Currently the big story at the movies is Avengers: Endgame. I'm assuming for the time being that it's well-made, if not quite what I'm into right now. These flicks do seem to be made by people who know what they're doing. Robert Downey Jr. knows he's found a good thing playing Iron Man.
But there's something jittery about the hype. There's a huge amount of money at play here. And blockbusters take time, too. That's a huge quantitative difference in regards to the source material. Mainstream comics have gravitated to much longer stories in my lifetime, but they still come out pretty quickly. The bottom line is that if you read an Avengers comic and it doesn't strike your fancy, there's another coming out next month you might like better, and will only cost a few bucks. That's not true of an Avengers movie, where if it falls flat for you, well, that's that.
What this means for how this period of film making will be remembered is an open question.
But there's something jittery about the hype. There's a huge amount of money at play here. And blockbusters take time, too. That's a huge quantitative difference in regards to the source material. Mainstream comics have gravitated to much longer stories in my lifetime, but they still come out pretty quickly. The bottom line is that if you read an Avengers comic and it doesn't strike your fancy, there's another coming out next month you might like better, and will only cost a few bucks. That's not true of an Avengers movie, where if it falls flat for you, well, that's that.
What this means for how this period of film making will be remembered is an open question.
2 comments:
ah, the 'marvel universe' phenomenon. i've long had a pet theory: that there's this 'holy grail' of which those who provide us with entertainment have long dreamed, which would consist of subliminally influencing our tastes over time in such a way that the concept of 'target audience' would no longer be a concern, to the extent that we've all, young & old alike, been reduced to some kind of permanent prepubescence, taste-wise. this way, their various products (movies, books, series), by following particular prescribed courses, could be fundamentally guaranteed to produce maximum returns every time...
the extraordinary run-away success of the 'marvel universe', wherein a number of ancient ('60's) comic book characters, played by a/aa level actors, are somewhat retro-fitted into our current reality, in the form of big-budget, special-effect packed blockbusters, indicates to me that this holy grail has been achieved. these movies are all things to all people: they're thrilling, they're witty, they're nostalgic, they're romantic, they're socially relevant (not to mention 'politically correct'), &, above all else, they're proudly, loudly juvenile to the core...
so, props to stan lee & co. true visionaries who, having somehow foreseen this day arriving, have proceeded, over the decades, to position themselves in such a way as to be at the head of the line when it did (note that the longer-established dc continues to struggle while attempting figuring out what exactly it is that lee & co. have obviously already mastered)...
now, this isn't to say that i didn't thoroughly enjoy the recent spider-man game (it was... amazing!). it's only to say that i imagine that even stan the man himself never saw the day coming when a movie featuring one of his super heroes would actually end up being nominated for the academy award for best picture. i seriously doubt that even he was quite that visionary :) ...
The funny thing is that the consensus you always hear about is that the mass audience is disappearing. It is true that you can't get so many people to all watch the same show at the same time, and selling a million copies of a record has become a pipe dream. But much the same product is being pushed all the time at everyone, so over time, yeah, that has an effect.
Marvel has an edge over DC, I think, in that so much of their universe congealed around the same time, from the same source. DC had different teams create Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman a few years later, but a bunch of others that didn't last, at least in their original incarnations. This was all around WW2. Marvel (Timely at the time) had even fewer and were overall a middle of the pack company. But then in the early sixties Lee, Kirby, Ditko etc. were able to take over. They had a good dozen pretty much major characters on the market before the big conversion to color TV. So well before major motion picture deals were coming their way, they had practice in promoting the whole "brand" together. DC still struggles with making a big deal out of characters outside the big three, although they seem to be learning. (Also, of course, is the irony that their recent success on Shazam is with a character they acquired after suing Fawcett out of the comics business for alleged copyright infringement.)
Yeah, Stan the Man must have been shocked and heartened at the success of Black Panther. He didn't quite make it to the Oscar nomination, but it was kind of foreshadowed by then. Although he had his own problems the last few years. I imagine Kirby would have been pleased on one level. Maybe disgruntled on another.
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