Supergirl Set to Debut on CBS (Fall TV Preview)

Image from Entertainment Weekly

Well folks, it looks like DC Comics and Warner Brothers have finally gotten their crap together. Sort of. After years of promising fans TV and movie adaptations, we're finally getting a flood of product, most of it on TV, and most of it quite good. They're not doing it as cleanly as Marvel Comics, having already created multiple continuities rather than one shared live-action universe. But thanks largely to Greg Berlanti (the guy behind Brothers and Sisters, of all things), we have The Flash, (Green) Arrow, The Atom, Firestorm, Black Canary and now Supergirl. Given that Berlanti was behind Green Lantern, a movie I liked, but which was nearly universally panned by fandom (what did you guys want it to be anyway?), I think we're lucky someone at WB had faith in him!

As with The Flash, Supergirl has costume choices that are head-scratchers (Why the blue in the S? Why a different S from the movie Superman?). As with the 1984 movie and the original comic, Supergirl has heavy doses of borderline sexism in the story elements, at least as presented in the trailer. But it looks like it has potential. It looks like it's being given an honest attempt at putting Kara Zor-El on the screen and making it believable. And if Berlanti's previous efforts are any indication, we can probably expect further elements from the comics to show up in ways that reflect the real world and the heritage of the character. I expect for a cat named Streaky and a horse named Comet to figure in eventually, but without the eye-rolling corniness of the 50s and 60s.

I still have no idea why WB/DC have decided upon multiple media universes for these characters, and only hope that Supergirl ties in either with the other TV shows, or with the universe established in Man of Steel. With Gotham already complicating things by being its own thing, it would be silly to make Supergirl come up it's own stand-alone world (CBS and the CW are owned by the same folks, after all). Unless they're setting up a multiverse event? Then, count me in!

 

Official Trailer for Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

I've kept my disclaimers of my big move on the page to explain why my blogging has been sporadic, because I've still not settled into a habitual blogging pattern since leaving Las Vegas. And the more I look at them, they more they look like excuses and whining! So, whether or not I've got my feet under me again, there is simply no excuse for not having posted something about the new Batman/Superman movie, with the trailer having leaked. So, here it is!
 

I've complained a lot in this space about Warner Brothers' seeming cluelessness as it regards their DC Comics properties. While Marvel manages to rock the entire world with their sprawling cinematic universe, which has managed to have an interconnected continuity over a dozen or so films and now three or four TV shows, Warner has struggled. To give credit where it's due, DC has for years done very well with animated fare. But animated fare is seen as "for kids" moreso than live action, and certainly doesn't have the impact of epic movies.

The Dark Night series was of course hugely successful, and there have been other DC properties that have been successful. There are some that I feel were unfairly maligned (I still don't understand the hate for Superman Returns or Green Lantern, which you'd think would have gotten some credit for at least trying amid a DC-character drought). And then, there were big successes like Man of Steel which still managed to critically disappoint. Finally, with Man of Steel though, we got the first hints that DC was finally going to start their own interconnected universe. Woo-hoo! We found out Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman and Aquaman would all be in the same stories, and that it would be in a sequel that would set up the Justice League of America! Awesome!

However, my feeling that Warner Brothers would screw it all up remains. There are several reasons for this (besides, you know, past precedent). Amid this fledgling universe, a few different things happened. It was decided to reboot Batman again, and then hire Ben Affleck to play him (I'm cool with this, many others had reservations, to say the least). A new version of Green Arrow was brought to TV, also rebooted, and different from the one in the long-running Smallville. Arrow was a hit, so far as they exist on the CW network, big enough to warrant spinning out its own universe. Arrow begat The Flash--an even bigger success--and the two shows are on their way to creating combined universe Justice League, as well as other spin-offs. We've also got Gotham, a show about Batman as a boy, that is unmoored by continuity to any of the other properties. And a new Supergirl show that may or may not be connected to other established continuities.

The DC TV universe is flourishing, probably by surprise.

On the horizon are a movie version of The Flash that is separate and apart from the TV version, the coming JLA movie (also separate from TV), and if all of that works well, presumably all of the other big DC characters. So, why complain? After decades of rare gems from DC properties, amid scads of crappy product (when we got any product at all), we have a wealth of options!

Well, because we comics fans are nerds. We complain endlessly about things we like as much as things we don't. But we feel justified because it just looks like they're making a mess of things.  We've got two simultaneously blooming main DC Comics universes, big screen and little screen. We've managed to live with this before, with separate continuities for Superman with each new TV show (Adventures of Superboy, Lois & Clark, Smallville), that sometimes overlapped with Superman movies on the calendar. But, will the public be able to sort out two completely different versions of The Flash at the same time? Two Supermen (assuming Supergirl on TV still is his cousin)? And yet another rebooted Green Lantern? Maybe two? We're supposed to also get Shazam! on the big screen, but will they also want him on TV? Will either of them be properly called "Captain Marvel," even though Marvel is introducing their own character with the same name?

Comic geeks can rationalize and "fan wank" anything away, if they like it. They'll complain about it all even if they like it. But you need a broader audience, and if you start out by confusing them? It just seems like a bad idea. And why exhaust ideas or risk repeating yourself with competing versions of the same characters? I just really don't get it. I'd like to see someone at Warner Brothers take the reins like Marvel has done, and make a cohesive whole out of all of it, even if it's a "multiple universes" connection. That would be the most "DC" thing they could even do!

 

Right Wing World: Climate Change Still Happening, Deniers Still Denying

Of all of the strange things I've blogged about over the years, probably the most frequent one is the bizarre fact that virtually every issue has become a left vs. right shouting match, even those things that don't have a logical, political divide. Climate change may be becoming an even bigger one than abortion or gay rights.

Let me start with what is strangest about it to me: conservatives should probably be on the conservation side of this one, but aren't. Given their heavy saturation with religion, you'd think that wantonly raping and pillaging the earth to wring every drop of fossil fuel out of it might bother them. You'd think potentially ruining the beauty of vast regions and making parts of the planet  inhospitable for "God's creation" would also spur a twinge of guilt. And you'd think the regimentation and repeatable nature of science would align with that rigid, upright (tight assed) reputation that conservatives always use to have. Nope.

Yeah, let's just ignore the scientists.
That never goes wrong.

Long ago, anything to do with nature, science, conservation, regulation, safety, caution, concern for future consequences (in anything beyond the national debt, or a nuclear Iran) all became dirty hippie, granola munching, kale and arugula eating liberal stuff. Somehow, a scientific consensus (and that is what there is among climatologists, a high 90-percentile on board with man-made global climate change) is just a liberal conspiracy, invented by Al Gore after he made the internet, just so he could put the screws to energy companies. Or something.

See, part of my problem is the motive. For a believable conspiracy, you need a motive, and "So Al Gore can feel important and get rich(er)" doesn't seem like enough to me. Sure, you'll hear some conservatives try to say there is a "climate change industry" that will allegedly get rich too, somehow, though I've seen no through-thread from climatologists to Solyndra. But even if a credible "truther" movement had gelled, HOW did it overtake the majority of conservatives' and Republicans' world view, from the layperson to high elected officials?

All of this ignores the fact that of course man can affect the ecology with pollution. We've seen acid rain, state-sized oil slicks and garbage patches, ozone holes, rivers and lakes and sometimes tap water that are combustible. We've seen earthquakes that coincide with fracking patterns. Smog in big cities to the point of severe health alerts. In China, the air is practically a solid. Go back to the early industrial revolution, there were blackened cities from coal. And hey, how 'bout Chernobyl? Clearly, it is possible for us to affect our immediate area, surrounding areas, down-river areas and beyond with the things we as humans do. Why the hell is it even remotely hard to believe that it could accumulate, grow, become something that is a global concern? Why? And how exactly is that left or right?

My guess is, conservatives think that if they're wrong, we will either
get a rapture or The Jetsons, so what's the problem?

The answer is kind of easy: huge monied interests, gigantic corporations with deep pockets would really rather not have a lot (or any) regulations. They'd rather not be forced to change at all until there is no fossil fuel left to exploit. Full speed ahead, dirtier and more dangerous methods of extraction, it doesn't matter as long as there is profit. So, anything that puts the brakes on hurts profits, any caution would anger shareholders. Corporations and their shareholders rarely plot out contingency plans beyond the next quarter(s). Their concern is profit, now. So forget that forging new, cleaner plans for energy could make them a bundle too. Forget even making plans to contain inevitable clean-up necessary for more difficult fossil fuel extraction. Profit, profit, profit.

So, they fund think tanks, they fund punditry, they fund their own "science," so they can latch onto anything that might throw a credible-sounding counter argument, so that they can continue raking it in. And if there's one thing the conservative media will grab onto it's giant corporations and their funding. "Job creators" shall not be questioned! So, it's not hard to see where the genesis of Right Wing World's climate change denialism comes from. It's just amazing how entrenched it is, when it's built on such an insubstantial foundation. But it's a fabulous case study on how to get a base of voters to vote against logic, reason and their own self-interest. And it also shows how easily you can get a group of people who have wedded their politics to their religion, to champion your cause as though it is their own.

But can we please not go totally Gomer Pyle, and claim that a snowstorm disproves "global warming?" Can we at least squelch the stupid? No, I guess not. [By the way, if you're wondering how the excerpted article below resulted in the Right Wing World column above, just follow the link and head to the comments there. WOW.]

[Excerpt]

The big melt: Antarctica's retreating ice may re-shape Earth
 
From the ground in this extreme northern part of Antarctica, spectacularly white and blinding ice seems to extend forever. What can't be seen is the battle raging underfoot to re-shape Earth. Water is eating away at the Antarctic ice, melting it where it hits the oceans. As the ice sheets slowly thaw, water pours into the sea - 130 billion tons of ice (118 billion metric tons) per year for the past decade, according to NASA satellite calculations. That's the weight of more than 356,000 Empire State Buildings, enough ice melt to fill more than 1.3 million Olympic swimming pools. And the melting is accelerating. . .

Read more at: AOL News

The Flash is Likely Coming to Television (Again)

Grant Gustin, cast to play The Flash, image from Huffington Post.

I'm not sure I can figure out what DC Comics is up to. As a long-time fan, I've watched with jealousy while Marvel Comics fans have reaped most of the rewards, with their ultra-successful string of superhero movies. After failures (Daredevil, Electra, The Punisher), middling successes (The Fantastic Four, Ghost Rider), and mid-sized hits (The X-Men series), and blockbusters (Spider-Man, two series) Marvel's own production house has had the Midas touch with everything from Iron Man through The Avengers, and on to even more sequels.

Meanwhile, DC fans had to be happy with various versions of Superman on the small screen (Superboy, Lois & Clark, Smallville) and big screen to varying degrees of success, and two successful Batman movie series. Most everything else has been a flop or at least didn't land in the public I liked Green Lantern and Superman Returns, I would seem to be in the distinct minority. Even Man of Steel, which made 2/3 of a billion dollars, was seen my many as a "disappointment," leaving many DC fans in the doldrums. Recently, that's changed with Arrow, oddly another DC Universe similar to, but different from Smallville, this time centered around the Green Arrow character. Like Smallville, Arrow is showcasing other DC heroes. But this time, one of them is getting a spinoff.

Last time The Flash came to TV (1990), he was John Wesley-Shipp.

consciousness as a "DC Comics" success story. Even though

I've been a Flash fan as long as I've been a comics fan. He was always my favorite, probably because of his wacky "rogues gallery," and the fantastical, bizarre situations he'd find himself in. Even as a kid, I'd seek out back-issues, as far back as I could afford. When a customer on my paper route volunteered that she'd sell me her son's old 60s Flash comics, it was like winning the lottery for me. So, a TV adaptation of my favorite hero is quite exciting. It's been done before, of course, in 1990, in a fun but quirky one-season run (pun intended). But I'm hoping that they do it right, and manage to work the Arrow/Flash universe into the Man of Steel/Batman universe. Otherwise, a future Justice League could be very confusing for consumers. Though I'm sure there are a few Smallville fans who are a bit confused by the new Arrow universe anyway.

[Excerpt]

'The Flash': Grant Gustin Cast As Barry Allen For 'Arrow' And Potential Spin-Off

"Glee's" Grant Gustin has been cast as Barry Allen (AKA The Flash) on "Arrow," The CW announced Friday. He'll appear in episodes 208, 209 and 220 of "Arrow" Season 2, and if the character is well-received, headline the proposed Flash spinoff. . .

Read more at: Huffington Post

Blast from the Past: Saturday Morning Super Heroes

I've been kind of sick over the last week or so, with a combination of allergies and/or head cold plus the added attraction of some sort of intestinal bug. Lovely, right? Consequently, not only have I been out of the blogging habit (this time with an excuse), and also out of the exercising habit. Instead, I've been indulging in binge viewing of a series on DVD. In this case, my series of choice was Smallville.

I'm a superhero fan since practically infancy, so a show about Superboy/Superman should have been appointment viewing for me. But for some reason (probably because we didn't used to get The WB--now The CW--on our cable service), the network it aired on is always off of my radar. I simply forget it is there. I missed almost all of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and all of Angel too, originally. Those were other binge parties. Anyway, it got me to thinking that superheroes ought to in some way figure in to my feature for the week.

So, why not the ones I grew up with? Superhero cartoons are some of my earliest memories of television, and Saturday mornings were event viewing at my house. Sugary cereal and the big three networks had more than enough.

 

And oddly enough, that's pretty much it for my era of Saturday morning TV. I guess I could have thrown in Captain Caveman and the Teen Angels, but nah. That'll wrap it up for this week. Happy Monday, everyone. Wish me well with my intestinal woe!

Ben Affleck's #1 Fan?

I checked out Ben Affleck's Twitter feed (@BenAffleck) to see if he's said anything about his new gig as Batman in the follow-up to this year's Man of Steel movie, and. . .yikes. While the internets are on fire with "Noooooo!" responses to the news of Affleck's casting (with hashtags like #BetterBatmanThanBenAffleck), he has at least one fan. One very, very persistent fan. The screen caps here are both from just one of Affleck's tweets. There are more there. I've blurred the young man's picture and screen name in case he thinks better of it, and takes them down. But. . .wow. Click to embiggen.

 
 

Ben Affleck to Play the Next Batman

So, Warner Brothers announced on Thursday night that Ben Affleck has been signed to play the next version of Batman in the sequel to Man of Steel. He'll be playing opposite Henry Cavill's Superman, in what will probably amount to a VS. that segues into a team-up. It's an important piece of DC Comics' puzzle on the way to a Justice League of America movie, to rival the movie universe of Marvel Comics.

Warner Brothers may be having a bit of a panic at the moment, because the announcement has been instantly and overwhelmingly negative, at least in the internet quarters I've been visiting. It's a big "Noooooooo!" even from my sister. I have no idea how ironclad the contract is, but I wonder if either WB or Affleck is feeling a bit bruised already. My advice to the fandom: calm down, and let it settle in. Daredevil was a long time ago. Not only has Affleck's craft improved, so has the entire genre of superhero movies. And while I've dissed the handling of DC's properties in the past, they got the Dark Knight trilogy and Man of Steel mostly right. So who knows?

The way I see it, Affleck is the right height, has the right hair color, has the lantern jaw, the ability to beef up when necessary, and is a fairly decent actor. I'm keeping an open mind. And hey, it's not like it's "Nicholas Cage as Superman," right? When you think about it, who was thinking, "Yeah! Michael Keaton as Batman!" until they saw him in it?

[Excerpt]
 
Ben Affleck to play Batman in 'Man of Steel' sequel

Actor Ben Affleck will play Batman in an upcoming Superman sequel that will see the two caped crusaders face off against each other, film studio Warner Bros Pictures said on Thursday. . .

Read more at: Reuters

Movies I Can't Wait to See: DC Comics Announces Superman/Batman Movie!

Image from source, MoviePilot

ERMAHGERD!!! Talk about a nerdgasm! What comics fan (particularly a DC Comics fan) wouldn't go nuts for a "World's Finest" team-up or battle between Superman and Batman? Ecstatic, even! There are however a few problems, namely, a) having to re-boot the Batman character, since Christian Bale is done with it, b) dealing with recaps or retellings of either character's origin stories, c) clarifying the timeline, as to if Supes and Bats have both been around for a while, or if this is a brand new relationship, and d) bridging the worlds of Gotham, Metropolis, and the larger DC Comics universe (Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, The Flash, Justice League).

With a) and b) I wish they would just dispense with retellings and rebootings. I think with three actors in a row having played Batman in the Tim Burton-started series, same thing with the Hulk, changing actors for the love interest in The Dark Knight, and the continuing changes in the James Bond universe, audiences can handle a loose continuity with these characters, without having to go back to square one. Fanboys might squawk a bit, but we don't have to see Batman's origin story again, we get it! If there's a significant change to the backstory, highlight that in a flashback, and then move on.

With c) and d) there is a more delicate problem. So far, DC Comics-based productions have been all over the place, and their behind-the-scenes pre-productions have been insane. It almost seems like a good movie comes out with a DC character. I mean, they were going to have Nicholas Cage be Superman? REALLY? Anyway, they scored a three-fer with The Dark Knight series, and I think continued it with Man of Steel. Count me as one opinion that just because Bale doesn't want to be Batman, that they could easily keep the continuity of the series with a new actor, whether it's Joseph Gordon Leavitt or a replacement for Bale. I've never understood why those three movies have to "stand alone." Even the naming conventions between TDK and MOS are the same. Why start from scratch.
mistake when a

What not to do. Image from NYDailyNews

Their most difficult task is going to be building this shared universe without going overboard, or screwing up one of the puzzle pieces. How will they introduce the other characters, without diverting from the story, or just throwing too much up on the screen? The Marvel template is there to follow, but you know they're going to want to do something different. Can Warner Brothers sustain the franchise with popular movies based on unproven characters, and keep the hype up until Justice League is born? Marvel managed it. In fact Marvel has managed in across studios, with the X-Men and Spider-Man series running in separate worlds from The Avengers. DC is developing their movie universe in a huge shadow.

But they couldn't wish for better than a Superman/Batman movie, done well. If that is done well, and ably sets up some spin-off characters, they will be off and rolling. Henry Cavill has shown that he's a great Superman. If they do as well with their new Batman, it's going to be some show! Can't wait.

[Excerpt]

Warner Bros. Announces Superman/Batman Movie For 2015

Big news Justice League shippers: Zack Snyder is returning for the sequel to Man of Steel.
Only this time, the aforementioned icon will be joining forces with the Dark Knight. . .

Read more at: MoviePilot

Blast from the Past: Up, Up and Away! It's Superman!

Man of Steel--the latest live-action version of Superman has been out for about a month and made over about $620 million worldwide. Oddly, some movie geeks think that's a lackluster performance. It also got some mediocre professional reviews, but has been generally loved by the public, so go figure. One thing it did is cast a huge shadow over every previous version of Supes, and there have been a lot of them. The Metropolis of Man of Steel for example, is so enormous that even though there is more destruction than has ever happened outside of an atomic bomb blast, 95% of it was left standing! It sort of made Superman II's destruction scenes look puny by comparison.

But as a long-time comics fan, particularly DC Comics and Superman, I'm notoriously easy to please, and like just about any version, cheesy or not. Here is a sampling of each edition I was able to find.

1. Superman (1948) - Movie serial starring Kirk Alyn and Noel Neill
2. Adventures of Superman (1952-1958) - Syndicated TV series, starring George Reeves

3. Superman: The Movie (1978) - Movie starring Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder
4. Superman II (1980) - Movie starring Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder



5. Superman III (1983) - Mostly bad movie starring Christopher Reeve and Richard Pryor
6. Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987) - Horrible, cheap movie starring Christopher Reeve



7. Adventures of Superboy (1988-1992) - Syndicated TV Series where Clark is Superboy for (somehow) several years), starring Gerard Christopher, who replaced John Haymes Newton
8. Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993-1997) - ABC TV series, starring Dean Cain and Terri Hatcher



9. Smallville (2001-2011) - WB/CW TV series, where Superboy stays a teenaged boy for way, way too long
10. Superman Returns (2006) - Quasi-sequel to Superman II, ignoring III and IV (wisely), and pleasing nobody except me, who kinda liked it




And that brings us up to the present, with Man of Steel, but since it's a month old, I can still put it on Blast from the Past, I guess. Any excuse to feature the incredible Henry Cavill. Sigh. . .



And yes, I'm aware that all of this would have made more sense a month ago. But it's been a weird couple of weeks folks! Hope you liked it, and hope you have a great week. Happy Monday!

Movie Review: Man of Steel

Compare and contrast to the photo below. Yeah, this is
an new Superman. Image from Forbes.com.

As a DC comics fan to nearly my infancy, I've been starved for representation in the movie adaptation realm. Yes, Batman has been amply represented, but he was never one of my faves, which has left me very little over the years. So, seven years ago when Superman Returns finally came out, I was ecstatic. I'd take him any way I could get him, and how I got him wasn't too bad. Brandon Routh looked the part, and was a decent actor. Kevin Spacey out-hackmaned Gene Hackman. And it kept the vibe of the classic Richard Donner/Christopher Reeve era.

It wasn't the best movie ever, but was far from the worst one, even if you confine yourself to the comic book world. Contemporaneous reviews back me up on this too, Superman Returns was generally well received. But the film was saddled with a lot of baggage, especially the two decades of development and expenditure leading up to it. And when it wasn't a mega-worldwide blockbuster with stellar reviews, it was recast as a flop, a failure. No.  Superman IV: The Quest for Peace was a flop and a failure. But I protest too much. I'm aware that I am in the minority in my appreciation of the 2006 film. And this many years later, I accept that 2013 was not too soon for a reboot.

C'mon, everybody, was it really so bad?
Image from Fanpop.com

Boy howdy did we get a reboot. Spurred, no doubt, by Marvel Comics' stunning string of successes (just ignore Daredevil, Electra, Ghost Rider, The Punisher, The Punisher again, etc.), not to mention legal matters from the heirs of Superman's creators, DC and Warner Brothers got it together at last. Man of Steel is finally here, and is its own kind of Superman. And unless sales deflate on a scale never seen before, it's already on track to be one of the most successful superhero films in history. For once, the hype, the marketing, and the buildup paid off. It's a freakin' great movie.

With over $200 million spent to make it, I guess it should be really good, but look at the recent Star Trek sequel. Its budget wasn't quite that big, and did respectable business, but has been belittled and berated all over the internets as an under-performer, and a disappointment (again, not to me, I dug it). Today's blockbusters are judged as much for how much money they haul in, as they are for actually being good entertainment.

But I'm off on a tangent here. We're talking about Man of Steel, so named to align with Batman's Dark Knight trilogy. The movie is star-studded, with huge names (Russell Crowe, Diane Lane, Kevin Costner, Laurence Fishburne), and lauded TV stars (Richard Schiff, Christopher Meloni). It starts by creating a whole new planet Krypton, with a re-imagined origin story. It ably combines the elements from Krypton in Superman: The Movie, the John Byrne era Superman comics and the classic silver/golden-age Superman comics.  The reasons behind Krypton's eventual destruction resonate with earthly concerns of today, and the villains consigned to the Phantom Zone (as in Superman I & II) have much more back-story and motivation.

Every adaptation monkeys with the "S" shield, none get it right.
This is one of the better ones, though.

Clark Kent's arrival on earth and growing up years are wisely mostly confined to flashbacks, in nice little nugget-sized factoids, woven adeptly into the story. Since almost everyone already knows about Clark Kent, Ma & Pa Kent, and the rest from Smallville, other TV shows, movies and seventy-five years of comic books, a more through story is unnecessary. Thank you, movie gods! The back-story leading up to the meat of Man of Steel does a good job of showing us how he got here, how he grew up, and where we are now, without belaboring any of it. And it manages to shed all of the Donner/Reeve years while doing so. With beefy, very different looking Henry Cavill playing Clark/Superman, it really does feel brand new. Even the costume (which is updated quite a bit) is given a reason for existing that is far and away better than any previous adapation. The Movie tried, with Marlon Brando's S tunic, but this movie got it right.

Given all of the fan mockups of Jusstice League posters
online, there are high hopes in fandom
land that Man of Steel begets lots of DCU movies.
Image from YoungJusticer.tumblr.com

Once Man of Steel gets going, it really gets going. Previous Superman movies are going to look like high school stage productions in retrospect, after this one. It really looks like super beings pummeling the stuffing out of each other. There's a little to complain about here, if you--like me--have a little difficulty following fast-paced battles in movies. It wasn't like Lord of the Rings, where there are hundreds of participants (I couldn't deal with it, sorry), so I managed. But there is a lot of whiz-bang here. Not to mention a lot of destruction. You thought The Avengers knew how to destroy a city? Well Smallville got a lot smaller, and Metropolis is going to be rebuilding for years.

If I had any other complaint about the movie, it would be one abrupt transition in the film. The bad guys are really making a mess, and things look bad. Supes is getting his clock cleaned. Then, all of the sudden, the good guys have a plan, and put it into action. There felt like there was a scene missing there. But at 2-1/2 hours long, they must have needed to speed things along. Ultimately, I left the theater feeling that it was the best Superman movie ever made. It topped Star Trek: Into Darkness (which I loved), comparatively speaking. And it made me excited at the prospect of more in the series, more in the DC Universe, and a hope for a Justice League movie!

This is a Superman I want to see again, whether he's called Man of Steel, Last Son of Krypton, Man of Tomorrow or just plain Superman. Oh, and as minor character Carrie Farris (awfully close to a Green Lantern character name) says at the end, "he's kinda hot." Perhaps the understatement of the year.

My grade is: A - Highly Recommended

Hate Group Using DC Comics' Superman for Publicity

The image NOMBlog is using to promote their brand.
Are you paying attention DC?

Ugh. I'll admit that when I heard that there was a boycott afoot over a proposed writer for a Superman comic, I was torn. First, I'm a DC Comics fan from way back when comics cost 20 cents, so the character is more than just another superhero to me. Second, I'm gay, and this writer dude Orson Scott Card is profoundly, loudly and proudly anti-gay. So, while I have some issues with interfering with an individual's career over his personal views, I also feel a personal connection to the character he's writing, and am appalled that he's going to be writing it.

But the issue is a little more clear when you realize that this isn't one guy's personal views. Card is on the board of the National Organization for Marriage, a hate group that exists not--as they purport--to "protect" marriage, but to thwart equal rights for gay people. One need not follow NOM's writings for long to suss out that "marriage" is only part of their agenda. Their championing of the Boy Scouts of America's anti-gay policy, their campaigns against domestic partnerships and civil unions, and many other issues illustrate clearly that NOM is an anti-gay organization, first and foremost. So, to my mind, Card isn't just some poor schmuck with an opinion.

DC Comics, for their part, has pretty much to this point stood by their man. And I get that. They don't want interest groups combing through each writer's and artist's pasts for something to object to. I get that. But I'm also one of many gay former kids for whom DC Comics and Superman played a large part in our growing up. And a lot of us still read comics. And how much can DC or parent company Warner Bros. want their flagship character to be used by a hate group? Because that is what NOM is doing with Superman.

[Excerpt]

ConservativeHQ: Buy A Comic Book To Stand For Marriage

. . .Orson Scott Card, a talented science fiction writer, is part of a team of writers and artists assembled by DC Comics to create an “Adventures of Superman” comic series ahead of the release of the summer Superman film Man of Steel.* Card is also a believer in the Biblical definition of marriage who has the courage to say so. . .

Source: NOMBlog (If you have a strong stomach, click through, and read some of their postings, but be warned. . .the comments sections are poisonous.)

Movies I Can't Wait to See: Man of Steel

Henry Cavill looks good, no doubt. But I'm hoping
the costume is an early prototype. Image from
JustJared.

DC Comics has just released The Dark Knight Rises, apparently the last Batman movie we're likely to get for a long time. The movie--despite the tragic opening night fiasco in Aurora,Colorado--is likely to do very, very well. Maybe not The Avengers well, but close. And that's a darn sight better than most of DC Comics' movie adaptations compared to Marvel's.

And for life-long DC fans like me, who actually dug Green Lantern and yes, Superman Returns, it's about time. But, if you think it's weird that I liked those movies, I've also been underwhelmed by Christopher Nolan's modern day Batman series. The second one with the late Heath Ledger as the Joker? Meh. I know everyone liked it, but to me, it was just oversold or something. But then, I wasn't much of a fan of the Tim Burton/Joel Schumacher Batman series either. Well, I liked the Val Kilmer one.

So, while I don't think it was necessary to reboot Superman only six years after the last one, I am nonetheless excited about Man of Steel. Supes has always been one of my favorites, and it would be sweet if DC finally hit on a non-Batman hero, one that everyone likes, not just me. The overdone "S" shield in this promo is a little troublesome. I am a graphic artist as an adult, and that thing is just too much. But I'll be there. Maybe not on opening night though. . .

For The Man of Steel, I Have High Hopes, Low Expectations

DC Comics characters, from Collider.com

I am a long-time DC Comics fan. As a child of the 70s, my earliest comics are from about 1974, the days of the 80-Page Spectaculars. While I had a few Marvel Spider-Man comics, I was a DC boy, all the way. As such, I was treated to some pretty good Hollywood adaptations in my youth. We had the Batman TV show. We had the Wonder Woman TV show. And we had Super-Friends, Batman and Robin, Superman, Aquaman and by the late 70s, Superman: The Movie.

All the while, Marvel fans had a half-way decent Spider-Man cartoon, some really lame Marvel Super-Heroes cheapo cartoons, a supremely lame Amazing Spider-Man live-action show (and Spidey on The Electric Company) and the dour The Incredible Hulk. Eventually, the Hulk series degenerated into a movie-of-the-week pseudo series, with desperate attempts for spinoffs of Daredevil, Thor and others. DC was winning the pop culture battle.

Sort of. The Flash was a short-lived DC prime time effort. Batman won acclaim at the box office under Tim Burton, until Joel Schumacher killed it with bat-nipples. Cat Woman died at the theater, and Spider-Man kicked ass. The Fantastic Four gained dollars for Marvel with two films, though it was critically drubbed. The X-Men had a three-movie (or five, whatever) series that was mixed, but somewhat successful. There was Ghost Rider and Watchmen and Constantine and many others. But outside of the latter day Dark Knight (Batman) movies, Marvel Comics is winning the pop culture battle decisively. That's a huge caveat, since DK movies are the critical holy grail of movies. I--curiously enough (a lonely fan of Superman Returns) found those flicks to be rather meh. Whatevs.

70s Spider-Man, from Zaki's Corner

So, now we have a brand-new, rebooted Marvel Amazing Spider-Man, just a couple of years outside of the original trilogy. And we have a brand new, rebooted Man of Steel, Superman movie, six years after the previous reboot/continuation of Superman: The Movie and Superman II (and ignoring Superman III and IV: The Quest for Peace). Brandon Routh, the star of the previous movie, was the very essence of Clark Kent and Superman. He was a doppelganger of Christopher Reeve, and a good actor. It was not his fault that there were several false starts, and tons of money spent in the interim between IV and Returns.

But, the idiots in Hollywood decided that the 2006 movie was at fault (and I'm in the minority of viewers who believes otherwise). So, it's reboot  time. Which isn't surprising when you consider that DC Comics reboots itself every six or seven years these days. They went along with one continuity from 1938 to 1984 or so (with an invisible transition in the 1950s-60s), and rebooted it in 1986. Then, they couldn't stop doing that, and made it a regular event. So, we've got to get used to rebooting, and rebooting and rebooting. It will be so with every popular franchise of every kind of character from now until the end of pop culture.

So, I'll hope for the best of Man of Steel, while expecting the worst. Henry Cavill is the new Clark, and he's British (just as the American born, but English-raised Andrew Garfield, the new Amazing Spider-Man is). He looks nothing like Christopher Reeve nor Routh, though he's plenty handsome.  There's something odd about both Spider-Man's and Superman's new costumes. The previous movies' versions were exemplary, the best combination of real-world and classic design possible. The new ones look derivitive and somehow dirty.  Not digging it, guys. I'm willing to change my mind if warranted. But I'm not optimistic.

Image from source, LA Times

[Excerpt]

‘Man of Steel’: Zack Snyder says film has ‘date with destiny’ 

When the Warner Bros. film “Man of Steel” opens one year from today it will be flying in formation with history, which is  a source of considerable excitement for director Zack Snyder.
“The thing that’s really special and hasn’t really been acknowledged is that ‘Man of Steel’ comes out on the 75th anniversary of ‘Action Comics’ No. 1,” the filmmaker said just before a stage appearance at the recent Hero Complex Film Festival.  ”That’s the very first appearance of Superman. I haven’t seen people talk about that yet. . .”

Read more at: Los Angeles Times

Republicans Unanimously Vote That "Global Warming" Doesn't Exist

I think it's official. The Republicans are the Elders of Krypton.

[Excerpt]

‘War On Science’: Committee From Koch Votes To Deny Climate Change



Today, Republicans in the House energy committee voted not once, not twice, but three times, against amendments recognizing that climate change is real, despite the broad scientific consensus that “climate change is happening and human beings are a major reason for it. . .”
 

Read more at: Think Progress

Superman Recast with Henry Cavill

Image from source, Filmonic

There's a Superman named Henry? Isn't that even dorkier than "Clark?" Oh well, he looks like a handsome, strapping dude, and British or not, I think he can pull it off. I feel bad for Brandon Routh though. I'm in the distinct minority of comic book fans who actually enjoyed Superman Returns. I think much of the negative press that film took had more to do with the countless false starts, and many counted lost millions on Superman films that never got made between 1987 and 2006. Oh well. I'm just glad they're actually going to do another one. No matter how good it is, though, there will be disappointed fan boys out there. Relax, at least it isn't Nicholas Cage!

[Excerpt]

Henry Cavill is the new Superman!



After much speculation, relative unknown Henry Cavill has landed one of the most coveted roles in Hollywood. The British actor will play Superman (aka Clark Kent, as if you didn’t know) in Zack Synder’s still-untitled Superman film, set to be produced by Christopher Nolan. . .
 
Read more at: Filmonic

The Problem With Superhero Movies

All images from
SuperHeroMovies.net

I've spent a good portion of my evening reading about upcoming superhero movies. As I often do, I sort of got lost in the topic, having no idea how much time I was spending. But through all of that reading, I was also doing a lot of thinking. There are tons of great characters out there (and I'm just talking about the DC and Marvel characters I'm most familiar with). They've had in some cases over seventy years of story ideas. Yet somehow, many characters languish for years in development hell, and others come to the screen as major disappointments.

Part of the problem is that comic book fans are notoriously fickle. You couldn't find a group of people--outside of Star Trek or Star Wars fans--who are harder to please. They don't like the director, they don't like the script, they don't like the actors chosen to play their favorite heroes, villains and the lot. Mostly, they'll complain that the final product is too different--or paradoxically too much like--the source material.

Another part of the problem is that if they're too faithful, they might just look silly. As good as the first two Superman movies were, Christopher Reeve's tights did look goofy. The Spider-Man movies of the last ten years and Superman Returns (highly underrated, in my lonely opinion) proved that they can make a fairly faithful costume that doesn't look ridiculous. And in the upcoming Green Lantern movie--which looks like it could either be great or crappy--they wisely ditched the elbow-length white gloves.

One of the biggest problems with bringing our heroes to the big screen seems to be Hollywood meddling. You would think with so much source material, coming up with a gem would be an easy proposition. But a look at some of the stuff that didn't make it shows that Hollywood doesn't know what it's doing a lot of the time. If you've ever seen pictures of the Tim Burton take on Superman (staring Nicholas Cage as Supes!), you know what I'm talking about.  Even when they get it right, the sequels always spin out of control. 

The original Superman series got progressively more silly, and lower-budget, to the point of embarrassment. The 80s-90s Batman franchise added too many characters, and changed actors too often. X-Men just. . .lost something.  Spider-Man fell to the same "too many characters" trope, and The Punisher could never figure out how to replicate the comic, amongst many other problems.  Only Iron Man and The Fantastic Four seemed to be consistent with tone and style, though I'm again in the minority of opinion on that one, and FF is rumored to be on a reboot schedule as well.

And when they don't fall apart, they reboot. This makes sense, as with Batman Begins, starting up a dormant property in a new era. But only a few years passed between The Hulk and the reboot, The Incredible Hulk. Spider-Man is being rebooted with only a couple of years since the last installment. Superman: Man of Steel is on its way, as a reboot only six years after the last one.

All of this is taking place in a market already saturated with bombastic, CGI-laden "blockbuster" films (now in 3D!). How many times can we watch the "first" installment of a new or rebooted series, with half the picture taken up by an origin story? How many times can an audience be expect to "reboot" their brains to keep a now changed storyline straight? Especially when they're trying to tie the Marvel stories and the DC stories into respective "universes" so that they can make "group" movies like The Avengers and The Justice League of America?

Honestly, as much as I want to see my favorite heroes (Wonder Woman, The Metal Men, Plastic Man, Firestorm, The Flash, Shazam!, JLA, etc.) come to life at the movies, I have a funny feeling that all of this is going to collapse under its own weight. Maybe if Joss Whedon's The Avengers, along with Captain America, Thor and Green Lantern all manage to be both good movies, and successful, that feeling will go away. But given the recent history of failed or stillborn attempts, I don't have a good feeling about the genre in general.

Now, if you are interested in finding a place where all of the future superhero movies can be read about in one place, I've got a link for you. A lot of them are subject to change or cancellation of course, and several of them sound like they can't possibly happen with the given details (could The Flash, JLA and Wonder Woman really all come out on the same day?), and some will make you groan. I mean, they're really going to call a Captain Marvel movie Billy Batson and the Legend of Shazam!? Why not, Shazam! The World's Mightiest Mortal, or With One Magic Word. . .SHAZAM!?  Anyway, the site is called Superhero Movie News. Don't get lost there, like I did.

The Secret Origin of DC Comics

For comics geeks everywhere. . .

The History of DC Comics on TV

Image from source, IGNTV

I've often said in this space that I'm a comic book fan, specifically of DC Comics. I've also often lamented DC's relative lack of product, compared to rival Marvel Comics. But DC has had some success on TV, including the upcoming The Human Target with Mark Valley on FOX. Since the blog has been rather light this weekend, I thought it might be fun to put something non-political up for a change. And superheroes are one of my favorite diversions, so here you go!

[Excerpt]

The History of DC Comics on TV

This Sunday sees the premiere of Human Target on FOX – a new action series based on the DC Comic book of the same name. But Human Target is hardly the first TV version of a DC hero, and we thought we'd take the opportunity to look back at all of the DC heroes who've graced the small screen in the past – or in some cases, never got further than the pilot stage (most of the time for good reason). . .

Read more at: IGNTV

Does Spider-Man Really Need a Reboot?

Image from source, Bam! Kapow!

What the heck is so difficult about making superhero movies? There are countless stories told over spans of forty to seventy years in some cases, and still the movie studios seem clueless. For every good superhero movie, there are several bad ones. For every strong first movie, there are strings of bad sequels. For every one that gets to the screen, there are countless discarded treatments, and more cancelled concepts.

Marvel Comics--much to this DC Comics fan's chagrin--seemed to be on a roll. They had critical and/or popular success with X-Men, Spider-Man, Fantastic Four and Iron Man. Some were middling or failures, like The Hulk, Daredevil, Ghost Rider, Electra, Wolverine, and the many versions of The Punisher. But when it comes to bringing product to the screen, Marvel has been riding high.

DC hasn't fared as well. They've struck popular and critical gold with Batman lately (particularly with The Dark Knight), but not much else. They utterly failed with Catwoman. Didn't do so well with Constantine. I guess Watchmen did all right, but I didn't much care for it. But this isn't exactly their top-shelf stuff, excepting Batman. Where are the long promised Shazam!, The Metal Men, Wonder Woman, Superman vs. Batman, Justice League of America, Plastic Man and The Flash?

Superman Returns came out in 2006, continuing the basic storyline of Superman: The Movie and Superman II. I loved it, but am in the minority. The lukewarm response has parked the franchise in purgatory, with rumors of a "reboot." A reboot takes the same or similar characters, and starts over, with a different cast, different continuity and usually different people behind the scenes. It can re-energize a franchise (see Batman) or can make little difference (The Incredible Hulk). And it runs the risk of alienating fans of the previous franchise. The time to reboot Superman would have been before the last movie, if they were going to do it.

Now comes word of a Spider-Man reboot. Why? This franchise has all come out in the last 10 years. The cast is still in an age range that works. The third movie underwhelmed, but for reasons that had nothing to do with the creative team (other than the writer). The problem with Spider-Man 3 is the same one that plagued the Michael Keaton/Val Kilmer/George Clooney Batman series: just too damned much. Too many characters, particularly, villains thrown into one big movie blender. Rather than a reboot, a simple paring back would have sufficed.

The strange thing about rebooting Spider-Man is that there has been a recent attempt to tie together these Marvel movies into the same universe with little cameos at the end. Doesn't making a whole new version kind of screw that up? For some interesting reading, Google around (or Wikipedia around) for some behind the scenes stuff about the making of some of these movies. Here's one to get you started, for the Superman series. It's stunning how many talented people can have so many stupid ideas. How hard can it really be to make a good superhero movie?

[Excerpt]

Spider-Man Movies Get The Reboot

Peter Parker is going back to high school when the next Spider-Man hits theaters in the summer of 2012. Columbia Pictures and Marvel Studios announced today they are moving forward with a film based on a script by James Vanderbilt that focuses on a teenager grappling with both contemporary human problems and amazing super-human crises. . .

Read more at: Bam! Kapow!

Frivolity Break: Weird Deleted Scenes from Superman IV: The Quest for Peace

Image from Superman Homepage

This is a total geek post for fans of the Superman movies. Everyone knows that Superman: The Movie and Superman II were the best of the series (though I am in the minority of those who dug Superman Returns). Superman III went silly with Richard Pryor, but things really went wrong with Superman IV: The Quest for Peace.

For a variety of reasons, the fourth movie was outsourced to a cheapie studio, and the result was an unmitigated disaster. Once, we believed a man could fly. In this edition, due to budget cuts, not so much. The plot had something to do with Superman ridding the world of nuclear weapons. And trying to romance both Lois Lane and Mariel Hemmingway. In the mix were Gene Hackman, playing Lex Luthor like he'd been overcome with stupid, and Jon Cryer as an even stupider nephew of Lex. Luthor's plan was to clone Superman, and make his own version who would answer only to him.

The result was "The Nuclear Man" who inexplicably had a completely different appearance, and different powers. Worse, the movie was made incoherent by some drastic edits made just before it was distributed. As a comic collector at the time, I had the official adaptation, which included many scenes that did not appear in the movie. I always thought the movie stunk, but maybe it wouldn't have if those drastic cuts hadn't been made. I was wrong.

Below are the long-missing scenes. And as you will see, they wouldn't have made the movie any better. It was unsalvageable. Still, as a long time fan of even bad superhero movies, I was delighted to see the scenes at last. Hat-tip to Uncoached, where I found the first clip.