People often argue that DC and Marvel shy away from creating movies with Black characters as the protagonists because most moviegoers couldn’t relate as well to it. Many also argue that the two publishers don’t possess any characters popular enough to bring to the big screen.
Box office numbers of several action/superhero movies debunk the theory that the majority of audiences couldn’t relate to black superheroes on film and wouldn’t buy tickets. For example, in 2008 Sony Pictures (who owns Spiderman cinematically) created a movie essentially created around a black Superman called “Hancock”. I will be the first to admit that movie was far from great, but it was able to make over $950,000,000 (adjusted for inflation) in theaters, which is more than films with well known white protagonists made like: “Thor”, “Thor 2”, “ Man of Steel”, “Batman Begins”, “Captain America: The First Avenger”, “The Amazing Spiderman” and others.
A few more examples of action/superhero movies with black protagonists that performed at the box office are “Django Unchained” and “The Book of Eli”. “Django” was basically The Punisher if the punisher was a former slave in the 1850’s. Nearly half of the movie was centered on a black bounty hunter shooting white people and it still made over $430,000,000 (adjusted for inflation) in theaters. “The Book of Eli” was about a black, blind swordsman who was killing his way through America until he reached the west coast. On a relatively small budget and with a modest marketing campaign the movie was still able to make nearly $170,000,000 (adjusted for inflation).
Some also argue that there just aren’t any popular enough characters to put on the big screen. The “Blade” franchise made over $500,000,000 (adjusted for inflation) in theaters and contributed to the rise in the popularity of the superhero genre. Batman, The Punisher, Superman, The Hulk and Spiderman have all had reboots in the past few years, so why not reboot Blade? Special effects have improved immensely since the last movie, and the horror/vampire genre is much more popular than it was 10 years ago. Also, both publishers have seen black characters like John Stewart, Black Panther, Cyborg, Static, Icon, Aqualad and Miles Morales rise in popularity through comic books and television shows. These characters might not be icons like Batman and Superman, but I imagine they have similar if not better name recognition than Ant-Man and The Guardians of the Galaxy.
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