As I was watching Hancock at 1am I considered two things:
1.) what am I doing with my life?
2.) Why aren’t there more original superhero characters being tried out.
This film isn’t exactly a masterpiece but it allowed for there to be a different take on the genre and played with the idea that heroes aren’t all squeaky clean and act the way they should do.
In the days where licensed superheroes are split up in between film studios, this means that it is next to impossible to transfer some storylines directly from the comic books to the big screen without a Spiderman style deal between studios. For example Wolverine 3 is apparently going to be based on Old-Man Logan which isn’t really possible as allot of the main characters are at Marvel Studios instead of Fox meaning that changes need to be made from the source material. So why can’t new characters be created that fit those character’s roles in the films so there are more possibilities moving forward.
What if these studios created new superheroes to fit in their universes to plug those gaps? Obviously not just straight rip offs, they don’t even need the same powers necessarily. And if those heroes are successful then they can spin off and have their own movies/comics, but if they are awful then they can just be killed off or ignored and no fans would be angry as they don’t have a fan base to enrage.
Let’s look at marvel for a second, eventually they are going to have to either recast or switch out some characters in the future. Obviously they have a vast number of possible characters from the comics that they can use but why don’t they try and mix it up.
This may also be a way of improving diversity in CBM’s. I’m going to come clean… I’m not a woman and I have whiter skin than Jared Leto’s joker so I may not be the best person to judge on this matter, but instead of making Falcon Captain America for a couple of years or making Jane Foster Thor why don’t they create new characters that aren’t white guys. This will give more diverse heroes without enraging fans who hate that that Hulk is Asian or whatever.
The main argument against this is that they won’t make money because they are unknown quantities like Kick Ass. Sure that may be the case (although Hancock made about $625m worldwide) but there’s always a risk of every movie not making money. One solution would be to introduce them in a team movie (e.g. the Avengers, Justice League, X-men or the Mighty Ducks) and then spin them off from there into their own franchises.
Also a new character frees the writer’s to craft storylines that are maybe a bit different without enraging fans. For example As Zack Snyder changed allot about Batman and Superman. He maybe could have come up with a couple of characters who fit the universe more/do some of the moping instead.
But as the superhero genre has really come to the forefront of the film culture, we’re going to have 753 superhero films in the next 5 years. Surely there’s room for a new character in there that a team of talented writers have created specifically for the needs of the universe they are building.
So in conclusion Hancock is the best movie ever made.