Did Speed Racer Kill Our Chance for a Fun DCCU?

And could it be it's savior?

Editorial Opinion
By AverageDrafter - Dec 31, 2013 12:12 PM EST
Filed Under: Speed Racer

Warner Brothers have gotten a lot of heat for Man of Steel; for throwing Superman into the grim and gritty world reminiscent of Nolan's Batman; for the mass destruction and apparent deaths of thousands; for ignoring or outright destroying the basic underpinnings of what the character represents.

They have also taken flack for letting much of the DC universe languish in development hell. Wonder Woman, in particular, has been the subject of constant hand-wringing and doubt on the part of WB. Including her into what appears to be an overstuffed MoS sequel has not really set well with her fans; who are content for now that she getting a big screen treatment at all.

Why all this fear and doubt? Why not just let the characters wade in their gloriously exuberant comic book glory on the big screen?

Many will point to the underperforming Green Lantern as the reason for their reticence, but I offer another big budget film that (unlike the modestly successful Green Lantern) was one of the biggest box office disasters in history.

Speed Racer



Unabashedly seeped in it's anime origin, live-action turned colorful and cartoonish with a CG brush, and made without fear for it's earnest ability to take seriously the world it establishes, even when that world is hyper-stylized and even silly to the extreme.

Not only did it fail to perform, but it also split people's opinion more than most movies could. Some decried it as eyeball bleeding nausea, others as nothing more than the glorious video game infused future of cinema.



At the time of Speed Racer, The Wachowskis had a string of money makers in the Matrix Trilogy and V for Vendetta. They were given the budget and latitude to create Speed Racer as they saw fit, opting to go with a PG film aimed at the family market that was both lucrative and in keeping with the spirit of the source material.

Things... did not go as planned. The show did not have the cache with the kiddos it did with their Gen-X parents, and adults seemed to be turned off by the bubblegum visuals and tonally off-putting presentation.



Also given that WB had no idea who to market this thing to led to a blanket approach that over-saturated an already super-saturated movie, and still it left many to wonder who this was meant for.

What it also did was make Warner's gun shy about trusting anyone coming into their offices looking to make a film with seemingly childish source material and massive budget requirements. If you want to know why someone hasn't waltzed into the executive offices of WB with a Wonder Woman script that revels in the comic book nature of the character - I guarantee you they have and probably with something sublime enough make a WW fan weep with the sadness of what could be.



"Make it DARK, raise the stakes." they will respond, "We don't want another mess like Speed Racer."

And no wonder they've stuck to the grim world of Batman for their DC films - its paid off. It a safe way to proceed where the way of Speed Racer is fraught with uncertainty and failure.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the dust bin of cinematic history. As is such with all works of such audacity, Speed developed a following. It was lauded by its fans as a tragically overlooked film, one of sheer creative brilliance and unleashed excitement.



Yes it is campy, but it also packs a wallop of an emotional punch; not an easy thing to manage all at once.

What is more striking than the following it has achieved is that the fans of the film are amongst the most passionately feverent and cinematicly knowledgeable folks I've read and talked to, and they also tend to aline themselves well with geek-out sensibilities as well as with the finer masterpieces in the film world.



Few who have actually seen it will tell you its the garbage that many assume it to be, and no one will tell you they've ever seen anything like it.

Those who love the film will tell you that it is one of the best films of the last decade, and not in a "no one else gets it but me" way, but in a "I want EVERYONE to see this and then have to scoop their brains back into their heads" way.

That passion, that following, that feeling that you want to share - well its getting harder and harder to find, but if you are willing, you will find it in Speed Racer.



It is what we need now in the DCCU, no less than the Silver Age reborn in all of its joyously awesome sense of adventure and discovery, splashed across the screen with the sure hand of artists who know exactly what they are doing.
PREY Star Emile Hirsch Talks SPEED RACER's Surprising Legacy And WOLVERINE Fan Casts (Exclusive)
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PREY Star Emile Hirsch Talks SPEED RACER's Surprising Legacy And WOLVERINE Fan Casts (Exclusive)

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MrStayPuft
MrStayPuft - 12/31/2013, 1:31 PM
Its really sad because that was my favorite movie.
DEVLIN712
DEVLIN712 - 12/31/2013, 1:37 PM
It's a me, Mario!
TheOneAboveAll
TheOneAboveAll - 12/31/2013, 1:40 PM
I actually liked Speed Racer for how closely it resembled the source material that I watched as a kid. It was perfect in tone.
Wolf38
Wolf38 - 12/31/2013, 1:44 PM
I'm pretty much cool with Speed Racer. But some films are just not destined to be blockbuster financial hits.

I do think, though, that a film that aims to be bright and fun and "silver age-y" needs to both (a) go all out, full speed ahead with that plan and (b) actually be well-written. If the script and humor are sharp, it can work. Everyone involved has to fully commit. That rarely happens.

kong
kong - 12/31/2013, 3:34 PM
I LOVED this movie. I remember when me and my best friend would play this on the playground. Soon EVERYONE in the grade was following us as we raced on the track!! I was always speed and my friend was Racer X!

It was such a big part of my childhood and this movie captured every character so well. I actually loved the movie and it would be awesome if CBM's could do this? Especially a movie like Flash or Green Lantern.
Moohika
Moohika - 12/31/2013, 3:47 PM
I was expecting PMJacky. DC does not need to change its themes, their characters work best with the "dark/grim" theme- if you want to call it that.
QuestiontheAnswer
QuestiontheAnswer - 12/31/2013, 3:59 PM
I thought this was a Jacky article.
AverageDrafter
AverageDrafter - 12/31/2013, 5:25 PM
@MarioJokes - pretty much why I picked that picture.
@JackyJokes - I am honored by the confusion.
@GuyWhoLikesGrimDC - It's just so damn lame. And boring. I don't need EVERYONE brooding like Batman, hell I don't even need Batman brooding like Batman anymore.
@LoveForSpeed - Spread the word my brothers.
CorndogBurglar
CorndogBurglar - 12/31/2013, 6:55 PM
MoS didn't destroy the basoc underpinnings of what Superman represents...
AverageDrafter
AverageDrafter - 12/31/2013, 7:19 PM
Defend your position corndog, and prepare to be annihilated.
Lhornbk
Lhornbk - 12/31/2013, 8:58 PM
The LAST thing that DC films need is to be like Speed Racer.
ALF9001
ALF9001 - 12/31/2013, 9:37 PM
LOVED speed racer!!! Such an awesome, original and fresh film. I honestly think that people didnt like it because of how diferent it was, I would really like to see more movies like speed
CorndogBurglar
CorndogBurglar - 12/31/2013, 10:58 PM
@ averagedrafter

Haha. Okay.

At the end of the day, Superman represents the best in humanity. He is the ultimate, morally sound individual on the face of the planet. Like Batman has said, he is the pinnacle of otherworldly power, a person not of earth, but in trying to learn the best aspects of humanity, he has actually become the most human of us all.

I think what people forget is that even though he may be the most morally sound person on the planet, he is not perfect. People also forget that MoS was his first outing as a Superhero. He was inexperienced in dealing with super powered beings.

Yes, he took a life. He killed Zod. But anyone that complains about that needs to do their research because Superman also killed Zod in the comics. In the comics, he did it in a much more methodical way, too. He planned a way to kill Zod with Kryptonite. It wasn't some split second decisio where an innocent family's lives were on the line. He actually thought about how he would take Zod's life, and then did it.

So again, Superman represents all that is morally right with humanity. When comparing his actions in MoS with some of his actions from the comics, I fail to see how anything he represents was "destroyed".

Was the movie perfect? No, it wasn't. But people saying that Superman's character was ruined or destroyed are severely overreacting.
CorndogBurglar
CorndogBurglar - 12/31/2013, 11:12 PM
Fangz

I hear ya man. Like the taking of Zod's life. I fully expect the reoercussions of that to effect Superman on some emotional level in the sequel. Its already been said that they will explore it, but who knows to what extent? And who knows, maybe his guilt over killing Zod is what leads him to the decision of never taking another life again?

I've seen people complain about him letting his father die. All I can say is that he was young and still learning life lessons from his father at the point.
That is a period of time that we never really get to see in the comics. Yes, we know that Superman normally wouldn't sit back and let that happen in the comics. But we also DON'T know if there was some event that led him to take that stance. Superman wasn't born with these strong morals, they were taught to him from his father and through life experiences, just like anyone else.

The other thing people complain about is how he kept fighting in the city full of people. Again, he was inexperienced. It was his first time dealing with super powered beings...and he was outnumbered. If you watch the scene where he is fighting Faora and "Generic Kryptonian #1" then you cansee that he's doing everything he can just to stay alive. Any time he fought one off, the other was right there to take up the fight.

Anyway, nothing in that movie made me think, wow, that isn't what Superman stands for.
maninfinesuit
maninfinesuit - 1/1/2014, 12:14 AM
Speed Racer was an incredible film. Definitely worthy of more praise than it gets.
MightyZeus
MightyZeus - 1/1/2014, 12:45 AM
Good article. I dont think Speed Racer was the fault of the DCCU becoming more friendly in it's newer and modern films. I think most of the cause goes towards Green Lantern.

I mostly put the blame on Superman Returns and Nolans Batman. I love Nolans Batman but neither films wanted to have a shared expanded DCCU which is a shame because we could have had a proper DCCU now instead of it being rushed to compete with Marvel's sucess of The Avengers.

Most films can become a hit or a miss it just depends on the screen play and if its suited to the themes of it's characters and story.
Wolf38
Wolf38 - 1/1/2014, 4:30 AM
@Corndog/Fangz

I also agree that MoS did not destroy what Superman stands for.

But specifically with relation to Zod, to me the key theme there is not that he killed a bad guy, but that he killed one of the (presumably) last other members of his race. That's heavy.

The actual killing never struck me as being an issue. I am fascinated by the apparent uproar over that.
AverageDrafter
AverageDrafter - 1/1/2014, 1:36 PM
Like everyone, Superman isn't born knowing what is right and wrong. His values are instilled in him by the people who find him as a baby. In most instances, this is Jonathan and Martha Kent, who teach him decency, honor, and protecting those who cannot protect themselves. Even as his powers grow, at his core he maintains these values and through his strength, he puts them into action.

This is made even clearer in those iterations where his ship lands elsewhere, and he takes on the values of whoever finds him. Superman: Red Son for example, who is raised on a Ukranian farming collective is taught the values of Stalinism and when his power manifest, he becomes a totalitarian dictator. In True Brit he is taught to hide his powers for the sake of conformity.

Man of Steel is like one of these alternate universe Supermen, with the good and decent Jonathan Kent replaced by one who instills the values of sacrificing the innocent (literally allowing children to die) in the name of fear. It is not until Jor-El's conscience returns does Clark get off his ass and stop fearing the humanity he is supposed to protect out of gratitude and respect.

From Krypton to the Kents, and even to the last scene with the drone, fear dominates the movie. It is not that Superman is never supposed to be afraid, but he is never supposed to be afraid for himself. All the other major issues from the film can be traced back to this core misunderstanding of how this character functions as a driving force for the values his is raised with.

Unless this was Goyer and Snyder intent, in which case it is even more appalling if this is supposed to be a definitive reinvention of this character.
CorndogBurglar
CorndogBurglar - 1/1/2014, 2:04 PM
AverageDrafter

But you forget, Clark didn't let the bus full of kids die. He saved them. Granted, it was before his talk with Johnathan Kent in which he said MAYBE he should have let them die. He did not actually teach him that letting the children die was the right course of action. He presented a different point of view, but did not force it on Clark.

The scene with the tornado...Johnathan would have rather himself die than risk everyone discovering what Clark was. Clark was going to save him until Pa Kent told him not to. And again, this could have been a turning point for Clark. That coukd be the defining moment that he decided he wouldn't stand idly by anymore. We don't really know because they don't come out and say it, which is definitely a flaw of the film, but the bottom line is, for all we know, that could be one of the driving factors that leads Clark to become Superman.

If people want to make the argument that Johnathan Kents morals were destroyed in this movie I would have no argument against it. But at the endof the day, when Clark dons the Superman costume and begins protecting the innocent, he is very much like the Supermam from the comics.
AverageDrafter
AverageDrafter - 1/1/2014, 3:13 PM
Jonathan Kent's brain dead morality is one of the core issues of the film, but certainly not the only one. For me it seems that at every turn there are decisions made that either make no sense, have no purpose, or are born from outright disdain for the character.

The disaster porn at the end of the film is an often cited example. Needlessly complicating the origins of superman's powers so that the phantom zone gang doesn't have powers, except they do anyway because of kewl suits. Then ignoring their own rules (always a bad sign) so that Zod can fight mano e supermano, despite the fact that he's been here a week, breathing kryptonian air, and wearing a SPF 1,000,000 suit. Jettisoning kryptonite, except the kryptonian air is the same thing in all but name only. Giving Jor-El a bigger role in the who superman becomes than the Kents. The unending magic punches that got boring after the 30th one. Practically wearing their disdain for the character on their sleeves by hardly refusing to say his name.

The frankly lazy neck snap that really does show how far off base this guy is from Superman from the comics (and one panel that happened in an alternate dimension that people love to trot out does not show Superman's willingness to kill. It's like basing Wonder Woman off of Amazons Attack! Actually, I wouldn't put that past these numbskulls.)

That's what the film is - lazy. A few missteps here and there would be fine, but this thing is a mess of epic proportions with little but an effects reel to show for it.

Most people will never crack open a Superman comic, the version they see here will be the one they know until someone else comes along to reboot again in 30 years. More than anything it makes me sad that a lot of kids are going to think that suit by Spalding Kal-El is what Superman is, without even a sequel to his own to attempt to course correct.

Yes, he does good (well, the thousand of people he buried under the rubble of Metropolis and Smallville might disagree), but Superman is much more than this one note interpretation. I never had any notion that anyone making this film understood this at all.

I could stand by a wildly different interpretation of Superman, but this film even rufuses to play by its own rules. That's just terrible filmmaking, and I think Supes deserves more than that.
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