So should a studio take a risk on an unknown black character and hope for success instead of changing the race of a more well known character who has a better likelihood for success...even if the race is changed? I think that's my point. Why should we expect studios to take these risks? As has been explained to me repeatedly...the movie studios are in this for profit.
It worked for Blade three times. No one knew who the hell he was back then besides a small subset of comics fans from back in the Tomb of Dracula days in the 70s. The whole unknown thing doesn't work when you consider how D-list Blade was, and people still clamor for him. He has had a movie trilogy, his own tv series that was the highest rated on its channel, and an anime series. This all with being a character that not very many people knew about.
Also here's something to think about in regards to profit. There have been six movies featuring black superheroes as leads. I'll list them:
Steel
$16 million budget/ $1.7 million box office
Spawn
$40 million budget/$87 million worldwide box office return
Blade
$45 million budget/ $131 million worldwide box office return
Blade 2
$54 million budget/ $155 million worldwide box office
Blade: Trinity
$65 million budget/ $128 million worldwide box office
Catwoman
$100 million budget/ $82 million worldwide box office
Every single one of those movies made back twice its budget at the box office besides Blade: Trinity which only missed it by a few million, Steel which was **** on top of **** that should have never been made, and the same can be said with Catwoman. The bottom line is that people go to see black superheroes when they come out unless there is just no effort made on the creators of the movie like Steel and Catwoman. And even in the case of a really poor third outing you see a good amount of people showed up to watch Blade: Trinity because they were invested in the character at that point. Had that movie been good it would have probably continued the trend of outdoing its predecessors.
Basically people will go see something if the movie is good, and there are plenty of great black characters in all comic companies. Just look at how popular Michonne is with Walking Dead fans. No one gives a damn about her being black or a woman. They just care that she has a cool ass katana that she owns zombies with. If Marvel were to put a really good effort into Black Panther, or in the upcoming Luke Cage tv show, or even some low level guy like Night Thrasher it would sell well if it looks good enough. I think us fans over think things sometimes in regards to how much the average movie goer cares about certain things.
Everyone doesn't have to be Superman, or Batman, or Spider-man to sell. In fact, don't take this as a shot, but it shows how you're a big DC fan. For decades Marvel has been kicking DC's ass by offering more than 5 important characters. While Marvel rolls out the X-Men, Spidey, Cap, Iron Man, Thor, Fantastic Four, Heroes for Hire, Daredevil, etc. DC is all like, "BATMAN! SUPERMAN! YEAHHHHH!" Just look at their response to Marvel's cinematic offerings. Marvel is like, "We'll let Sony and Fox take care of some other guys, but y'all like Avengers right? Cool. Here's some, but we don't want you to only live on that. Lets get some lesser known people some love. Here's some people in space, and some Netflix shows for you to watch. Oh yeah, there will be Ant-man, and a bunch of other stuff coming in multiple phases." What was DC's response. "How about we bring back Batman, and put him and Superman together! Yeahhhhhhhhhhh boiiiiiiiiiii!"
It's okay to step out of your DC shell now. All the other comic companies have cookies and milk. Like Anubis said. We'll get you some day.
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