DC Extended Universe (POST NO SPOILERS HERE!)

[Johnny]

*sigh*

That hurt.

Watching that Infinity War trailer....and then looking back at JL....I briefly thought that WB/DC should just give up, lol.

Just visually, IW just backhands the crap out of JL. The CGI, and mo-cap, on Thanos....that's what taking your time looks like WB.

I really hope Wan is using this next year wisely, and making sure that Aquaman is Avatar on LSD.

I wouldn't say I'm "hurt" per se, you just have one studio that mostly knows what it's doing vs another one that mostly doesn't. In a perfect world we would have two successful acclaimed movie franchises going at it, alas that just isn't the case. The MCU has its fair share of problems, the positives just happen to outweigh the negatives, as the public clearly seems to agree, while with WB unfortunately it's the opposite. I had no regrets about the DCEU while I was watching the Infinity War trailer, because it's just a different situation. As you said, Marvel took their time and had a clear vision, while WB instead, decided to rush after them. They will hopefully learn from that mistake and have a better planning now. One can only hope.

By the way, am I the only one who's tired of waiting for the Soul Stone? Where the hell is that damn thing.

[Angelo2113]

Avengers: Infinity War is going to be the culmination of Marvel Cinematic Universe's successful (sub)brand building. As soon as a character is brought on screen, they have instant cinematic history with the audience.

There's a lot of accomplishments that Warner Bros. can learn from Disney/Marvel Studios but sadly, as we've seen with Justice League, Warner Bros. hasn't learned from their mistakes yet. Justice League had unbelievably enjoyable moments but was proof that they've lost all faith in Snyder's vision of Superman and his birth of the DC Extended Universe. To me, that was quite damaging to what came before because that is what I was truly invested in. While they were certainly divisive with the audiences, they were chapters to an overarching story that a director should have been able to finish with Justice League.

Warner Bros. is at the point where Marvel Studios was with Avengers which was 6 years before Avengers: Infinity War. (To the exact date, if anybody else has noticed.) They need to reevaluate what makes DC Comics great and different from Marvel. Wonder Woman was a great start to that and put them 1 step towards that achievement but the corporate intrusion of Justice League put them 2 steps backwards. (For me, personally.)

Edited:

When watching Justice League did you at any point actually think they would lose? I don't totally disregard the "stakes" criticism because the MCU is a bit disnified in a way that the DCEU is not, but no cape movie has ever made me think the hero would actually lose.

I've never read the comic books before the movie but Watchmen certainly caught me off guard, haha.

[golgi]

If WB builds the Legion of Doom across movies, that would be sweet.

[FlashEarthOne]

Yeah, same.

Throughout the whole thing I was just thinking, this is the culmination of Feige's vision for the marvel U, executed by the Russos and Co, with a strong stakeholder who is confident in that vision.

I really liked JL for its parts but not necessarily the sum whole. That trailer looked like a movie that isn't going to make JL look bad. I'm more of a DC guy than a Marvel guy but damn. DC really is playing catch up. Loot at Thanos compared to Steppenwolf. Notice how the CG still looks good in the light whereas most DC movies have been in dimmed light to strengthen weaker CG.

[Clark_Kent]

IW looks good, but they’re once again pushing the idea of “it’ll be serious this time!” with the trailer...and yeah, I’m not falling for that again lol

The CG on Zoidberg was indeed very good. Eh, I mean Thanos. Without the helmet, I got confused.

[Clark_Kent]

Edited for spoilers.

[Clark_Kent]

Edited for...reasons. I dunno lol

[Vanguard-01]

Yep. Just watch the Infinity War trailer, and I'm simultaneously excited and depressed right now. I'm a much bigger DC fan than a Marvel fan, and it just sickens me that WB won't LET their cinematic universe achieve this level of awesomeness.

I'm so bitter right now, I almost want to boycott IW out of sheer spite.

(I won't. Don't worry.)

[TooFlyToFail]

Yea the way I see it no way they can do darkseid ever now without being even more compared to marvel even though he’s been around longer .

Well, they still can.

Aspects of Darkseid:
- the exchange of children
- said children, Orion and Scott
- Highfather
- the concept of a war between "heaven and hell"
- Apokolips and New Genesis are outside of time, and the multiverse
- the Omega Sanction
- him killing the old gods, and taking their power
- the Furies
- Granny Goodness
- the Anti-Life equation
- the Black Racer
- Grail

These are all things that make Darkseid different, from Thanos. Not just that tho, as you've gotta make the New Gods both epic on a biblical scale, but also very psychological. Darkseid, Orion, Scott, Barda, Black Racer, and GG are great ways to touch on the psychological implications that Darkseid has on people.

By the time Darkseid faces the league, it should feel like the Rapture on crack, with his hands clasped behind his back, and there's no hope of survival.

[Vanguard-01]

Well, they still can.

Aspects of Darkseid:
- the exchange of children
- said children, Orion and Scott
- Highfather
- the concept of a war between "heaven and hell"
- Apokolips and New Genesis are outside of time, and the multiverse
- the Omega Sanction
- him killing the old gods, and taking their power
- the Furies
- Granny Goodness
- the Anti-Life equation
- the Black Racer
- Grail

These are all things that make Darkseid different, from Thanos. Not just that tho, as you've gotta make the New Gods both epic on a biblical scale, but also very psychological. Darkseid, Orion, Scott, Barda, Black Racer, and GG are great ways to touch on the psychological implications that Darkseid has on people.

By the time Darkseid faces the league, it should feel like the Rapture on crack, with his hands clasped behind his back, and there's no hope of survival.

Yeah, Darkseid needs to be a long-game kind of thing. Play up the fact that he can corrupt people just by EXISTING in the DCU. Don't have him swagger through a Boom Tube and start wrecking crap just for kicks. Play up his minions and his vast resources. Thanos looks like he's just going around wrecking stuff and collecting Infinity Gems, with minimal support from anyone else other than his handful of minions. Darkseid? He has ARMIES. He has super weapons. He has minions who can attack the world on a physical, mental, and spiritual level.

Definitely agree with your last sentence. By the time Darkseid finally shows up in full, it should feel like he's already won. Do that, and there won't be ANY trouble differentiating him from Thanos.

[Doctor Know]

The difference being that the MCU films and Star Trek did those plot lines well. MoS was choppy and obviously rushed. Therefore, there's little if any opportunity to connect with the characters. That's what was wrong with it.

The plot of MOS was never the issue. People took issue with the execution and the delivery. Not to mention certain critics, like Devin Faraci, admitting he changed his positive review of MOS to negative, once he saw the trend going negative. Just to bandwagon and drive traffic to his website.

If MOS had a positive rating, would that change your opinion about the movie? Would you be more receptive to it's merits? Because other people asserted it was good. Like Spider-Man 3, Indiana Jones 4, Quantum of Solace, The Hobbit Trilogy and the Star Wars Prequels.

Uh, he inspired Pete Ross in what way, exactly? We only see him for two minutes and that's to have Lois find out Clark's identity and if anything, it looks more like Pete has PTSD from the situation. Also, he inspires Batman to want to kill him mostly, all of which flips on a dime when Bruce realizes...that their moms share the same name.


Yeah, not the best written scene out there.

Remember how Pete Ross was a bully, and then Clark saved him and that bus full of children. And later in MOS, we had this scene?

Pete changed, for the better. Thanks to Clark.



Batman admitted he was wrong and failed Superman at the end of the movie. Forming the JL and reviving Superman was his contribution to Supes' memory and correcting his mistake. The world needs Superman. The world needs Hope.

Also, by your definition of inspire, Donner's Superman inspired Lois, Lana (who sought to better her life because of Clark), and pretty much everyone to ever come into contact with him.

How is Kidder Lois inspired? She was the same throughout both movies Donner directed. Lana was in the Lester movie. So it wouldn't count toward Donner. Since, everybody makes like Superman 3 and 4 don't exist. Superman I and II is where everyone's nostalgia googles are.

Yeah, people have started to vote with their wallets, which is why JL is underperforming majorly right now. Now that Wonder Woman has shown them that DC can make good movies, its as if people are now holding DC to a higher standard. Imagine that. The brand damage done by movies like BvS is undeniable at this point.

If that was true, why didn't people jump ship from DCEU after BVS? Which would've have seen the most impact on Suicide Squad. SS which came in spitting distance of BvS's domestic gross. Or WW, which was a big box office success. WW was even pushed more in all the JL lead up marketing. Perhaps it's just box office fatigue and or blockbusters cannibalizing one another. Releasing JL 10 days after Thor 3, was liking a big mistake. Other sure fire success this year like Kingsman 2, War For the Planet of the Apes and Transformers 5 all underperformed at the BO as well. Release dates are everything.

Also:

(1) Marvel was able to gross over 3 billion from 3 movies alone and...

Context is important here. I'm referring to order of release. Not total dollars. If I were, I'd have included the last two Nolan Batman films. Which grossed 1 billion each.

The first 4 Marvel movies were
Iron Man - $585,174,222
The Incredible Hulk - $263,427,551
Iron Man 2 - $623,933,331
Thor - $449,326,618

Total gross = 1,921,861,722

Add in Cap 1 - $370,569,774
Avengers 1 - $1,518,812,988

And you see it took 6 MCU movies to get to where the DC films got to in 4.

(2) The Oscar that Suicide Squad won was for makeup artistry. Its not like it won Best Picture. Let's not twist facts here.

An Academy Award is an Academy Award. The make-up, prosthetics and tattoos the vocal minority of fans hated about SS, won it an award. Who should we listen to?

In a time when CBMs are king at the box office, the only other competition should be Thor: Ragnorok.

Yeah, and if DC were making good films other than Wonder Woman, then they'd be on a completely fair competing ground.

Cannibalizing, man. They can't all be winners. Opening night numbers for JL were down, recall. So, I think the audience were just tapped out, finanically. Tickets aren't cheap and the next big blockbuster after JL is Star Wars.

[Flash Gordon]

The idea that "critics don't like dark comic book flicks" doesn't hold any water. Captain America: The Civil War boiled down to a literal tragedy at the climax. It gets DARK, and not superfically dark.

I'm not saying that, that makes it a better story- just that there are lots of dark comic book joints.

[ekrolo2]

BvS and JL are Superman movies in the sense that it's his presence ( in BvS,) and lack thereof ( JL) that drives the narrative and the actions of our other main characters. However, Supes himself has little shown character growth aside from dialogue implying things, but we don't see tangible proof.

I've said it before, BvS plays like a grand finale to a trilogy, but we never got to see the middle chapter. If we had just gotten an MOS 2 in between MOS and BvS, I think a lot of the issues with the DCEU's building, especially as far as Supes is concerned, would have been solved. They could have used the film to highlight the good side of being Superman in places. BvS then could have shown the flip side of it.

Of course you'd still have the same suspects screaming at the top of their lungs " Not muh Superman!" , But I think the darker tone of BvS would have gone over better with audiences had it been shown in a proper Superman sequel before hand that at his core Superman was still the same guy you grew up with, just in a more realistic World where his actions have consequences, good and bad. All we saw with MOS and BvS for the most part was the bad. The good was there, but as I said before in another thread , sometimes people need things spelled out. It's unfortunate, but it is what it is.

The problem is that you can't make BvS the end of a trilogy with a lighter second act due to the way MoS ends, you don't do that kind of finale to the movie then have a grand Superman adventure only to veer back into the dark stuff. You also can't do a MoS 2 where Superman "fixes" things only for Batman to act like a lone bastard in a world that's more or less gotten used to Superman.

[Angelo2113]

Yeah, Darkseid needs to be a long-game kind of thing. Play up the fact that he can corrupt people just by EXISTING in the DCU. Don't have him swagger through a Boom Tube and start wrecking crap just for kicks. Play up his minions and his vast resources. Thanos looks like he's just going around wrecking stuff and collecting Infinity Gems, with minimal support from anyone else other than his handful of minions. Darkseid? He has ARMIES. He has super weapons. He has minions who can attack the world on a physical, mental, and spiritual level.

Definitely agree with your last sentence. By the time Darkseid finally shows up in full, it should feel like he's already won. Do that, and there won't be ANY trouble differentiating him from Thanos.

Which has me wondering if Warner Bros. is ever going to touch up on the Knightmare Scene or just ignore it because that had a very strong Darkseid presence without him physically appearing. Did Darkseid/Steppenwolf revive Superman and that's what lead to the events of the Knightmare scene? Is that what lead to Bruce altering that timeline by reviving Superman himself? I feel like there's a big disconnect and I'm curious if that was ever touched upon in Snyder's version.

[Clark_Kent]

The idea that "critics don't like dark comic book flicks" doesn't hold any water. Captain America: The Civil War boiled down to a literal tragedy at the climax. It gets DARK, and not superfically dark.

I'm not saying that, that makes it a better story- just that there are lots of dark comic book joints.

People will remember the tragedy of Tony Stank for years to come!