There is no doubt that Superhero movies are the most popular genre of the last decade. Having moved away from flimsy plotlines, poor special effects, and predictable endings of yesteryear, many modern comic book movies have adopted darker narratives in an attempt to give the lead characters greater depth. At the same time, other attempts haven’t lost their sense of fun, which is just as important.
One superhero film franchise which has managed to make a mark without the dark is the Iron Man trilogy. Iron Man 3 came out earlier this year and, apart from a few purists, was warmly received by the general audience and critics alike. It expertly provided enough drama and action with a few laughs along the way.
Superman to the rescue? The modern Superman franchise has struggled to capture universal love among comic book movie fans, but the latest reboot could change all that. It’s widely expected that the film could follow in the footsteps of The Dark Knight and go down a darker route. Man of Steel might not be able to find favour in the same way as recent Batman films have, but it will be interesting to see how it performs at the box office.
With film fans, Superman doesn’t yet appear to be as popular as Batman and Iron Man.
Ladbrokes Games recently conducted a survey of 1000 movie-goers which revealed that fans voted for The Dark Knight as the greatest superhero film of all time, gaining an 18% share with both men and women. The Dark Knight Rises came second for men with 19% of the vote. 17% of women voted for Avengers as their favourite.
Battle of the sexes? The Dark Knight was voted as the most popular superhero film, but that’s not the only category which the Caped Crusader topped. The Batmobile got 62% of the vote for the coolest superhero vehicle. Women voted for Batman as the toughest superhero of all, and one in four people said they wouldn’t want a new actor to take the role for the next Batman movie.
Fans of female superheroes seemed to be thin on the ground though. 22% of all those polled said that they felt Catwoman was the worst superhero film of all time. However, 30% of men said they would like to date her above any other female superhero, so it’s not all bad for her!
What ComicBookMovie.com users think? Obviously the poll in question was taken randomly, and we all know that it matters most what our highly targeted CBM readers think. So, below are some of questions of the poll. Take them all and let’s see if we get different results.