It's been quite the year for comic book movies. Last December, we were all excited about getting a whopping 7 live-action Marvel and DC titles, with three from the MCU and four from the DCEU (at this point in 2022, DC Studios had yet to announce the DCU plans which would make the latter movies irrelevant).
As if all that wasn't exciting enough, the long-awaited Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse sequel was only six months away and, six months on, there are rumblings Across the Spider-Verse will receive a "Best Picture" nomination at next year's Academy Awards.
Unfortunately, those live-action efforts have largely underwhelmed.
Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania was meant to start Phase 5 off with a bang and instead highlighted why The Volume should only be used sparingly in a movie (Kang the Conqueror's defeat was another major misstep). Then, Shazam! Fury of the Gods failed to live up to its predecessor and proved to be somehow even worse than last October's Black Adam.
On the plus side, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 was a beautiful end to James Gunn's trilogy and stands out as one of Marvel Studios' best movies.
It was all downhill from there, though, as The Flash was nothing if not divisive and far from the "greatest superhero movie ever made." Abysmal VFX, a messy story, and those weird cameos - not to mention that bizarre reshot ending with George Clooney - all doomed an already troubled project thanks to its lead star.
Blue Beetle was a hit with critics and fans but failed to make an impact at the box office as moviegoers grew wary of the DC brand.
The biggest shocker of the year, however, might have been The Marvels. A sequel to the $1 billion 2018 blockbuster Captain Marvel, it's now Marvel Studios' biggest box office flop and no one can quite figure out what went wrong! It wasn't a critical disaster like the Ant-Man threequel but it did struggle to strike a chord with fans.
Finally, there's Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom. That too is the sequel to a movie which grossed over $1 billion before the pandemic but it's been slated by critics and similarly struggled to find a sizeable audience.
So, as 2023 winds down, we want you, ComicBookMovie.com's readers, to chime in and cast your votes to pick what you believe was the best comic book movie of the year. Something tells us these results will be very interesting...