BvS All Things Superman and Batman: An Open Discussion - - - - - Part 14

[roach]

You're wrong, mate. We all know that every single character in LOTR should've had solo movies first. t:

lol
I keep using Star Wars as an example…SW introduced Luke, Han and Leia…Obi-Wan and Vader…the conflict between the rebels and the Empire and made people care about all of them including Chewy, R2 and C3P0…without solo films.

 

[Jake Cassidy]

The Avengers movie itself gave you reason to care about the characters.

Tons of people who saw The Avengers didn't see any previous movies.

Most of the people I know saw The Avengers and than wanted to watch the others.

 

[MrsKent26]

No, you need to spend time and get to know a character before you start caring about them. The solo films served that purpose so by the time we got to the team up movie, they could devote all that time to story instead of having to waste it on character.

You need some time. Not hours and hours. Think of movies in general, not just CBMs. Take a movie like Gladiator, for example. People cared about most of those characters and there was no movie before Gladiator to establish them. A 2.5 hour long movie is long enough for one to get to know most of the characters.

 

[Skrilla31]

Character doesn't take a whole movie to establish….and using Avengers as an example there was still character moments in the movie.

How much time out of the Justice League movie are you prepared to spend introducing and developing it's characters? How much do you feel is enough? 20 minutes? 30 minutes? 40 minutes? And how much of that time do you devote to each character?

Avengers didn't have this problem because none of the key characters needed to be introduced or familiarized. They were already familiarized. Avengers is a different movie if it were made after Iron Man 2.

 

[roach]

You need some time. Not hours and hours. Think of movies in general, not just CBMs. Take a movie like Gladiator, for example. People cared about most those characters and there was no movie before Gladiator to establish them. A 2.5 hour long movie is long enough for one to get to know most of the characters.

This 1000%

 

[Skrilla31]

You need some time. Not hours and hours. Think of movies in general, not just CBMs. Take a movie like Gladiator, for example. People cared about most of those characters and there was no movie before Gladiator to establish them. A 2.5 hour long movie is long enough for one to get to know most of the characters.

Except that movie has a singular protagonist and a Justice League movie would have several. If you want it to feel like a teamup movie and not Superman and Batman and friends, then you may wanna consider familiarizing the audience with these characters a little more before you throw them all on the screen with one another.

 

[Jekecy]

I'm not skirting around the issue, you're talking about a hypothetical movie that if it were made would be made with elements like I suggested. What you're asking for is a ultimately going to be a completely different type of film universe to what MoS is because you cannot tell a story of a simple farming family in the first film where nothing extraordinary happens then do a sequel where they find an alien - it's two completely different movies.

Yes, two completely different movies. Yet belong in the same universe. This is what I've been getting at. You cannot universally apply established rules across future installments, to infinity. Especially when that future doesn't exist. All it takes is one event to rewrite what is possible.

Your argument doesn't hold water because ultimately the Kents story before Clark isn't important, their story begins when they find Clark. You're suggesting MoS is a sequel to a non-existent movie which is frankly absurd.

I'm suggesting as with any fictional story, it will always exist in the middle of a pre-existing universe. What we're glimpsing is merely a fragment of an entire timeline. Events will have already transpired, and events will transpire, which we may never see. They don't necessarily matter as they have nothing to do with the intended narrative. If they did, they would be present.

I'm trying to point out to you the fallacy in a concrete blueprint which undisputably maps out the future. Especially in the realm of fiction. Things don't exist...until they do in the very next story. This happens all the time and is present in nearly any property you can think of.

Again; it is an impossibility to disprove what doesn't exist. That is unarguable.

 

[roach]

How much time out of the Justice League movie are you prepared to spend introducing and developing it's characters? How much do you feel is enough? 20 minutes? 30 minutes? 40 minutes? And how much of that time do you devote to each character?

Avengers didn't have this problem because none of the key characters needed to be introduced or familiarized. They were already familiarized. Avengers is a different movie if it were made after Iron Man 2.

as much is needed…if the audience doesn't care about the characters then nothing the movie does will matter. Yes Marvel is doing what they are doing and it's paying off but it's not the only way to do things.

 

[roach]

Except that movie has a singular protagonist and a Justice League movie would have several. If you want it to feel like a teamup movie and not Superman and Batman and friends, then you may wanna consider familiarizing the audience with these characters a little more before you throw them all on the screen with one another.

a Justice League movie will familiarize people with the non-superman/batman characters, build up hype for them and allow them to spin off into their own movies.

 

[MrsKent26]

Except that movie has a singular protagonist and a Justice League movie would have several. If you want it to feel like a teamup movie and not Superman and Batman and friends, then you may wanna consider familiarizing the audience with these characters a little more before you throw them all on the screen with one another.

We don't know enough to say that yet. I have many paranoias about Superman being pushed aside, but even I can admit that we don't know whether Superman, Batman, and WW will be protagonists. One could be an antagonist, one could be just a supporting character. We have no idea. We don't even know if they will team up. And there will probably be around 2.5 hours during this movie for the audience to get to know these characters.

 

[FeedOnATreeFrog]

Again, I think The Avengers movie itself does a well enough job of getting you on board with the characters.

For instance. I know a lot of people who liked Banner in Avengers who had never seen Incredible Hulk or didn't remember it from 4 years ago (many people I know didn't recall the film as the actor was different). The Avengers was basically a blank slate for Banner.

If there was no Incredible Hulk movie, I don't think it would have made a lick of difference to Banner's reception in The Avengers.

 

[Skrilla31]

as much is needed…if the audience doesn't care about the characters then nothing the movie does will matter. Yes Marvel is doing what they are doing and it's paying off but it's not the only way to do things.

But the reason we cared about these characters is because we saw their stories. Before any of us even saw Avengers we had already witnessed their origin, their fall, their conflict, and their redemption. And so we cared more about them.

 

[roach]

But the reason we cared about these characters is because we saw their stories. Before any of us even saw Avengers we had already witnessed their origin, their fall, their conflict, and their redemption. And so we cared more about them.

So you are saying that if someone went into Avengers having never saw the other movies they would not care about the characters?

 

[Jekecy]

Except that movie has a singular protagonist and a Justice League movie would have several. If you want it to feel like a teamup movie and not Superman and Batman and friends, then you may wanna consider familiarizing the audience with these characters a little more before you throw them all on the screen with one another.

Justice League at its core is an ensemble property. As with all such stories, you have to consider there are no individual stars. Thus you need to ignore all the baggage they carry in their individual mythos. 99% of it usually does not apply to the narrative at hand.

You only need to know as much about (insert JL member here) as it pertains to their arc and involvement for that one story. Everything else is fluff and cool background.

Even Avengers, which spent years building up other movies, still works as a standalone movie. Anyone can watch that sole film and not lose anything of noteworthy value by failing to view all the prior Phase 1 films.

 

[roach]

Justice League at its core is an ensemble property. As with all such stories, you have to consider there are no individual stars. Thus you need to ignore all the baggage they carry in their individual mythos. 99% of it usually does not apply to the narrative at hand.

You only need to know as much about (insert JL member here) as it pertains to their arc and involvement for that one story. Everything else is fluff and cool background.

Even Avengers, which spent years building up other movies, still works as a standalone movie. Anyone can watch that sole film and not lose anything of noteworthy value by failing to view all the prior Phase 1 films.

yup

 

[Skrilla31]

So you are saying that if someone went into Avengers having never saw the other movies they would not care about the characters?

How could they?

WHY would they?

The movie presented it's characters under the assumption that you already knew who they were. Would you care about any of the characters in Empire without having seen Star Wars first?

If you bought a ticket to Avengers and you didn't see the other movies first, either you were dragged to it or you wanted to see superheroes kick butt on screen. You didn't give a flying f*** about any of the characters.

 

[Skrilla31]

Thus you need to ignore all the baggage they carry in their individual mythos. 99% of it usually does not apply to the narrative at hand.

That's assuming the audience is even aware of their individual mythos.

Hence lies the problem. Unless of course you're fine with Green Lantern just being some random dude with a cool ring who bails Superman out of a jam here and there.

 

[roach]

How could they?

WHY would they?

The movie presented it's characters under the assumption that you already knew who they were. Would you care about any of the characters in Empire without having seen Star Wars first?

I have a buddy that saw Return of the Jedi first then the others

If you bought a ticket to Avengers and you didn't see the other movies first, either you were dragged to it or you wanted to see superheroes kick butt on screen. You didn't give a flying f*** about any of the characters.

Not everyone is a comic book movie fan. I am willing to bet that quite a few people saw Avengers without seeing any or all of the other films.

 

[Bathead]

if you look at the superheroes they both have made…they seem to be more reverent to the comics and origins than making changes to them…not to say they don't change things…but based on 300, Watchmen and Man of Steel…is Snyder more apt to give us a magic based WW or one with a sci-fi origin?

I think, although he might change certain details, he will indeed stick to her magical origins, just like he did with Superman and his comic book science based origins, and I fully believe he can make it work.

 

[Jekecy]

The movie presented it's characters under the assumption that you already knew who they were. Would you care about any of the characters in Empire without having seen Star Wars first?

Audiences cared about them with the first Star Wars. You didn't exactly get an origin story with anyone else but Luke. That was still very much a team movie.

I think you should reconsider your position about ensembles in general. This build-up process, origins included, is an incredibly novel approach in filmmaking. But the concept of an ensemble-centered story is ages old.

When you look at the pantheon of successful stories featuring multiple characters, all without their backstories (even though they exist in an unobserved fictional space), you should see how relatively unnecessary Marvel's method is.

 

[FeedOnATreeFrog]

How could they?

WHY would they?

The movie presented it's characters under the assumption that you already knew who they were.

No it didn't.

Every character's backstory/powers are explained in the movie itself.

-We get a flashback of how Cap came to the present.
-Coulson explains to Cap about Banner's experiment gone wrong.
-Iron Man explains that the thing in his chest keeps him alive.
-"Loki! Brother of Thor"
-Thor and Loki's relationship is explained in their first scene together.
-Black Widow's backstory is explained via the convo with Loki (which I think is an unnecessary scene. Her back-story adds nothing to this movie).

Each character's personality comes through in the movie itself.

 

[Herolee10]

Heck, neither Black Widow or Hawkeye really made that much of an impression with their cinematic debuts from previous films and yet they were well received, for the first time really, in "The Avengers" due to how well you were used.

 

[Skrilla31]

Not everyone is a comic book movie fan. I am willing to bet that quite a few people saw Avengers without seeing any or all of the other films.

I'm sure of that as well, and I'm also willing to bet that those same people didn't have the nearly the same investment in it's characters.

 

[roach]

I'm sure of that as well, and I'm also willing to bet that those same people didn't have the nearly the same investment in it's characters.

probably/probably not

However as I will always say: There is more than one way to skin a cat. There is more than one way to do things and it doesn't require every hero to get a solo movie to care about them.

 

[Skrilla31]

No it didn't.

Every character's backstory/powers are explained in the movie itself.

-Iron Man explains that the thing in his chest keeps him alive.
-We get a flashback of how Cap came to the present.
-Coulson explains to Cap about Banner's experiment gone wrong.
-"Loki! Brother of Thor"
-Thor and Loki's relationship is explained in their first scene together.
-Black Widow's backstory is explained by Loki.

Each character's personality comes through in the movie itself.

In other words, for those of you unfamiliar with these characters... here are the cliff notes. Not quite the same as spending 2 hours with a character, witnessing his origin, his fall, his conflict, and his redemption.

You know if you really wanna know what a book is about, all you have to do is glance over the cliff notes real quick. But we all know it's not quite the same as reading the book.