Well, I guess the title is pretty self explanatory. The future of the DC movie universe has been a hot topic during the past few weeks (several articles have been posted up about it already) and I decided to throw in my own two cents.
To say that DC Entertainment bet it all on Green Lantern would be an understatement. Word has it that the budget was well over $300 million dollars, and that DC was already developing a sequel and a Flash film, banking on GL's box office success. Warner Brothers have been very open in stating that the heroes of the DC Universe would be the future cash cows of the studio after the Harry Potter franchise wraps up this summer.
How much things can change in a week.
An extremely optimistic view would be that Green Lantern barely makes back its production costs and we get a sequel, but right now, things aren't looking too good for the Emerald Knight. For any other movie, a $53 million opening weekend would be great, but not for a movie with a budget as massive as Green Lantern. Plus you have to look at the competition, this week Cars 2 comes out, and next week Transformers 3 hits, and both are sure to be massive successes. In the end, I see Green Lantern pulling in about $150-170 million at the box office domestically. So where does this leave the rest of the cinematic DCU?
First off, you can count out a Green Lantern sequel. If you read my review of GL, I stated that I hoped we would see a sequel because I thought it could be vastly improved, and I still stick by that hope. Sadly, the studios look at the money first and I think Warner Brothers will realize a GL2 won't be worth the investment. Is this the last we'll see of Green Lantern on the big screen? I doubt it. In this day and age, reboots and superheroes are all the rage, so I'm sure we'll see a rebooted Green Lantern movie in 5-10 years.
What about that Justice League movie due out in 2013? Well, I think we can (thankfully) count that out too. I think Green Lantern was Warner Brothers testing the waters on DC heroes other than Batman, and after seeing it's performance, I don't think they'll be ready to jump in just yet. But this is also a good thing because I was dead set against a JLA movie so soon. As much as I would love to see all the heavy hitters of the DCU on the big screen, it was obvious that Warners was assembling movie as a panic response to The Avengers.
The Avengers is going to pay off big for Marvel because Marvel took it's time building up to it. They put out individual movies for each heroes, planted seeds, and got the audiences hyped up. With a movie as big as The Avengers, you almost need multiple prequels to lead up to it, and it will pay off. I think most people wouldn't react well to a Justice League movie with no build up. General audiences really wouldn't embrace a group of heroes that they had no connection too before, and would probably be confused at seeing different actors playing heroes like Batman and Green Lantern. So yes, thankfully we will be spared yet another cheap and rushed JLA movie. Again.
Then there's the Flash movie. Word has it that DC had a script ready and was going to put The Flash into production pending on the success of GL. Once again, I think we'll have to wait a little bit longer for this one, but once again, that's not a bad thing. The script for the Flash movie was written by the writers of Green Lantern, and if you read my review you'll know that I think the biggest flaw with GL was the clunky script. Hopefully, a delay will mean that they'll take Flash back to the drawing board and get a new screenwriter on it.
So overall, is the failure of Green Lantern a good or bad thing for DC movies? Ultimately, I think a lot of good can come from it. While I'm sure we'll hear multiple excuses from Warners over why GL failed (Twenty bucks says they'll blame the competition), I just hope they learn from their mistakes. I really want to see the DC heroes up on the big screen because I'm a huge DC fanboy, but I want to see my favorite heroes done right.
What Warner Brothers needs to do is look at what Marvel is doing right. Marvel seems to get writers and directors that actually care about the source material and want to make the best movie they can. Not only that, but Marvel seems to be getting either talented up and coming directors (John Favreau) or experienced veterans (Kenneth Branaugh). Also, the best Marvel movies (Thor and Iron Man) kept their stories as simple as possible. In Iron Man, Tony wanted to stop arms dealing, and in Thor, he wanted to prove himself to his father. DC needs to look at what makes their characters tick and focus on that, then they story will build itself.
DC also needs to find the best directors they can, not unknowns or journeymen. Christopher Nolan worked because he had a vision for Batman and knew how to execute it. DC needs to start getting the best talent they can for their films and find directors that will actually care about the characters.
So I think it will be a while before we see the heroes of the DC universe in live action, but I don't think all hope is lost. Next year we have both The Dark Knight Rises and Superman: The Man of Steel coming out as well. While TDKR is kind of a different beast all together from the other DC heroes, it will definitely be a huge success for DC Entertainment. And then there's The Man of Steel. While I think that Zack Snyder is terribly overrated as a director, he can bring that unique flair that Superman needs. There's been a lack of news over MOS these past few months but I really think this is the movie DC should be pushing. If DC is serious about competing with Marvel at the movies, why not start it off with their flagship character, Superman? Though TDKR will be a huge success, I think DC needs pull out all the stops on Superman and use it as their springboard for future DC movies.
So right now, its all up to DC. They can continue making sub-par superhero movies and wondering why they flop, or they can get serious and give us the movies we want. Fans are always looking for new superhero movies and it will only be so long before audiences tire of the same old franchises. But hey, if the new Superman movie doesn't work there's always that Batman reboot...
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