Comic Continuity Craziness!!!!!!!!!

[GregComicFan]

Some MINOR Spoilers!


Hi. So I agree with the notion that WB is just expanding on their investment by having solo franchises branch off of the JL movie. If JL does well, then Flash will get his own trilogy, GL will get his own trilogy, WW will get her own trilogy, Batman is getting Nolan movies, Superman Returns will eventually get a sequel, and hell, if JL does really well, expect a Martian Manhunter origin movie and an Aquaman, Hawkman, Green Arrow movie, and so on to spring up. Obviously WB is finally getting off their butts and trying to catch up to all the movies the Marvel characters have made.

Now to my concern....

CONTINUITY CRAZINESS!

Here is what we know:

Christian Bale is Batman in the Nolan franchise. Brandon Routh is the Superman in whatever sequel comes from Superman Returns. Green Lantern in George Miller's JL movie is John Stewart. The Green Lantern in the Greg Berlanti movie is Hal Jordan. George Miller's JL movie starts off with Barry, kills him, and lets Wally West take over. David Dobkin's Flash movie is about Wally West....

ok...so check out this continuity craziness.

Right now the WB has a distinct advantage over the Marvel movies. They have the ability to create a DC UNIVERSE on the big screen. Marvel hasn't ever done this cause their characters all owned by all these different studios, which is why we would never see Spiderman show up in an X-Men film or Daredevil say hello to the Hulk. But WB can create a DC Universe.

But THEY'RE SCREWING IT UP ALREADY!

Check it out:

1. Two different actors will be playing Batman/Superman. Christian Bale and then Miller's JL Batman; Brandon Routh and then Miller's JL Superman

2. Berlanti's GL is Hal Jordan but Miller's GL is John Stewart. So is Berlanti's movie a prequel or a sequel? Who came first according to the DC MOVIE UNIVERSE? Is Hal going to die and give Stewart the ring or vice versa?

3. Dobkin's Flash movie is obviously a sequel to Miller's JL, since we know in Miller's JL Barry dies and Wally becomes the Flash. So Dobkin's movie is a sequel to JL but Berlanti's GL movie is....who the hell knows??????????

4. Supposedly, the same actor who portrays the Flash in Miller's JL will portray the Flash in Dobkin's Flash spin-off franchise. But wait a second! If Christian Bale/Brandon Routh are being recasted....in order to separate JL from the Nolan/Singer franchises, why is the same actor going to be the Flash? So Nolan/Singer franchises are not connected to JL, but the Dobkin/Berlanti movies will be? And when WB finally makes a solo Wonder Woman movie is that movie going to be connected to JL or separate too?

Wow.

Talk about continuty craziness.

If the fanboys are this confused...think about the general audience.

General Audience Guy: "Hey, how come Batman is so different in The Dark Knight than he is in Justice League? Why isn't it the same actor too?

General Audience Girl: "Yeah, and how come the Green Lantern in JL isn't the same Green Lantern in Green Lantern? Two different Green Lanterns? How many Green Lanterns are there?"

General Audience Dog: "woof! woof! yeah! and I don't understand how Superman has a kid in The Man of Steel but no kid in the Justice League movies!"

General Audience Cat: "meow! meow! Well I guess the Flash in JL is the same Flash in the Flash movie. It's the same actor. But how come it's totally different for Batman and Superman? Why isn't it all the same?"

As you can see, general audience guy, girl, dog, and cat are all confused.

as am I.

thoughts?

Greg

 

[odiin]

Who cares? Just enjoy the damn movies.

 

[GL's Light]

General audiences won't be confused. They'll just take each film as it comes. It's fanboys who twist themselves into pretzels worrying about continuity.

 

[ChickenScratch]

Each film is a work of art and an entity onto itself. A regular movie goer goes in to see a cool story told. The continuity, inconsistencies and such and things for the comic readers to think about or in some cases worry about. Personally I don't care, I know where everything fits so I really don't give a damn.

 

[GregComicFan]

Haha. I've been a member on various superhero/comic book forums since I was 12 years old. I think this is the first time I've ever read fans not complaining about this sort of thing....

...haha!

 

[hippie_hunter]

The way it seems so far is that films such as Green Lantern, Superman, and Batman are off in their own universes. But Justice League, Flash, Wonder Woman, and Aquaman will be set in a particular universe.

Pretty damn stupid if you ask me.

 

[GNR]

Slow doen Greg,how does DC have the advantage over Marvel at the moment?

Iron Man and Hulk are already set for next year.Thor and Cap will follow the year after.Then the expected Avengers/Ultimates movie will be made.

Rushing a team movie which hasn't even been made yet and banking on it's "success" to make spin offs?

Marvel seems to have the better plan in my eyes.

 

[hippie_hunter]

Slow doen Greg,how does DC have the advantage over Marvel at the moment?

Iron Man and Hulk are already set for next year.Thor and Cap will follow the year after.Then the expected Avengers/Ultimates movie will be made.

Rushing a team movie which hasn't even been made yet and banking on it's "success" to make spin offs?

Marvel seems to have the better plan in my eyes.

I agree and Hulk, Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Nick Fury, and Ant-Man should be having the same continuity too. Which makes it better IMO.

 

[Sun_Down]

Ya know, some restaurants are serving brewed decaf these days.

 

[UltimateJustin]

Haha. I've been a member on various superhero/comic book forums since I was 12 years old. I think this is the first time I've ever read fans not complaining about this sort of thing....

...haha!

The bunting baby wants his continuity NOW NOW NOW!!

 

[Abaddon]

uggh, just call the Nolan films Earth 2, Singer films Earth 3, the Jl movie Earth 4,etc.

 

[I Am The Knight]

fans .....

complaining ....

...haha!

Oh, just read around a bit more, you'll find what you are looking for. As you know, if there is one thing a fan on a message board is good at, is the art of complaining / b1tching about the most wondrous things. I'm sure you can go over to TDK boards and find pissed Nolanites complaining about JL....And there still some people on the JL boards who will make the occasional comment about how everything is messed up and this movie is doomed.

 

[C. Lee]

Slow doen Greg,how does DC have the advantage over Marvel at the moment?

Iron Man and Hulk are already set for next year.Thor and Cap will follow the year after.Then the expected Avengers/Ultimates movie will be made.

Rushing a team movie which hasn't even been made yet and banking on it's "success" to make spin offs?

Marvel seems to have the better plan in my eyes.

He was talking about the crossovers of characters. With all of DCs characters owned by WB, they can put any combination of characters together in a movie. Marvel has many of it's characters divided up among rival studios....there are many combination sof characters that they can't put together into a movie.

 

[murdock_matt]

I think audiences are more clever than you give them credit. I mean people don't lose their minds wondering about Tom Wellings's Supes and Dean Cain's and Routh's. The emphasis on Wellings' "Smallville". I love the show but the leaps and bounds that show takes with the continuity of Superman is breathtaking. And yet people don't look at Kevin Spacey in Singer's movie and say, "Wow. When he was a young man in Smallville, his dad NEVER told him that land was the only thing they weren't making more of. Gee! I'm so confused! Why isn't this movie the exact same characters from that TV show?"

 

[Katsuro]

I think audiences are more clever than you give them credit. I mean people don't lose their minds wondering about Tom Wellings's Supes and Dean Cain's and Routh's. The emphasis on Wellings' "Smallville". I love the show but the leaps and bounds that show takes with the continuity of Superman is breathtaking. And yet people don't look at Kevin Spacey in Singer's movie and say, "Wow. When he was a young man in Smallville, his dad NEVER told him that land was the only thing they weren't making more of. Gee! I'm so confused! Why isn't this movie the exact same characters from that TV show?"

You seem to be forgetting Batman Begins, and the legions of people who asked "wait a minute, I thought Joker killed Batman's parents!" So no, some audiences aren't more clever than that.

 

[UltimateJustin]

You seem to be forgetting Batman Begins, and the legions of people who asked "wait a minute, I thought Joker killed Batman's parents!" So no, some audiences aren't more clever than that.

The only time I heard anything like that was when the first Batman Begins trailer ran and some hot teen said "they're remaking BATMAN? thats stupid." Besides, thinking that the Joker killed Batman's parents just means they thought that Batman Begins made a mistake in Batman's continuity, not that they believed this movie was in any way connected to BATMAN '89.

 

[jmc]

You'd be surprised how many people still think Batman Begins is a prequel to 89 Batman.

Whilst Flash seems likely it will follow the JL continuity, I'm very doubtful Green Lantern and especially Wonder Woman would follow suit.

 

[Sun_Down]

I think audiences are more clever than you give them credit. I mean people don't lose their minds wondering about Tom Wellings's Supes and Dean Cain's and Routh's. The emphasis on Wellings' "Smallville". I love the show but the leaps and bounds that show takes with the continuity of Superman is breathtaking. And yet people don't look at Kevin Spacey in Singer's movie and say, "Wow. When he was a young man in Smallville, his dad NEVER told him that land was the only thing they weren't making more of. Gee! I'm so confused! Why isn't this movie the exact same characters from that TV show?"

Exactly. When it comes down to it, people just enjoy what they're given and it's only people like us that ask the questions.

You seem to be forgetting Batman Begins, and the legions of people who asked "wait a minute, I thought Joker killed Batman's parents!" So no, some audiences aren't more clever than that.

Who are these "legions"? I've not met one person who said anything even remotely close to that. To suggest that a plot point in a movie from 1992 would be that salient to an audience in 2005 is just ridiculous and you know it. The only confusion was when the initial teasers/commercials came out and people thought it was a sequel to BR, but that confusion was swiftly eliminated by either the title "Batman Begins or the fact that there was a new actor and director. Seriously, let's not create an issue where there isn't one.

 

[hippie_hunter]

Who are these "legions"? I've not met one person who said anything even remotely close to that. To suggest that a plot point in a movie from 1992 would be that salient to an audience in 2005 is just ridiculous and you know it. The only confusion was when the initial teasers/commercials came out and people thought it was a sequel to BR, but that confusion was swiftly eliminated by either the title "Batman Begins or the fact that there was a new actor and director. Seriously, let's not create an issue where there isn't one.

My mother was confused at first over the continuity of Batman Begins and Superman Returns. I had to beat it into her head that the other Batman films never happened and for Superman only the first two happened but the rest didn't.

 

[Katsuro]

Who are these "legions"?

The entire production staff of Who Wants to be a Millionaire, for one. The question was "Which of these movies is a prequel". The answer "Batman Begins".

And aside from that, i've met plenty of people confused by the whole situation. People who think Batman Begins was a prequel to B89, and people who think TDK is a remake of B89. Maybe now people are starting to understand, but for a very long time they didn't. They didn't understand the concept of a "reboot", especially when the movie has the very prequel-sounding name of "Batman Begins".

Trust me, this will confuse people. People can be very dumb.

 

[Sun_Down]

My mother was confused at first over the continuity of Batman Begins and Superman Returns. I had to beat it into her head that the other Batman films never happened and for Superman only the first two happened but the rest didn't.

The entire production staff of Who Wants to be a Millionaire, for one. The question was "Which of these movies is a prequel". The answer "Batman Begins".

And aside from that, i've met plenty of people confused by the whole situation. People who think Batman Begins was a prequel to B89, and people who think TDK is a remake of B89. Maybe now people are starting to understand, but for a very long time they didn't. They didn't understand the concept of a "reboot", especially when the movie has the very prequel-sounding name of "Batman Begins".

Trust me, this will confuse people. People can be very dumb.

So we've got hippie hunter's mom and some person writing Who Wants to be a Millionaire questions. That hardly qualifies as legions.

And if these are the examples you're using to argue against this, then, what? No one can ever make a Batman or Superman movie again because it will cause mass hysteria and confusion in the audience? Come on. Most people can wrap their minds around the concept of a reboot (it's really not that complex) or just enjoy the film put before them without thinking about other movies that have come before. Most people don't analyze or scrutinize these movies as much as we do.

You say people are dumb. I agree. In fact, that's the credo I live by. But people's stupidity is exactly why they won't be confused by JLA. Because stupid people hate to think and stupid people (95% of the population, by my estimation) will just watch the damn movie and enjoy it. And us comic fans can appreciate the different continuities and everyone is happy.

 

[UltimateJustin]

To take it further, even if these things confuse people, what will that do? Will they freeze in place because they are perplexed by seeing Batman begin when they have been told since 1992 that not only has he began but he's all ready had time to return? If anyone is interested in seeing a movie about the Flash, will they not go see it because they have a specific preference for which continuity it should be a part of?

The biggest outcome any of this possible confusion could lead to would be a five minute conversation after the movie between casual moviegoers debating whether what they saw was supposed to be a prequel, re-boot or what we called it when I was five, "not in the same universe".