According to Wiki of the highest grossing media franchise's to date
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...dia_franchises
Spiderman - 28.6 Billion to date [17.045 Billion]
Batman - 27.7 Billion to date[merch sales - 21.329 Billion]
Avengers - 15.3 Billion to date mostly thanks to box office and DVD sales [merch 6.928 billion
Superman - 10.7 Billion [4.753 Billion]
Superman, Spiderman, ironman and batman are the only individual characters to make the list.
Ironman has earned 3.19Billion to date with 2. 886Billion coming from Box office and DVD/Home video sales.
The MCU has done wonders for Marvel in terms of popularity but aside from Iron man there's nothing to support the claim that Marvel has used their character better in outside media. They finally had a period of great movies following previous failures.
The same can be said for DC [Donner era and Nolan era]
Spiderman and Batman are pretty neck and neck
Interesting to see the figures after their next movies and GK come out.
Aquaman has a sequel and an animated series
WW had a sequel, had animated movies, is in an animated series and has a movie coming out
JL and sS have games and animated movies
I don't see how some can claim that Dc isn't capitalising on the recent success of these characters/IP's.
Flash, Titans, Teen Titans, Batwoman, GL [they had an animated series and movies].
I would argue that up the NCU came to be Dc was better at promoting it's OP's in outside media.
After the McU they are pretty much on par.
The vast number of projects and upcoming projects featuring characters that aren't part of the big 7 is testament to that.