Well, it seems, just from the new “epic” (FirstShowing.net’s words, not mine) trailer for X-Men Origins Wolverine, that the Donner’s company and Marvel may just have sounded the death knell for superhero flicks.
Now, before you get all heated on me, and yell at me for not having seen the film or that 2003’s Hulk was bad, or Daredevil was atrocious or Ghost Rider was the nail in not only Mark Steven Johnson’s career (which it wasn’t), but superhero movies in general (don’t even start the argument that Ghost Rider isn’t truly a superhero), I have only to say this:
No matter how bad or poorly-constructed those movies were, they all concentrated on one mainly single character, and everything that came with that character along whatever specific journey the character took and there was something specifically worthy that ultimately could be gleaned from each movie.
When there was a movie with ancillary characters like X-Men and Spider-Man, the latter which, no matter how fun and well-constructed a movie it was, it still seriously dropped the ball on the Green Goblin. Had it shown any of the weakness that just the trailer for the new Wolverine shows, there may not have been an Iron Man or even Spider-Man 2, a strong contender for best modern superhero flick.
However…far from the daring choice Bryan Singer was for X-Men, Gavin Hood appears, again, simply from the terrible final preview, to be an inferior cousin of Mark Steven Johnson, who, for all his weaknesses, may have chosen Michael Clarke Duncan, but at least knew enough to capture the “essence” of Kingpin, no matter how lame the final “showdown” was.
Hood has taken some massive liberties with characters and, in the trailer, shown us a seriously misguided Deadpool, some seriously wonky CGI and a Sabretooth that seems both banal and utterly toothless and really tries to make a strong dramatic-action hero out of a guy who uses playing cards to fight people. Okay…for all his shortcomings (I mean, a teleporting blue circus freak?), Singer made Nightcrawler integral to the beginning of the story and gave him an introduction that none of the other characters except him needed. Deadpool and Gambit seem to be central to the main conceit of the movie and are even given weird capabilities that don’t fit with what the character is or has been. What the hell was Deadpool, in this movie incarnation, doing spinning in the air? Who but a dedicated fanboy can look past Ryan’s stupid sleeveless shirt and accept what they see? And then accept the wonky CGI on a criminally mis-used Liev Schrieber as Sabretooth?
Many of you will watch this movie and tell me I have to eat my words, but I stand by this and believe that the Avengers movie and Captain America movie listed after this one will not only suck in theory, but the final Avengers movie will not only not make it to theaters, butwill fail to even get made.
Gone Elsewhere 
I’m not even sure I’m going to see this theatrically (and I was a big fan of Singer’s first two entries) but I think it’s a little early to dismiss Hood entirely based on one mediocre film (Rendition) and what looks to be a superhero clusterfuck.
I certainly wouldn’t elevate uber-hack Mark Steven Johnson above him.
And as I’ve said many times before: Marvel has no future.
They will be bought out before the next decade is out, you just need to look at the hubris of their upcoming production slate to know it’s inevitable.
Gee, that’s odd, because everyone I know is super excited at the latest trailer. Maybe you saw something I didnt see, but at least 60 people in real life talking to me are all hyped about it. Perhaps you were someone who hated Predator, go watch the trailer for that. Everyone is wanting a real action hero film where the guy doesn’t fly get’s beat up and still wins. Nobody I know doesn’t want to see it, because I don’t know you.
I’ll send you a copy of sex in the city if you want.
call me after I make more money off marvel stock.
a ‘CRIMINALLY’ misused sabretooth? criminally. So who is Liev Shrieber pressing charges against. What you are is a hack who has nothing better to do than bitch about things you don’t even like anyway, probably trained at university to be critical of everything, and find any flaw you can in anything you aren’t interested in. Now, as an english lit major, I will tell you, I would have listened to you seriously if you were smart enough to put one paragraph about what you hope and think it could be instead of sentence counter sentence. They say it’s good but look how stupid this is. That doesn’t persuade a person. What you say is, “Many people are looking forward to it, I hope it is good too. Wolverine is a favorite character of many people. My fears are about these things…” not just crush the damned movie and insult people’s hopes. Nobody will like that, believe you, or change their minds other than the people that already think exactly like you, so you might as well just talk to yourself.
And if you had a damned brain you would know they don’t have the cgi tweaked whenever they release a trailer. They get the trailer out asap as soon as footage is okay but they still work on it afterwards. If you ‘liked’ Wolverine you would have a reason to write a bitchy review and complain, but nowhere in your whole piece did you say YOU liked WOLVERINE at all.
How about I just write reviews about how much i dislike the advertising for geico car insurance when I’m never buying it, don’t need to buy it, and don’t care about it at all anyway. I would be legitimized in doing so if I at all mentioned I had hoped for geico to be good, but it wasn’t for this reason. You have zero bullshit reason to be writing a smear peice because you didn’t like a trailer.
And before you get all snobby smart on me and say why did you write all this if you have no reason look at what you said, well I AM INVESTED in this MOVIE so you are attacking me. I have money invested in this company. You are directly attacking ME so that is a good reason to complain about what you said.
No, he’s not, and we don’t allow persecution complexes on this site.
Knock it off or I’ll ban you. Fair warning.
EDIT: Since you’ve introduced yourself by being such an asshole, any future comments will require approval by one of the administrators before appearing here.
Look at the ensuing picture:
http://io9.com/photogallery/notscarredyet/1007531064
Look in the background, on the left side of the picture, above the head of the guy in the gray…what is that on those “trees”? A light switch.
‘Nuff said.
What the hell?
Buried in all of that charm is one relevant fact: Marvel’s stock is up, a minor miracle in this economy. They reported a 68 million dollar profit in the fourth quarter of ’08 (mostly off of DVD sales of Iron Man and Incredible Hulk)
Of course their stock price went up. They’ve had a great run of some pretty decent movies that have generated some decent revenue for the bottom line.
I think the argument James and I agree on is that the ensuing slate of films and the choices being made are going to be a lot like what Cheney managed to do with our national surplus: destroy whatever was built before it.
The whole thing about marvel in my opinion they totally did wrong by leting producers rewrite or mess up the story lines of the characters and the charaters themselves if you are a true marvel fan YOU DONT MESS UP THE CHARACTERS AND THE STORY LINES. God i just wish someone would not mess up the AVENGERS and Cap. I mean killing cap was just wrong and stupid. He was an icon of WWII and read by men who gave there life for this country(The United States of AMERICA) . The Avengers were the hit when they came out. All i am trying to say is keep the story ines right and just. And stop fliping messing up the story lines MARVEL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I have no problem with upheaval. If Marvel (or DC) actually let some of their “…will never be the same again!” changes stick and/or characters to age and die gracefully, folks might stop abandoning the books in droves. Comics deserve to die.
It did 87 million in 3 days plus 73 million overseas sucker
And now you’re not longer left out….