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Sunday, January 30, 2011

What's With the Reboots?

You know, I really don't get what's up with all these superhero movie reboots. I mean: Spider-Man, X-Men First Class (apparently without a Cyclops, which makes it not X-Men at all, in my opinion. Cyclops even made it into Wolverine Origins, damnit), Superman...

I honestly don't get it. I really don't. Okay, I mean, I get that Superman Returns kind of flopped (I actually liked it a lot, but I get why some folks didn't), and Spider-Man 3 and X-Men III were really really awful, but I don't know why an entire reboot is necessary. Couldn't they just pull a Highlander 3 and pretend the previous movies didn't exist?

I mean, I got why they rebooted Batman. Batman and Robin pretty much killed the franchise. But more importantly, Batman had never had a movie origin (or at least not one made after the 1940s.). But we've SEEN origins for Spider-Man and Superman. Do we really need more?

I mean, what's really going to change? We already know the story, after all. I liked Ed Norton's Hulk better than the Eric Bana one, but I didn't really think it added anything to the movie mythos overall.

Don't get me wrong, I think the new Spider-Man and the new Superman are pretty easy on the eyes. But I'm really hoping they avoid yet another origin story. If it's like X-Men was or the Michael Keaton Batman movie, in media res, so to speak (well, for the team if not Wolverine in the case of the former), then that's okay. At least then there's a chance for a NEW story. But if it's yet another origin story, I'll probably pass.

Unless the actor's REALLY hot in costume, of course. :-)

posted by kalinara @ 10:27 PM  

7 Comments:

  • At January 31, 2011 7:48 AM, Blogger Diabolu Frank said…

    Actually, Superman Returns did okay for a near direct sequel decades late with hundreds of millions of dollars in development that was rather dull and misguided. I expect much better from Zack Snyder, and speaking as a heterosexual male, the new Superman is dreamy without being Chris Reeves' clone.

    I actually think First Class being set in the 60s/70s is kind of fun, and I like Havok as Cyclops' older brother/predecessor. It should also wash the taste of previous installments out of people's mouths, and whose to say Scott and Jean don't show up at the end?

    I figure Spider-Man is going back to high school because there's a new audience of tweens to seduce, and their younger siblings need new toys with the funky updated costume. Peter Parker is eternally coming-of-age, or else he becomes Superman, so it was inevitable.

    I'm pretty sick of origins myself though, and expect to pass on the new Spider-Man. I don't even think Captain America looks to great. Thor should be interesting though, since his origins seem pretty jazzed up and reinvented.

     

  • At January 31, 2011 8:45 AM, Blogger kalinara said…

    I think Havok as predecessor screws with the dynamic too much, honestly. (Which is the same problem I had with Ultimate X-Men.) I think a great deal of Havok's personality is defined by the relationship with Scott (the perils of introducing a character via a relationship to a pre-existing one) that when you fuck with that too much, you basically end up with "random guy #6" who just happens to have the name "Alex Summers".

    But really, my issue is still that it never feels properly like X-Men without Cyclops. Even if he does show up at the end, it's not really going to feel right to me. Probably that's just fangirl irrationality, but there you go.

    But I do think Captain America looks awesome. :-)

     

  • At January 31, 2011 4:19 PM, Blogger Marshall Ryan Maresca said…

    Superman Returns was a decent movie for what it was, which was little more than a love letter to the Christopher Reeves/Richard Donner movie. I remind myself, especially after seeing the ideas from the proposed Burton/Cage film, as well as what Kevin Smith went through when he was hired to do a script for it, how much much worse it could have been.

    As for why reboot, on the Marvel side of things, it's pure studio politics. With both X-Men and Spiderman, the studios that currently have the rights have to keep making movies or the rights will revert back to Marvel. So it's more worth it to reboot but keep working.

     

  • At January 31, 2011 5:13 PM, Blogger SallyP said…

    Um...yeah. Why the heck are they making yet another Superman movie? Why not give another DC hero a chance?

     

  • At February 01, 2011 3:11 AM, Blogger Rocketlex said…

    My problem with reboots is not necessarily the reboots themselves, but the fact that rebooting a superhero franchise invariably means you tell the origin story again.

    The 1989 Batman movie is really one of the few that ever got it right. It gives you Batman's origin, as much as one needs to know, but it isn't an origin story. You don't need to wait forty-five minutes to see him in the suit. You see Batman within five minutes and he's got the Batmobile and Bat-cave ready to go.

    I'm not saying all origin stories are bad, but I don't think they necessary when you're starting (or re-starting) a superhero film franchise. I mean, by design many superheros have backstories which can be run through in a couple minutes so we can get to the action, why can't more writers use that to their advantage?

     

  • At February 03, 2011 6:54 PM, Blogger notintheface said…

    5 Superman movies, 6 Batman movies, but no Wonder Woman or Flash movie. WTF?

     

  • At February 03, 2011 6:56 PM, Blogger notintheface said…

    If the new Superman movie has the origin, I'd like it done Morrison-style. Get it over with quick and on to the majority of the movie.

     

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