Best and worst directors of comic book films?

[The Overlord]

Who are the best and worst directors of comic book films?

 

[Mandon Knight]

..and in 5,4,3,2,1...internet breaks....

 

[ouroboros]

Three of the best: James Gunn, William Witney (who dat?), Bryan Singer

Three of the worst: Brett Ratner, Christopher Nolan, and (hah) Singer again.

 

[Tacit Ronin]

Best: Sam Raimi

Worst: Marc Webb

 

[Asteroid-Man]

Three of the best: James Gunn, William Witney (who dat?), Bryan Singer

Three of the worst: Brett Ratner, Christopher Nolan, and (hah) Singer again.

........rage intensifies

 

[CK Spider]

My favorite director to actually direct a comic book movie is Taika Waititi, but we haven't seen his CBM yet. The trailer looks amazing, though. I cannot recommend enough his films Boy, What We Do In The Shadows and Hunt For The Wilderpeople (haven't managed to see Eagle vs Shark yet).

Now let's do this.

Best: Waititi (for his other movies, as explained above), Gunn, Raimi, Wright, Whedon, Mangold, Vaughn, Russos, Coogler (see Waititi), Favreau, Nolan and Singer. Ok, way to much in there. LOL I guess we had too many great directors already. LOL

Top five would probably be:
Waititi
Gunn
Wright
Raimi
Whedon or Vaugh, hard to tell

Mangold and the Russos would probably steal Wright's and Waititi's places if we're only talking about their CBM's, though (Waititi's simply because we can't judge Ragnarok yet).

Worst: Pitof, Schumacher (only for what I've seen, I heard he is usually decent, though) Mark Steven Johnson and Rob Bowman

Worst is a lot easier than best for me. LOL

 

[psylockolussus]

Worst: Zack Synder

Best: Sam Raimi

 

[DACrowe]

I suspect we are asking which directors did the best job with adapting comic books. For example, Ang Lee is easily one of the greatest directors to ever do a superhero movie... but no one including myself is going to defend Hulk.

With that in mind...

Best: Christopher Nolan (obviously), Richard Donner, Tim Burton, Sam Mendes, Sam Raimi, Matthew Vaughn, Edgar Wright, James Mangold, Jon Favreau, James Gunn, and Bryan Singer (roughly in that order).

Worst: Pitof, David Goyer, Brett Ratner, Mark Steven Johnson, Rob Bowman.

It would be too easy to include Zack Snyder or even Joel Schumacher on the worst list. They made some of the historically most importantly awful superhero movies, but not the kind that are truly inept or incompetent.

 

[The Joker]

Best: Chris Nolan, Sam Raimi, Richard Donner, Bryan Singer, James Gunn, Jon Favreau.

Worst: Zack Snyder, Josh Trank, David Goyer.

 

[Drseuss]

Singer, Mangold, Nolan, Raimi, Vaughn

 

[Erzengel]

Best: Russos, Nolan, Raimi, Singer, Vaughn
Worst: Pitof, Story, Snyder, Trank, Schumacher, Ratner

Some of the rest, I think either at least 1 more good or 1 more bad movie.

 

[henzINNIT]

Best: Raimi

Worst: Snyder

 

[Moridin]

I suspect we are asking which directors did the best job with adapting comic books. For example, Ang Lee is easily one of the greatest directors to ever do a superhero movie... but no one including myself is going to defend Hulk.

Hmmm, not sure. I took the question as "CBM Directors with the best overall filmographies" or "who are the best/worst directors to make a CBM?".

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

Best - Christopher Nolan, Sam Raimi, The Russos, James Gunn, Richard Donner, James Mangold, Bryan Singer
Worst - Josh Trank, Zack Snyder, Pitof, Marc Webb, Joel Shumacher, Tim Story, Brett Ratner, David Goyer

 

[DACrowe]

Hmmm, not sure. I took the question as "CBM Directors with the best overall filmographies" or "who are the best/worst directors to make a CBM?".

In that case, I would rank the best as:

Steven Spielberg (if you count The Adventures of Tintin)
Christopher Nolan
Ang Lee
Sam Mendes
Tim Burton
Matthew Vaughn
Edgar Wright
Sam Raimi
Bryan Singer
Jon Favreau
Richard Donner
James Mangold
Kenneth Branagh
James Gunn

 

[2kt09]

Best:
James McTeigue
favorite cbm bias aside, he's got this noir style I can't get enough of
Bryan Singer
gotta get the right pacing and perfecting that ensemble balancing act
Edgar Wright
the ever beautiful art of editing to make moments and scenes really pop with sharp wit to boot
Bong Joon-ho
the best grasp on empathic character drama
Alex Proyas
making sure the style compensates very well for simple substance
Zack Snyder
something really fascinating about a guy who relishes in the aesthetic whilst obsessed with making satire
Jon Favreau
visuals bar-none and short but sweet moments aplenty
Anthony/Joe Russos
two character-focused heads are definitely better than one

Runner-Ups:

Spoiler

Sam Raimi
horror rom-com tragedies anyone?
Christopher Nolan
realize just how interesting the villains can be whilst grounding the gritty concept
Matthew Vaughn
so genre flexible and the dependable one to call if you can't get Wright
James Mangold
really infatuated with westerns no matter the setting
Joe Johnston
pulp fiction extraordinaire

Worst:
Philip DeGuere Jr
Pitof
Rob Bowman
Jimmy Hayward
Gavin Hood
Stuart Gillard
David S. Goyer
Neveldine/Taylor

Runner-Up:

Spoiler

Robert Schwentke

 

[GeckoMoria]

Best: Russos, Nolan, raimi, Matthew vaugghn
Worst: mar Steven Johnson, Snyder, Tim Story, Joel Schumacher

 

[Spider-Aziz]

Man, some of you really underrate poor old Marc Webb, he directed one good movie, and another that is average at best.

BEST:
The Watchowskis, David Cronemberg, Pete Travis, Sam Mendes, Shane Black, Joe Johnston, the Russos and Christopher Nolan

WORST:
Rob Bowman, Stuart Beattie

 

[Batmannerism]

Best: Nolan and the Russos are really the contenders for the top spot - my personal fave being Nolan. These guys elevate the whole genre.

Mangold's pretty close, but only on the strength of one film .

Sam Raimi, very respectable for (at least the first two) Spidey films.

James Gunn, again for one film, but boy what a film !

Richard Donner: gets special props for making one of the best ever cbms in freaking 1978, so far ahead of his time !

Matthew Vaughn, somehow manages to blend ultraviolence and humour successfully.

Jon Favreau, kind of at the bottom of my "best" list as he directed one of the best cbms of all time, and followed it up with a pretty crappy one.


Mediocre cbm directors:

Bryan Singer, his X-movies aren't bad at all, just kind of forgettable, although he's better than Brett Ratner - in terms of rankings he's kind of top of the middle.


Zack Snyder, has a couple of decent cbms, but come on is it really that hard to make an entertaining film when your two main characters are the most famous superheroes of all time ? Really ?

Peyton Reed, Ant Man is an okay film, but super forgettable.


Brett Ratner, I'm probably one of the five or six people in the world who didn't mind X-Men the Last stand, not a great X-film, but not a terrible one - and Xavier's death was a great moment.

Ang Lee.... probably more talented than Snyder, but like Snyder doesn't really understand the genre.

Marc Webb, one okay Spidey film and one crappy one, 'nuff said.


Worst cbm directors:



Surprisingly....David Ayer, for the unforgivable rubbish that was Suicide Squad.



Joel Schumacher, I tried to rewatch Batman Forever the other week, and realised that it's actually pretty bad, and then there's Batman and Robin.....


David Goyer, although to be fair he's almost a worse writer than director. For a guy who loves comic books he does a pretty poor job of writing/directing comic book movies. If Chris Nolan had let Goyer direct the Dark Knight trilogy, well who knows ?

Josh Trank, don't think any explanation needed there.

 

[DACrowe]

Man, some of you really underrate poor old Marc Webb, he directed one good movie, and another that is average at best.

BEST:
The Watchowskis, David Cronemberg, Pete Travis, Sam Mendes, Shane Black, Joe Johnston, the Russos and Christopher Nolan

WORST:
Rob Bowman, Stuart Beattie

I forgot Cronenberg and Shane Black directed comic book movies. Good calls.

 

[Erzengel]

Best: Russos, Nolan, Raimi, Singer, Vaughn
Worst: Pitof, Story, Snyder, Trank, Schumacher, Ratner

Some of the rest, I think either at least 1 more good or 1 more bad movie.

Russos: The Winter Soldier & Civil War
Nolan: TDKT
Singer: X-Men 1, X2 and DOFP
Raimi: Spider-Man 1 & 2
Vaughn: First Class, Kingsman, Stardust, Kick Ass
Donner: Superman & Superman 2

Pitof: Catwoman
Story: FF & FF:ROTS
Snyder: BvS
Trank: Fant4stic
Schumacher: Batman Forever & Batman & Robin
Ratner: X-Men: The Last Stand
Hood: Wolverine: Origins

The best of, actually had to work for it by having more than 1 good CBM. The worst of, however, I wasn't as gracious.

 

[Tony Stark]

As bad as some of these guys are, I think Josh Trank deserves his own category of bad. I mean Snyder is not great, but no where near the level of awful that Trank is.

 

[Tacit Ronin]

Marc Webb's direction in ASM 2 is spectacularly bad. From completely wasting Paul Giamatti to the wild tonal swings. One minute we have naturalistic dialogue between Aunt May and Peter and in the next is Batman Forever style camp with Electro and the german doctor. It's bizarre.

 

[Spider-Aziz]

Brett Ratner, I'm probably one of the five or six people in the world who didn't mind X-Men the Last stand, not a great X-film, but not a terrible one - and Xavier's death was a great moment.

Worst cbm directors:

Joel Schumacher, I tried to rewatch Batman Forever the other week, and realised that it's actually pretty bad, and then there's Batman and Robin.....

I'll leave a surprising opinion by saying Batman Forever is worse than its sequel.

I forgot Cronenberg and Shane Black directed comic book movies. Good calls.

Marc Webb's direction in ASM 2 is spectacularly bad. From completely wasting Paul Giamatti to the wild tonal swings. One minute we have naturalistic dialogue between Aunt May and Peter and in the next is Batman Forever style camp with Electro and the german doctor. It's bizarre.

He probably deserves some blame for that, along with every weirdo thinking money and nothing else.

 

[First Avenger]

Marc Webb's direction in ASM 2 is spectacularly bad. From completely wasting Paul Giamatti to the wild tonal swings. One minute we have naturalistic dialogue between Aunt May and Peter and in the next is Batman Forever style camp with Electro and the german doctor. It's bizarre.

This so much. It's like it was directed by at least 2 different people.