Warner Brothers Almost Gets It - In Regards To Their Superheroes

Hey folks, Harry here... Today - over at The Wall Street Journal - Jeff Robinov is talking about the "master plan" for DC's Heroes as they apply to Warner's film slate. It seems that the big series of round table meetings that they had - back after IRON MAN came out - have caused trimming of the bush - along with planting of new seeds in their development slate. Then DARK KNIGHT came out - and kinda changed everything in their executive brains. Jeff Robinov has decided to follow the MARVEL model in regards to their characters. Introducing Stand Alone Character films "For every character they have the rights to" - a statement that I feel is probably a gross exaggeration. But I bet it's every character that Robinov is familiar with, ie. that DC put in front of him. Then use those Stand Alone hopeful Franchises to build toward a multi-character film - like a JUSTICE LEAGUE movie. Ok - I'm down with that. Sounds good. Then you get toward the end of the article and Jeff apparently wants "the next pack of superhero movies to be bathed in the same brooding tone as 'The Dark Knight.'" Ok - this is where it becomes readily evident that Jeff Robinov doesn't get it. BROODING is what BATMAN does. DARK TONES is what makes BATMAN and GOTHAM the places they are. You can apply some of that to Green Arrow - but making a dark brooding SUPERMAN - bathing Metropolis in a darkness isn't necessarily what we want. Robinov feels that they need to explore the evil side to characters - as the key to unlocking these other characters. The key isn't to make all the heroes realistic vigilantes - that hate themselves. The key is to take their villains serious. If you want to make a SUPERMAN movie to blow peoples' minds - do a Darkseid story. If you want to blow our minds with a GREEN LANTERN movie - by all means - go crazy Science Fiction with it. BUT these other franchises and characters are OTHER CHARACTERS. They are not BATMAN clones. The reason IRON MAN did so well for MARVEL - although in some monkey's brain he was a 'B' Character - was because they realized the character as he was meant to be realized. His character is a womanizer, a lush and a genius. SPIDER-MAN worked because Peter Parker is a sweet kid that messed up and got his Uncle killed and is trying to spend his life making up for that. But when they tried to make his character DARK & BROODING in the last film - fans rejected it. BECAUSE THAT IS NOT SPIDER-MAN. The key to all of these heroes are their villains. Because the measure of a hero is the villain that they face. Lex Luthor isn't a bumbling Land Grabber like Richard Donner gave us and that Bryan Singer gave us - Lex Luthor is the evil TONY STARK - actually - he's closer to Jeff Bridges's Stane. Lex would have been the world's greatest man had SUPERMAN never existed. His mind was an evolutionary step forward. His company solving the world's woes... for a profit. Then this orphan from space comes and puts him in a shadow. Put's him in a corner - and nobody puts baby in a corner. And it caused something to snap - it's the tragedy of SUPERMAN - his existence created Lex's villainry. BUT more importantly - you have amazing villains like Braniac or most importantly - DARKSEID! Painting SUPERMAN with dark tones... does anyone remember SUPERMAN III? Of course that was done tongue in cheek, but I am just not one to want a brooding sad sack SUPERMAN moaning constantly about being ALONE. That's THE MARTIAN MANHUNTER - not SUPERMAN. Ideally - what I'd like to see is to have each character realized as well as BATMAN has been. Just develop the properties with RESPECT and GRANDEUR. That's all I ask. What about you Talkbackers - how would you like to see the DC heroes handled. Take these and tell us what you'd like to see from WONDER WOMAN, SUPERMAN, GREEN LANTERN, GREEN ARROW, MARTIAN MANHUNTER, THE FLASH - and building to a JLA flick?