Has Fox hit a dead end with their Marvel Properties?

[Logan0327]

man you guys get defensive on mcu villains real quick lol

 

[SuperT]

And Ultron may not have been what everyone was hoping for but he was interesting and layered and world's better than the utterly one-dimensional and non-charismatic Apocalypse. Geez even Malekith was better.

Who?

 

[henzINNIT]

I think my big issue with Fox's Marvel properties is that they've now tied the X-men characters to specific time frames. You can't have modern stories of Cyclops, Jean, Storm, Prof. X, Magneto, Mystique, etc because they've provided their introductions in past decades.

There's still a cast in place for those characters though, Fox just aren't using them. Stewart and McKellen are as old as characters involved in World War II would be.

 

[Ragnaroknroll]

Malekwho?

Who?

Ok so who stole whose joke?

 

[Raiden]

I think there should be some kind of guidelines for villains. There are villains who have motivations and personality but deed as forgettable so he's "bad", like Darren Cross, and another that has nothing except a funny accent and a mask and people think he's great, like Bane. Also, Joker is pretty one dimensional and he doesn't have any arc or conflict in his character, but he's among the most interesting villains so he is regarded as the best CM villain.

 

[Stark Bauer]

I think there should be some kind of guidelines for villains. There are villains who have motivations and personality but deed as forgettable so he's "bad", like Darren Cross, and another that has nothing except a funny accent and a mask and people think he's great, like Bane. Also, Joker is pretty one dimensional and he doesn't have any arc or conflict in his character, but he's among the most interesting villains so he is regarded as the best CM villain.

My favourite MCU villain by far is D'Onofrio's Kingpin. He is a villain I can sort of sympathize with, and isn't a straight up villain, more of a conflicted character.

 

[Iron_Stark]

So now the requirements of a good villain is how many people cosplay him or her? Lol!

Sorry no. I love Tom Hardy but his Bane was not a good villain. No, I take it back, he was good not great, memorable because of that silly voice, he was better than the villains from the Fox-Men universe and some other bad ones, but let's not pretend he's Darth Vader and Hannibal Lecter because some comic nerds play dress up at comic con.

Comic/Arkham games/TAS Bane >>>>>>>>>>>>>> both movie Banes.

 

[Joe Rockhead]

There's still a cast in place for those characters though, Fox just aren't using them. Stewart and McKellen are as old as characters involved in World War II would be.

Yes... but my point is that the historically popular characters, or at least the ones that have been the focus of the primary X-men comics, are being aged out of modern stories.

Teen Cyclops and Jean are now tied to 80's, that puts them in line to be early thirties by the first X-men movie, so now if you want modern stories with those characters they're pushing 50.

Magneto still tied to the holocaust as a teenager... so maybe they lean towards him being younger when his powers manifested. That still puts him at best 13 years old in 45, so that puts him in his mid-80s now. Now I would be happy if future movies got away from Magneto and Xavier as the primary rivals in the movies, but he's still the premiere X-Men villain.

 

[DACrowe]

So now the requirements of a good villain is how many people cosplay him or her? Lol!

Sorry no. I love Tom Hardy but his Bane was not a good villain. No, I take it back, he was good not great, memorable because of that silly voice, he was better than the villains from the Fox-Men universe and some other bad ones, but let's not pretend he's Darth Vader and Hannibal Lecter because some comic nerds play dress up at comic con.

Comic/Arkham games/TAS Bane >>>>>>>>>>>>>> both movie Banes.

I assume when yo say "Arkham Bane" you mean the one from Arkham Origins, who was based in part on Hardy's Bane. Because the one from Arkham Asylum (and TAS for that matter) was pretty awful.

And no Hardy isn't on the same level as Vader or Lecter (two of the absolute best movie villains of all time). But Ledger's Joker is. And just for fun here is a more reasonable standard: when people look back at the great roles or body of work for Jack Nicholson, The Joker is on that. Same with Catwoman for Pfeiffer, and Magneto for McKellen.

I can imagine that Fassbender's Magneto will have that same standout mark on his career, as does Hardy's Bane. Nobody when thinking of great Jeff Bridges, Robert Redford or Guy Pearce performances jump to their Marvel work.

There is a reason for that.

 

[Erzengel]

If you did a list of the top comic book villains, who'd be at the top of the list? There'd be Luthor, Joker, Magneto, Dr. Doom. Would Loki or Ultron even make it as 5? Even Thanos isn't necessarily that popular. I remember having to explain to people who he was at the end of the Avengers movie. Point being the Avengers villains aren't like Batman or even Spider-Man's rogue gallery.

 

[Flint Marko]

There'd be Luthor, Joker, Magneto, Dr. Doom

I'm pleased Dr. Doom has had such a successful run in the movies. He's my favorite villain in all of comics, and seems like such an easy character to adapt, so it's no wonder Fox was able to -

Spoiler

 

[StormC]

Bring FF home so the cinema can truly know the glory that is DOOM!

 

[Willie Lumpkin]

And Galactus. Fox has two of the best, most iconic comic-book villains ever and they've absolutely, inexcusably butchered them.

 

[Abudefduf]

What Fox has done to those two is inexcusable, but are we really sure Marvel Studios would treat them any better? I realize a mediocre villain is better than an awful one, but still.

 

[psylockolussus]

I would love to see the Mole Man and Super Skrull! And please do Namor!

 

[StormC]

What Fox has done to those two is inexcusable, but are we really sure Marvel Studios would treat them any better? I realize a mediocre villain is better than an awful one, but still.

There's nobody in the industry I would trust to handle them more than Feige.

 

[Mjölnir]

I assume when yo say "Arkham Bane" you mean the one from Arkham Origins, who was based in part on Hardy's Bane. Because the one from Arkham Asylum (and TAS for that matter) was pretty awful.

And no Hardy isn't on the same level as Vader or Lecter (two of the absolute best movie villains of all time). But Ledger's Joker is. And just for fun here is a more reasonable standard: when people look back at the great roles or body of work for Jack Nicholson, The Joker is on that. Same with Catwoman for Pfeiffer, and Magneto for McKellen.

I can imagine that Fassbender's Magneto will have that same standout mark on his career, as does Hardy's Bane. Nobody when thinking of great Jeff Bridges, Robert Redford or Guy Pearce performances jump to their Marvel work.

There is a reason for that.

I don't think the Joker can measure up to Lecter. People getting my hopes up for that was actually the reason I was a bit disappointed in the character the first time I watched the movie. Lecter is written far better with not even remotely close to the same plot conveniences and his scenes have incredible tension. The Joker is funnier but that's about it. Not that it's a knock on any villain that they aren't as good as Lecter. Or if you talk about just being recognizable and popular, Vader smashes the other two.

As for great roles, I don't think the Joker is there for Nicholson. It's of course up there with recognizable roles since it's the one huge blockbuster he did, and most people don't watch the classics, but his work there can't measure up to his best roles. Something he of course agrees with himself as he hates people bringing that up.

McKellen has, despite being a great actor, more nerd focus on his career now so for him it will be on there. With Fassbender and Hardy I'm less sure since they have potential to have plenty of Oscar nominations on their resume when their careers come to an end. Although Fassbender does show that he's a great actor in many Magneto scenes so it doesn't have that gap at least. Hardy less so with Bane.

 

[Mjölnir]

Another case that highlights that Marvel villains might get criticism because most other things are done so well in those movies is that no one talks about Peter Dinklage, and the fact that no one does that should really mean that people do start to talk about him, but in that Fox wasted him.

The sentinels weren't very interesting since they had no personality or emotional connection to them. They were just there as the plot device. Trask was the villain that could have elevated the movie and given the sentinels more of a connection to the audience as Dinklage is a really good actor, but he got very little to do and pretty much only affected the plot in a secondary way. He got to be clearly less than Obadiah Stane.

 

[Darth_Spock]

Hmmm....so does magnifying Marvel's villain issues some how exonerate Fox from current issues with X-men and F4?

 

[SuperT]

Hmmm....so does magnifying Marvel's villain issues some how exonerate Fox from current issues with X-men and F4?

The two don't have anything to do with each other. Marvel has issues with villains and other things, Fox has issues with X-Men and F4 - they both got issues to resolve. Neither are perfect and are open to criticism in hopes of getting better.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

Bingo. I've been saying this for the longest time when it came to expanding the X-Universe that the way to go is through team spinoffs and not solo character movies. There's really only two X-universe characters that can sustain solo movies - Deadpool and Wolverine. I'd throw in Mystique there too because her solo run working as a double agent is still one of my favorite X-solo's of all time but that's a matter of personal opinion.

I think Gambit can too. But they would need to distance him from the X-Men and focus more on him being a mutant thief.

A Magneto solo could work, but they already covered much of the ground of what would make up a Magneto solo in X-Men First Class so there wouldn't be much point.

 

[Angryfantasyfan]

The two don't have anything to do with each other. Marvel has issues with villains and other things, Fox has issues with X-Men and F4 - they both got issues to resolve. Neither are perfect and are open to criticism in hopes of getting better.

I think what he's getting at is the topic of the thread is "Has Fox hit a dead end with their Marvel Properties?" We've spent several pages going off topic.

 

[Erzengel]

I think Gambit can too. But they would need to distance him from the X-Men and focus more on him being a mutant thief.

A Magneto solo could work, but they already covered much of the ground of what would make up a Magneto solo in X-Men First Class so there wouldn't be much point.

I want to see Rogue make an appearance in Gambit.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

The two don't have anything to do with each other. Marvel has issues with villains and other things, Fox has issues with X-Men and F4 - they both got issues to resolve. Neither are perfect and are open to criticism in hopes of getting better.

Let's accept the idea that Marvel has generic cardboard cutout villains and Fox does not. I disagree with that, but it isn't really relevant to this point, so let's say that is indeed the case.

It is a far, FAR bigger problem to have generic, boring heroes (like we've seen from much of the X-Men in these films) than it is to have generic, boring villains. The heroes are the backbone of a franchise. They are the star quarterbacks. Darth Vader may be extremely popular, but Star Wars goes nowhere without Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, and Princess Leia. Deadpool worked largely because people really liked Deadpool himself. The closest Apocalypse had was Quicksilver (who was a supporting character) and Xavier (who was sidelined for most of the second half of the film).

There are of course many other things as well that goes into a great superhero film, such as the villains, but nailing the heroes can cover for a lot of other problems and not nailing them can sink a movie.

 

[DACrowe]

I don't think the Joker can measure up to Lecter. People getting my hopes up for that was actually the reason I was a bit disappointed in the character the first time I watched the movie. Lecter is written far better with not even remotely close to the same plot conveniences and his scenes have incredible tension. The Joker is funnier but that's about it. Not that it's a knock on any villain that they aren't as good as Lecter. Or if you talk about just being recognizable and popular, Vader smashes the other two.

As for great roles, I don't think the Joker is there for Nicholson. It's of course up there with recognizable roles since it's the one huge blockbuster he did, and most people don't watch the classics, but his work there can't measure up to his best roles. Something he of course agrees with himself as he hates people bringing that up.

McKellen has, despite being a great actor, more nerd focus on his career now so for him it will be on there. With Fassbender and Hardy I'm less sure since they have potential to have plenty of Oscar nominations on their resume when their careers come to an end. Although Fassbender does show that he's a great actor in many Magneto scenes so it doesn't have that gap at least. Hardy less so with Bane.

Ledger as Joker is absolutely one of the best screen villains of all time. His scenes were less about creating a psychological profile like Lecter, so I am not sure comparing them so literally is apt. But what Ledger did do is personify a very specific and modern, post-9/11 image of chaos that disturbs Americans. He reveled in it in a way that struck a nerve, and is one of the key reasons that movie is still considered by most (though not all) the best comic book movie of all time. He won a posthumous Oscar for it for crying out loud (the last time that happened was for another legendary performance, Peter Finch in Network). The life and nastiness that Ledger imbued into the Nolan version of the Joker is unforgettable. And Nolan used him well. If you want to compare him in terms of narrative function to other screen villains, he is more like the shark in Jaws. A force of nature that just rolls onto the screen and destroys the lives of everything he touches before vanishing again.

As for the Nicholson Joker, you are right his Joker is not in the same ballpark as his very best films, including Chinatown, The Shining, A Few Good Men, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. But his Joker performance is remembered just as fondly in any retrospective as those, and more than other less iconic hits he did, like The Witches of Eastwick or Reds.

Still, my point stands. Even if it being a big blockbuster is a reason it is a highlight of his career, Iron Man and Captain America 2 were also big blockbusters. Stane and Pierce will still not be some of the roles people reminisce about when talking about them.