunity to simply tell Batman "Luthor is blackmailing me into fighting you by holding innocent people hostage" he adamantly refuses to do so.

I will say that Jesse Eisenberg's Luthor is one of the high points of the film. You're right in that he's very young and peculiarly manic, but he's also a recognizable interpretation of Luthor. Like, you look at him and how he acts and what he does and you're like "yeah, okay. This is Luthor."

-Merc
Keep Rat


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Gryphonadmin
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22375 posts
May-25-17, 02:54 PM (EDT)
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36. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #35
 
   >I will say that Jesse Eisenberg's Luthor is one of the high points of
>the film. You're right in that he's very young and peculiarly manic,
>but he's also a recognizable interpretation of Luthor. Like, you look
>at him and how he acts and what he does and you're like "yeah, okay.
>This is Luthor."

In the trailers, he reminds me of an evil version of a guy I knew at WPI who always seemed like he had just mainlined a big slug of meth. (The real one was a decent guy apart from being the king of bad ideas insufficiently thought through before put into practice, which I guess would make him Speed Zuko.)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.


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Star Ranger4
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2483 posts
May-25-17, 06:50 AM (EDT)
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34. "RE: Speaking of movies I haven't seen"
In response to message #29
 
   >Of course, that's all my opinion, and in no way constitutes an
>endorsement of what's going on in those films. Or, to put it
>another way, I think I get what they might've been trying to do, but
>that doesn't change the fact that it was a dumb idea that didn't work.
>:)
>
.... All I can add to this is a very AOL'ish Me Too, G.

Of COURSE you wernt
expecting it!
No One expects the
FANNISH INQUISITION!

RCW# 86


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