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smokeybrandreviews · 6 years

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We Can Be Heroes

So i took in Ragnarok a second time and even wrote an in depth review about it. I said i wanted to compare and contrast between JL, more because Marvel has released some solid films both directly from Marvel Studios and their franchised heroes to other studios, in particular Fox. Logan is the second greatest cape flick i have ever seen, after the Dark Knight. I don’t throw that distinction around lightly because TDK is one of the greatest films, overall, ever made and Logan can give it a run for it’s money any day. Outside of that flick, Homecoming was spectacular and so was Guardians. I have already gushed about Ragnarok and even Wonder Woman was on point. So why was Justice League so bad? Why did no one go to see it?

I’m not sating that Justice League is a flop. Of course not. It made a pretty penny. It had, like, a 96 million dollar opening last week. Cash money. The thing is, if i know the box office, that’s unsustainable. A good drop in the week two run is around 40 to 50 percent. I’m not sure what the week two drop was but, considering all of the cats i saw looking to check out Coco and the fact my screening of Ragnarok was full, i imagine it’s going to be pretty substantial. Probably high 50 to mid 60s which is not was Warner Bros. wants. That’d be terrible news. Considering it only made about 185 mil in the foreign markets over opening weekend, that mid 60percent is looking better and better. So how is it Marvel keeps knocking these things out of the park and DC keeps stumbling across the finish line? As a comic fan, Marvel Fanboy, and cinemaphile, i wanted to throw my two cents into the argument because i find it all very intriguing

DCEU Fatigue

There are cats talking about superhero fatigue. I’ve been hearing that thrown around a lot lately. I don’t think that’s accurate. There are too many of us millennials out here, of age, starting our own families, that are afflicted with that crazy childhood nostalgia because we’re all latchkey kids, particularly the older of us. Cats like me, born in the early to mid 80s, adore comic books and Saturday morning cartoons. We loved the escapism as the excess of greed and selfishness during the 80s tore our families apart. Among our “Oregon Trail” generation, we have some of the highest rates of divorce so escapism was real. We threw ourselves into Nintendo, BTAS, and Marvel comics. We brought our younger siblings, those notorious and oft maligned by the media as the true “millennials”, those youngsters born in the 90s, into our world of comic book distraction, cartoon interference, and video game diversion. To see all of those heroes we followed as kids put up on the big screen with massive budgets and SFX spectacle is like catnip to us. The market is rife with prime demographics for these films and, as log as they’re good, there’s no stopping that machine. But that’s the overall problem.

Marvel has been doing this since 2008. They stumbled in a few outings (The two Hulk films, the first two Thor films, and to a lesser extent Iron Man 2 and Age of Ultron) but they have also shined brilliantly along the way while taking crazy risks. No one knew who the f*ck the Guardians of the Galaxy were or why Chris Pratt would even be cast in a superhero role but look; That first Guardians film is a classic and the second, even with all of it’s missteps, is a goddamn joy to watch. Pratt is a huge star now and people are looking to GOT to set that Cosmic Marvel tone. James Gunn’s visibility as a director has increased considerably, to the point that Taika Waititi took a little of their tone and levity into his own MCU outing, Ragnarok. And, again, i adored that flick. When Ultron came out and audiences reacted with mild tepidness, Marvel pulled Whedon and installed the Russos as the primary architects of MCU and look what happened. Cap 3 was ridiculous and literally every Marvel film after has scored in the 80s or 90s on Rotten Tomatoes. Not only did these cats helm arguable the best MCU film in Winter Soldier (the first Iron Man, i guess the first Avengers flick, and Homecoming might have something to say about that) but they were trusted with introducing the Marvel golden child, Spider-Man, in Civil War. and he was a goddamn hit! In my screening, people gave Pete a standing ovation. I cried manly tears when i saw him suit up. We have Black Panther on the horizon and the hype for that sh*t is explosive while Infinity war has been brewing for a decade. Marvel is coming up aces. The lowest rated film on Rotten tomatoes is The Incredible Hulk (see, them hulk flicks,man) and it’s at a 67 percent. Over almost a decade and 17 films, the MCU has an average tomatometer rating of about 83 percent.

The DCEU? different f*cking story. These cats are just the worst at this game, man. Their highest rated film is Wonder Woman. She’s sitting at a respectable 92 percent. To be honest, upon repeated viewing, i think it’s more a high 80s flick but still, for what it did with what ist had, i’m not made at the 92. Gal Gadot and Patty Jenkins crafted a heartfelt fairy tale that built up a legit female icon for girls and even boys to look at with admiration. I adore what this film meant on a social level and the fact it blew up the f*cking box office has movie execs standing at attention. Wonder Woman is the best character and overall experience to come out of this sh*tty DCEU. Everything else is trash. The next best reviewed film in the DCEU is Man of Steel, the first in the franchise, at 55 percent. That’s a far cry for the MCU’s initial outing of Iron Man at 94. My lady is a MASSIVE Supes fan and she HATED MOS. She said that wasn’t a Superman movie. She said it was a hodge-podge of nonsense. And it was. Sh*t didn’t get any better either. Since 2013, the DCEU has dropped 5 films, two of which rate less than 30 percent. their average tomatometer rating? 48.2 percent. I’ll be kind and round that up to 49 percent. Why would yo keep throwing money at a studio that ‘s dropping such awful movies? Justice League had it’s problems but i don’t think it’s 49 percent bad. I think audiences don’t trust Warner to their jobs. I think audiences are still burned by that 27 percent BvS debacle. I know they’re still reeling by that cluster f*ck of Suicide Squad. Essentially it’s fool me once, shame on you. Fool me three times, shame on me. Wonder Woman was really good but that’s because it’s more Marvel than not. But fool Me four times? Nah, breh. We learned our lesson. Cats are experiencing Superhero fatigue, we’re experiencing bad movie fatigue. We’re tired of the DCEU producing crap and don’t want to pay for another clusterf*ck. of nonsense.

No one trusts Zack Snyder because he’s awful at telling stories and DC was stupid to put him in charge of their cinematic universe to begin with

300 was dope but that movie lended itself to Snyder’s style of film making. If you’ve ever actually read Frank Miller’s 300 comic, you’d know that it’s all splash pages and action scenes. There’s very little substance in the book itself, just a bunch of cool looking sh*t. There’s no overarching narrative other than these 300 guys stood in there Persian’s way only to die fighting. That’s the narrative for 300. So, for a guy like Snyder who can’t craft a plot to get himself out of a wet paper bag, this was a tale designed for him. All that slow-mo and cg blood was just cool sh*t to see, Snyder is a master at crafting cool looking scenes to see and that 300 flick of his was cool to see Terrible film overall (non existent plot, terribly cheesy dialogue, anti climactic ending) but it was dope to see. This is where, i think, people mistook Snyder’s ability to craft a dope ass action scene for an ability to actually tell a story. People loved 300. It made 456 mil on a 60 mil budget. Critically, it sits at a 60 percent, critically and an 89 percent audience rating. Surprise-Surprise, cool looking sh*t based on cool looking sh*t is popular among the ignorant masses but falls short with people who actually engage cinema on more levels than just cool looking sh*t. So what happens when you give Snyder a heavy plot and meticulously crafted narrative to adapt to film? you get his take on Watchmen.

One of the greatest tales ever written in comic form was Watchmen. Alan Moore crafted a magnum ops of a tale and st it on the backdrop of cold war paranoia. This thing is visceral. This thing is sobering. This thing is real. It peels back the layers of our supposed society and asks hard questions about what it means to be human. So, taking this commentary rick narrative in to account, WB decided to give it to an asshole who couldn’t recognize subtext if it shoved it’s massive cock down his throat in Zack Snyder. Yes, Watchmen is pretty but does it do it’s job as an adaption? F*ck no. None of that gritty, hard question asking, almost malevolent intent at holding society hostage for it’s nonsense. None of it. Instead, we get, like, Watchmen lite. No character development. No social commentary. Not even a period correct piece. Watchmen take place in the 80s. Why do i feel like it’s present day?? Because Zack Snyder is the worst at movies. This thing made 185 mil on a 130 mil budget and sits at a 65 percent (which, i think, is Snyder’s highest critically rated film, ever) on Tomatoes. The audience score was about 71 percent, a significant drop from his last outing with 300. This is Snyder trying to create an actual movie, trying to craft a proper narrative and he lost about 17 percent of his audience,according to Rotten Tomatoes. So WB tripled down on this asshat and gave him a massive budget to do whatever the f*ck he anted with it and we got Sucker Punch. Nd OH BOY, is THAT film problematic.

So Sucker Punch was WB giving Zack Snyder carte blanche and about 8 mil to do whatever he wanted. And this mess of a rape fantasy is what we got. There are just so many thematic, social, and personal problems that ween through it’s terrible, terrible, film. You can see that Snyder hates women or, at least, thinks ridiculously less of the with all of the rampant sexism in this film. You can tell he has no idea how to actually cut a film with that lack of coherency. You can tell he has no idea how to develop characters beyond the literal and shallow tropes that are present in even the most mundane of cinema. This sh*t is a glorified, multi-million dollar, student film based on a fanfiction Snyder wrote when he was 14 years old and barely understood why he got boner or why the popular cheerleader didn’t look his way. Sucker Punch is trash. Sexist, problematic, poorly executed, wildly rapey, trash. And both the audience and critics understood that. It’s sitting at a 47 percent audience rating and a 23 percent critic rating on Tomatoes. No one liked this film. No one went to see it. It only made 89 mil on an 82 mil budget. Sucker Punch proves that Snyder is a bad filmmaker and a crackpot story teller. So WB puts him in charge of one of their most precious and profitable franchises in Superman?

This Zack Snyder is a proven loser and you give him Superman? You give him one of the most recognizable icons in the world and tell him to create a new vision that will be the linchpin of an entire cinematic world to rival the now full steam MCU? Based on 300, Watchmen, and Sucker Punch? Literally all of his films have shown woeful diminished returns but this is the guy you throw the DCEU to, after coming off the Dark Knight Trilogy? F*cking Nolan got you an Oscar on the back of Ledger’s performance as the Joker and instead of giving the reigns of the DCEU to a guy with that sort of vision, you give it to Snyder who can only craft “cool looking sh*t”? really? On top of that, you force him to bring to life a David S. Goyer script, the co-author and co-creator of that wildly successful Dark Knight trilogy, and expect Snyder to execute like Nolan did? Really? Who thought this was a good idea and why?? Where was the guy at the top to say “No”? Which brings me to my next point...

The DCEU needs a guy like Kevin Feige or Kathleen Kennedy to guide their universe and not rely so much on filmakers to execute a vision.

The DCEU needs a Feige to reign this sh*t in. I hear WB touting that a cinematic universe should be helmed by film makers or whatever and they’re tight. But there also needs to be a uniform vision. Someone needs to sit up top to guide the ship. Someone removed from the film making process but still knows a good narrative when he sees it. Someone who understand the business side of movies while understanding what’s necessary to create a compelling film. The DCEU needs a proper producer to sit on top of all of these movie directors and force them to essentially create within the formula. Yje <CU does that and look at their success. Te Star Wars universe is doing that and look at their success. Hell, the Star Wars universe is a perfect example of the same issues the DCEU is having right now.

Look at the original trilogy, Episodes IV to VI. Lucas was sitting on top, even directed the first, but stepped aside to let actual film makers craft an actual narrative after A New Hope. What did we get? F*cking classics. The Empire Strike Back is one of the greatest films ever made and sits on a very short list with The Dark Knight and The Godfather Part II as sequels better than their predecessors. Guess what happened when Lucas decided to make the Prequels himself? Yeah. George Lucas is that visionary with a lot of ideas but lacks the ability to execute them properly. He’s a lot like Zack Snyder in that way and the Prequel trilogy showed that to the world. Disney took those mistakes to heart and basically built a universe system based on the success they’ve had with the MCU and guess what? two movies in, it’s paying off. The Force Awakens and Rogue one are sitting at an average of 89 percent critic rating on Rotten tomatoes. Average. the audience rating is about 88 percent. People love these films and The Last Jedi looks to be a home run as well. They have so much confidence in Rian Johnson, they gave that cat a trilogy to develop on his own. Bet, though, that Kathleen Kennedy is going to be right there, adding her input and making sure it follows that path she has set for the future of the Star War universe. Giving the film makers themselves the reins to the entire universe is a little like letting the patients run the asylum ad the DCEU is worse off for it.

The DCEU should have followed Marvel’s blue print and taken it’s time to flesh out the principal players in their massive team up instead of copping-out with BvS as basically it’s second film into a fledgling franchise

This one, i think, is the biggest reason the DCEU is sh*t. Marvel took it’s time to execute and create a world. We had a Hulk film, two Iron Man flicks, a Thor outing, and a Cap flick before we even got to the Avengers. We knew the character. We loved the universe created. We were invested when Loki snatched the Tesseract. We were five movies into a universe, five decent movies into a world, before cats came together to face off against a rogue god and his alien army. Sure, there were course corrections. Thor was adjusted a bit and Ruffalo was recast as The Hulk but it worked. We go Nat in Iron Man 2 and Clint in Thor. And the Avengers was good. I don’t think it was Dark Knight good but it’s still pretty widely accepted as the superior film for some reason. Marvel took the time to build something. They took the time to establish something. They built up their characters and made sure audiences knew exactly ho they were and what they were about before they even attempted that team up flick. Everything felt organic. The growth felt earned. The DCEU did not go this rout. The y, instead, rushed out BvS instead of MOS II and basically sh*t all over the good will they had with audiences.

BvS should have stuck to one story and carried that over but it didn’t. t was The Dark Knight Returns and The Death of Superman with hints of For All Seasons thrown in just because and none of it meshed. BvS should have bee the climax to a DCEU phase one. Start of with a character driven story about Lois Lane investigating “The Blur” which leads her to the discovery of Superman or whatever. maybe have a token villain or some sort of world cataclysm that needed addressing just to introduced boy scout Supes and call it a day. No Krpytonians yet, maybe have them as the end credit stinger or something. We should have had a Wonder Woman movie before BvS but after SUpes, so, maybe the second one out? And then a throwback Batman outing that established his vigilantism in the past. I would have adapted that excellent Year One story or The Long Halloween, crafted a tale of mystery and noir, Batman’s strengths, as a prequel to the universe it’s self. Wonder Woman could have been exactly hat it was and have her movie with the Motherbox stingers at the end. Sandwich that with another Superman flick, MOS II, that introduced Deathstroke and Metallo while making Luthor (and i don’t have a problem with Jesse Eisenberg’s interpretation. In this day and age, of course Luthor would be Zuckerberg That just makes sense.) the mastermind behind all of this, culminating in him, with the help of the expert Deathstroke, discerning the identities of the Trinity. Set up for Phase two, ya dig? So now you release the MOS as Snyder envisioned, tweaking it ever so slightly into a Trinity movie and not just a Supes film. Kryptonians invade, forcing not only Superman to act but Wonder Woman and Batman, too. Working together, the latter two as the civilians Diana Price and Bruce Wayne so they get a front seat for how much destruction Supes has caused, they subdue subdue the Kryptonians and banish them and/or kill them. Supes can still kill Zod because you have two films establishing that he deosn’t want to do that, that his moral compass dictates that murder is never a thing. Having to kill Zod would shake his world and you can go into that existential Supes we saw in BvS while forcing Bruce to understand how threatening Kryptonians are and Wondy questioning in her banishment from the world of man is actually right.

Phase two Starts of with BvS ad it follows The Dark Knight rises scenario. Luthor pits Supes and Bats against each other because he knows exactly who they are t this point, probably Diana as well, and sets about to have the twi destroy each other. It can be established that he’s already gotten access to the Kryptonian ship and has been working on his “Doomsday Protocol was killed two years earlier or whatever. After being goaded into trying to kill Supes, Bats does his thing, more or less, how it’s seen in BvS without all that Martha bullsh*t. During their battle, Bruce and Clark come to terms and realize that neither really wants this battle and decide to go after the awaiting Luthor who activates Doomsday/Bizzaro. The two engage and, with the help of Wonder Woman, subdue the beast at the cost of Clark’s life. He dead. Bruce visits Luthor ins prision, at his invitation, and reveals that he was able to activate one of the Motherboxes two years ago and the entity on the other side told him about the Kryptonian history of conquest. He continues to explain that everything was a means to remove Superman from earth, because he believes it’s in the world’s best interest, so that their world wouldn't fall like the countless others. Since Luthor was locked away, Bruce is the only other person in the world with the means and will to continue his work to which Bruce agrees but decided to do it his own way.

Bruce’s nonchalant dismissal would infuriate Luthor even more and the seeds of The Legion of Doom have been sowed for future titles. Little did Luthor know, however, that it was Steppenwolf on the other side of that Motherbox trying to find a way back to earth in order to enslave it. He used Luthor to remove the greatest threat to his conquest, the Superman, and it worked. The earth is defenseless and Batman knows it. So he sets about to find cats with powers as a means to defend them from what’s coming. And now you move forward Witt the standalone Flash, Cyborg, and Aquaman films. Maybe a Wonder Woman sequel and then drop that first Justice League flick. It can basically be what we got now. which fits, for the most part, with what i would have established. SO, now, instead of having basically two book e films in your five film world, you have about 11 of varying popularity, in about 7 years. maybe 10. The point is, you’ve built something. Something good. Something compelling. Something substantial. Something worth coming back to, again and again.

You see how taking the time to craft a universe sets you up for spectacular success? You see how telling good stories can compel others to want to create better stories? The MCU understands this. The Star Wars universe understands this. You can’t rush these things in an effort to cash-in or compete You need to go t your own pace and make sure the product is up to snuff. The DCEU didn’t do that. They rushed in with no plan or strategy and released sh*t. Why was Suicide Squad even on the docket? how does that film fit into the DCEU? There was literally no mention of it in Justice League and you’d think an attack by a thousand year old witch would be something cats would want to speak on. nope. The what was the point of it all? Sh*t’s whack son.

At the end of the day, no one trusts the DCEU aymore

Justice League failed because the DCEU is failing. People imply don’t trust WB to deliver stories on the same level of Marvel. The DCEU is looked at more as another Dark Universe, which is now defunct, rather than something with promise like the Star Wars universe or something established like the MCU. They’ve earned the reputation of shilling sh*t and that sticks. Cats want good cape flick. They want to see their heroes portrayed brilliantly. The want to go to a film that’s pretty, entertaining, and enriching. No one wants to watch that dark ass BvS. No one wants to see an out of context, somber ass Superman. Vats want the comradery of that Timmverse Justice League. Cats want to see their heroes represented in live action as well as they have been in their animated outings. The thing is, though, i don’t think anyone believes the DCEU can deliver that level of quality. I think everyone is tired of giving these cats chances. I liked Justice League a little bit. I thought the tone was a decent, if jarring, combination of levity and seriousness. In someone else’s hands, there is a great f*cking movie there. But, Snyder has his mits all over this thing and it shows. Bringing in Whedon to clean up was a stroke of genius but it was too little too late for JL. And, to be honest, it might be too little too late for the entire DCEU.

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smokeybrand · 6 years

Text

We Can Be Heroes

DCEU Fatigue

No one trusts Zack Snyder because he’s awful at telling stories and DC was stupid to put him in charge of their cinematic universe to begin with

The DCEU needs a guy like Kevin Feige or Kathleen Kennedy to guide their universe and not rely so much on filmakers to execute a vision.

The DCEU needs a Feige to reign this sh*t in. I hear WB touting that a cinematic universe should be helmed by film makers or whatever and they’re tight. But there also needs to be a uniform vision. Someone needs to sit up top to guide the ship. Someone removed from the film making process but still knows a good narrative when he sees it. Someone who understand the business side of movies while understanding what’s necessary to create a compelling film. The DCEU needs a proper producer to sit on top of all of these movie directors and force them to essentially create within the formula. The MCU does that and look at their success. Te Star Wars universe is doing that and look at their success. Hell, the Star Wars universe is a perfect example of the same issues the DCEU is having right now.

At the end of the day, no one trusts the DCEU aymore

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