DC Comics Multimedia General - A crisis of infinite fuck ups

[clickbait]

Especially since half the sites I check say Andrea had red hair, and you fucking know what that means in modern Hollywood.

They're a bunch of dyslexic racists.

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

Ver archivo adjunto 9218371
When you're the only Son whose death was put to a vote.

I mean, I tried playing Arkham Knight and I can see why people thought he was annoying because he is.

The problem with WW is that they lean too much on feminism. She can have events that aren't shoving "WOMAN" everywhere. Have Circe do something big that can escalate and boom! Instant classic! Instead, we had "Amazons Attack" and it barely featured her (for the best, really but still). She is always treated as if she were a feminist mouthpiece instead o a hero!

She is a character no one can seem to figure out fully. The clash between Greek Pantheon, and Feminist characters, along with the randos leads to a disjointed rogues that has no real theme or consistency. One minute she is fighting literal Gods, the next its some tard in a blue snowman suit. It often feels like she is trying to ape off of more defined heroes since her own rogues rarely get to amount to anything.

Yeah, she's more of a symbol than a character, which makes her a very flat character overall. I'm pretty sure the reason why people like her has more to do with her actresses than the character herself. I guess she's like Gandalf where her personality stats are maxxed out, so she ends up being a better supporting character in other stories rather than the lead. Even in the only good movie she's in, Chris Pine is the one with actual charisma and stake in the story. She follows along and beats up a bunch of German kids and schoolteachers in uniform.

 

[HodgePodgeRogerDodger]

@Basic Blond Boy

In general, Hollywood comes across as having contempt whenever they adapt anything. That or the need to “fix” what the established fanbase likes*. Comics or animated have an added feeling that Hollywood doesn’t respect other mediums and are embarrassed that they have to lower themselves and adapt whatever. To the point of directors and writers getting angry if the Actors read the source material (LoTR is the exception… well it was).

I don’t think it’s over correction. I think it’s fundamentally not caring about the product anymore. Either social engineering loans, Hollywood accounting, sheer size of these companies, or whatever. I think the people green lighting don’t give a shit. Success doesn’t matter for the execs, they’ll set someone else up to take the heat. The clique’s that control Hollywood directing and writing are also typically the failed scions of wealthy people or industry cum dumpsters. So you’ll get some retard angry they have to write children’s media or disposable media for people they hate.

*Alan Moore had that faggy mentality that you can’t give the audience what they want. I believe it infected American comics. Contempt for your audience

 

[That Chris Guy]

Lynda Carter in the 70s as well, but yes. WW really struggled to have much of anything to her name, a lot of it due to aversion to female heroes, but also, she lacked much to really build off of from comics. She never had a major story or arc like Batman, Superman or the Titans did. Hell even the Flash and Green Lantern have things like Flashpoint and Geoff John’s runs.

She is a character no one can seem to figure out fully. The clash between Greek Pantheon, and Feminist characters, along with the randos leads to a disjointed rogues that has no real theme or consistency. One minute she is fighting literal Gods, the next its some tard in a blue snowman suit. It often feels like she is trying to ape off of more defined heroes since her own rogues rarely get to amount to anything.

Greek gods isn't the worst rogues gallery, but I've yet to see any of her villains stand out in a way that mattered, not that I've followed any DC comics as of late.

Wonder Woman's problem is twofold. Firstly, her writers are inconsistently jumping between writing her as a womanly woman (the best kind), or as a Xena who has to be gay since strong straight women don't exist. The other two characters haven't been shackled to this kind of baggage, whereas Wonder Woman has had to face close association with bondage for decadres and gay iconography more recently. Supes and Bats have rigidly defined personalities, but is Wonder Woman a compassionate third wheel or a takes-no-fucks butch Amazon?

Secondly, Wonder Woman has plenty of attractive competition in superheroines and femme fatal types. Catwoman, Black Canary, Batgirl and Starfire for example, but it absolutely isn't limited to DC. Storm, Jean Grey, Black Widow, Rogue, Wasp, the list goes on. Why be a strong Greek girl when you can fly around and control the weather? Or have the power of the cosmos at your fingertips?

 

[Lion of Yehuda]

Greek gods isn't the worst rogues gallery, but I've yet to see any of her villains stand out in a way that mattered, not that I've followed any DC comics as of late.

Wonder Woman's problem is twofold. Firstly, her writers are inconsistently jumping between writing her as a womanly woman (the best kind), or as a Xena who has to be gay since strong straight women don't exist. The other two characters haven't been shackled to this kind of baggage, whereas Wonder Woman has had to face close association with bondage for decadres and gay iconography more recently. Supes and Bats have rigidly defined personalities, but is Wonder Woman a compassionate third wheel or a takes-no-fucks butch Amazon?

Secondly, Wonder Woman has plenty of attractive competition in superheroines and femme fatal types. Catwoman, Black Canary, Batgirl and Starfire for example, but it absolutely isn't limited to DC. Storm, Jean Grey, Black Widow, Rogue, Wasp, the list goes on. Why be a strong Greek girl when you can fly around and control the weather? Or have the power of the cosmos at your fingertips?

I think I'd prefer the strong Greek girl over all that.

 

[Fatsuit Shinji]

You know, once they get WB, Paramount should make DC oriented channels on Pluto TV and maybe Paramount Plus, like one with the cartoons and another with the movies.

I have a feeling the DC cartoons are going to be airing on Nickelodeon soon.

From the wrong company but...

 

[Incecticyder]

Yeah, she's more of a symbol than a character, which makes her a very flat character overall. I'm pretty sure the reason why people like her has more to do with her actresses than the character herself.

That too but I will put another hypothesis into the mix. In the WW movie, Diana was learning. She was fighting against enemies with weapons she never even imagined, met with experiences she couldn't have though of and saw world that had changed since her predecessors last saw it. As long as she learns, I think that she can be fresh and likeable.

Too many times she is written as a girlboss or a Mary Sue where she is obnoxious. Also, the Amazons are written as either too perfect or too evil.

I guess she's like Gandalf where her personality stats are maxxed out, so she ends up being a better supporting character in other stories rather than the lead.

I don't think she has too great a cast for what she is. Superman has Ma and Pa and the Daily Planet. Batman has the Bat Family, Commissioner Gordon and Selina Kyle. What does WW have? Etta Candy? The fat chick meant to make the rest look prettier? Give me a break. By the way, whenever they don't writer as the teacher that teaches everyone, they write her as the person that knows nothing. Which leads too...

Even in the only good movie she's in, Chris Pine is the one with actual charisma and stake in the story. She follows along and beats up a bunch of German kids and schoolteachers in uniform.

The need to keep giving her guides. She is the eternal outsider that has to be taught about "Man's World". She needs a way to be a guide too.

Overall, WW is either the condescending feminist teacher that has to teach men how to not rape women 24/7 or be guided by a man in a world that largely is alien to her. Imo, what she is missing is apprentices. Not just the Wonder Girls. Actual sidekicks that are taught by her the things she learned. Bring a few Amazons from Paradise Island and have them learn while fighting bad guys. That would be best.

Wonder Woman's problem is twofold. Firstly, her writers are inconsistently jumping between writing her as a womanly woman (the best kind), or as a Xena who has to be gay since strong straight women don't exist.

I do not have a problem with WW's sexuality (not liking women when that is the only thing you have is unrealistic) but she can be feminine and strong. She can rip a monster to shreds in the morning and bake a cake for a party in the afternoon.

The other two characters haven't been shackled to this kind of baggage, whereas Wonder Woman has had to face close association with bondage and gay iconography more recently. Supes and Bats have rigidly defined personalities, but is Wonder Woman a compassionate third wheel or a takes-no-fucks butch Amazon?

She can marry the two characterizations. She shouldn't be butch but she comes from a culture of warriors. She can be compassionate but also firm when she needs to be. Like a loving mother who can put a misbehaving child in time out.

Secondly, Wonder Woman has plenty of attractive competition in superheroines. Catwoman, Black Canary, Batgirl and Starfire for example, but it absolutely isn't limited to DC. Storm, Jean Grey, Black Widow, Rogue, Wasp, the list goes on. Why be a strong Greek girl when you can fly around and control the weather? Or have the power of the cosmos at your fingertips?

I think that she needs a new wardrobe. Also, she might need to learn new, interesting tricks.

 

[TheAmbiguousLurker]

I mean, I tried playing Arkham Knight and I can see why people thought he was annoying because he is.

"I'M noT LikE The OTheR VilLAins, bRUce! I KnoW How YOu tHInk!" *Proceeds to do every villain cliche in the book and get his ass beat*

Joker's real last laugh was not finishing Jason's whiny ass off.

 

[Godzilla@1989]

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

Greek gods isn't the worst rogues gallery, but I've yet to see any of her villains stand out in a way that mattered, not that I've followed any DC comics as of late.

Wonder Woman's problem is twofold. Firstly, her writers are inconsistently jumping between writing her as a womanly woman (the best kind), or as a Xena who has to be gay since strong straight women don't exist. The other two characters haven't been shackled to this kind of baggage, whereas Wonder Woman has had to face close association with bondage for decadres and gay iconography more recently. Supes and Bats have rigidly defined personalities, but is Wonder Woman a compassionate third wheel or a takes-no-fucks butch Amazon?

And the Greek gods can be very cliche in of themselves. Her supporting cast is mostly Steve Trevor because he is her MacGuffin... and they always remove him because she's an immortal warrior and he isn't, so for most of her stories, she doesn't have a love interest to give her reasons to do anything. WW 84 literally has to contrive a reason to bring him back just for her to have a dramatic scene. Also, something something she don't need no man sex-tism on the part of the writers. Why be a member of the Justice League full-time? Even if you write her like a proper diplomat, then you have to think about Themyscira's place in the world and why Hippolyta would want to interact with Man's world when they don't economically or culturally.

 

[Ultraman Orb Dark]

Welp, against my better judgment, I decided to give Supergirl a chance. I figured, "both sides have to be blowing this out of proportion." The last movie I went to see using this logic was The Bride!. I will at least say Supergirl is a least better than The Bride!.

Spoiler: Thoughts

As for the main attraction, I think Kara was pretty mediocre as a lead. Granted, she's far from the worst protagonist in a superhero movie I've ever seen. She's not some unhinged psychopath or a criminal people are saying should be viewed as a role model. I like how pragmatic she was fighting without her powers in the first act, and she still chooses to help people at the end of the day. There are just two issues I have with her. First off, she is way too focused on saving Krypto. When it was just about saving her dog after some asshole poisoned him, it was okay for her to prioritize his safety while also making sure this other kid named Ruthye didn't get herself killed going after him, but then we learn that the bad guys abduct little girls to use as child brides to repopulate their race. Not only does Kara not seem to prioritize saving the girls to the point she has to be reminded to save them when the bad guys' ship is being torn up in the final battle, she keeps making this whole conflict about saving Krypto. Even when she has one foot in the grave and is talking to a kid who watched her family get murdered by the same guy, it's just "tHeY'Re GoInG tO kIlL mY DoG." This may be because I'm not much of a pet person, but maybe you should at least consider mention needing to save the enslaved child brides? Just a little lip service would be nice. The second issue is that her arc is very unclear. The movie wants to make her out to be this flawed hero, but her flaws are never explored. The movie opens with her being a heavy drinker, but she never really deals with substance abuse issues. The movie says she doesn't see Earth as home, but we don't see her hating Earth outside of a single flashback where she just lies down in a room with Krypto. The movie gives her a no-kill rule and has her advise Ruthye not to pursue revenge, but then she kills the bad guy herself because, you guessed it, he poisoned her dog. What is Kara supposed to learn here? Why is the movie trying to compare Kara losing her parents and home to a natural disaster to a child who, need I remind you, WATCHED HER FAMILY GET MURDERED BY SPACE PIRATE CHILD RAPISTS?

Easily the worst part of the movie is the villains. They're just a bunch of marauders who steal weapons and go from planet to planet stealing girls. Maybe it'd be okay for a different movie, but when you're fighting a girl who is more powerful than a locomotive, you need more than just swords and tanks. For fuck's sake, even the Kazon had laser guns. The main villain, Krem, is just some rando with a funny accent. He relishes in killing Ruthye's family, but he doesn't really come off as threatening outside of "having the strength of a thousand men". It's only because the bad guys happen to have a ton of ways to incapacitate a Kryptonian like Kara. How they even know what her weaknesses are, much less where they got the kryptonite is never explained. Remember, Lex needed Metamorpho to mimic kryptonite because he couldn't find any of it. There were these teleporting tech pirates who only appeared in one scene, and they were far more interesting than Krem was.

Speaking of, for a movie meant to expand the landscape of this universe, all of the aliens are boring and uncreative as shit. There aren't any Thanagarians, Green Lanterns, Martians, Daxamites, or any recognized DC alien races. Just a bunch of garbage you'd see in any dime a dozen sci-fi movie. There aren't any cool worlds or concepts to explore. It's stuff like buses and truck stops, but in space. The most we got was Lobo, but he barely did anything. Also, Seth Rogen voices a tiny alien and somehow delivers the line that came the closest to getting a laugh out of me. I think more could have been done to show why Kara enjoys partying out here instead of living on Earth. Maybe she's close with some of the aliens here and is kind of like their Friendly Galaxy Supergirl. There's one scene showing Kara knows one alien's language. What if she was fluent in multiple alien languages to contrast with Clark not even being able to speak Kryptonian? There are a ton of ways you could take the space setting and use it to expand the universe and characters, but the movie doesn't do shit with it.

There is at the very least an attempt to expand on the history of Krypton, but it comes off as the writers hedging their bets or course correcting after the backlash the last movie got for its vague confirmation that Clark's birth parents wanted him to conquer the Earth. "See? The Kryptonians aren't all evil! We didn't make them all Viltrumite rip-offs because people like Invincible! Look, Kara's parents are good people who were only mildly annoyed by Jor-El's plan!" So were Jor-El and Lara just a pair of nutjobs who believed that sending a baby to Earth to repopulate their entire species was a good idea? If there was a plan to save part of Krypton, why send Kal-El away? Did Zor-El ever ask his brother why he wanted to do this? If Zor-El wanted to send Kara to Earth, why didn't he tell her what to expect or why Kal-El was sent away? Yes, we know Clark didn't conquer Earth or raise a harem, but Zor-El doesn't.

Finally, time for other nitpicks, issues, and questions I have with this movie.

• Remember that episode of BoJack Horseman where he proposes his new show's pilot opening with him taking a shit on a VHS of his old show, and the entire joke was how out of touch that sounded? Anyway, the first joke of the movie involves Krypto pissing on a newspaper with Superman on the headline.
• Funny how Ruthye takes up her family's sword and it's small enough for a child to wield with ease.
• They establish the regenerative properties yellow sun radiation has on Kryptonians during the opening montage, so why doesn't Kara just... take him to a yellow sun planet? They can't even say it doesn't work because a later scene has Kara being drugged with the same poison as Krypto (though she ingests it and quickly purges it), and the yellow sun keeps her from keeling over.
• So Lobo is sent to take down one of Krem's goons, but he doesn't want to take on Krem because there's no bounty. Why the frag is one of the space pirate child rapists wanted while the leader isn't?
• Where are the Green Lanterns in this sector? Is this like the cartoon where there aren't any Lanterns to enforce the law? Is there any law enforcement in this part of the galaxy?
• It's probably because they didn't have a lot of sets for Argo City, but they have young Kara playing near the shield generator, AKA, the one thing keeping the remaining Kryptonians alive.
• The green sun stuff was already discussed in this thread, but it's more egregious to me after watching the movie because they explain where Kryptonite comes from during the flashbacks. If you want to achieve the same results, just make a few changes. Instead of green sun, have the aliens lure Kara to a red sun planet, shoot her with kryptonite darts, and then throw her off a ledge. She's rescued by Ruthye and taken to a cave to recover before the planet's yellow sun heals her, and then she suits up for the final battle.
• Kara tells Ruthye not to pursue revenge or kill anyone, but I'm pretty sure Ruthye killed a guard an hour after they were separated, to say nothing about the body count during the final battle.
• Did we really need a scene of an alien shitting popcorn?

I really didn't want to dislike this movie. I had a good time Superman last year, and I hoped this one would at least be a solid follow-up, or something so bad, it was funny. It wasn't even the latter. It's like, a C- at best.

 

[Gunter x Gunter]

I already mentioned it in the MAWs thread, but it’s mostly dead so I will repeat here.

The fact they lied about their Superboy being Kon-El and instead brought teenage, not kid, John Kent into MAWS makes me suspect they did it because they are gonna reveal he is gay, and give him a boyfriend.

I knew that design was too zesty even for that already gay ass show. Also he was looking a little browner and kind of like lois so it being future jonofag kent make sense. Any MawS is pozed from hell to back it literally every modern trope regarding comics media wrapped into one.

 

[oh no its pipkun]

How the fuck Marvel managed to have a better media strategy astounds me.

i'd say marvel understood what the non comic book reading public knew about their marquee heros and wrote stories around that. DC played into the comic book understanding of the heroes. exceptions exist like dark knight, joker, wonder woman.

 

[Incecticyder]

And the Greek gods can be very cliche in of themselves. Her supporting cast is mostly Steve Trevor because he is her MacGuffin... and they always remove him because she's an immortal warrior and he isn't, so for most of her stories, she doesn't have a love interest to give her reasons to do anything. WW 84 literally has to contrive a reason to bring him back just for her to have a dramatic scene. Also, something something she don't need no man sex-tism on the part of the writers. Why be a member of the Justice League full-time? Even if you write her like a proper diplomat, then you have to think about Themyscira's place in the world and why Hippolyta would want to interact with Man's world when they don't economically or culturally.

My idea would be to use the backstory that said they were created to help men understand women. However, that means they abandoned their duty. I can see WW being their atonement but what is the point of that anymore? Let's face it, the countries that need feminism will not be featured.

Welp, against my better judgment, I decided to give Supergirl a chance. I figured, "both sides have to be blowing this out of proportion." The last movie I went to see using this logic was The Bride!. I will at least say Supergirl is a least better than The Bride!.

If both sides put their differences aside and agreed it is bad, then it is really bad.

i'd say marvel understood what the non comic book reading public knew about their marquee heros and wrote stories around that. DC played into the comic book understanding of the heroes. exceptions exist like dark knight, joker, wonder woman.

Marvel had Ike who would never approve something until it passed certain quality thresholds. Now that Ike left, they are doing the same shit DC does.

 

[That Chris Guy]

Did we really need a scene of an alien shitting popcorn?

It's James Gunn. He probably fought for its inclusion.

 

[Mystery Spy]

I know everyone love's Wonder Woman in the DCAU because of the Wonder bat ship (that canonically never went anywhere). But just remove her from Bruce for a sec. Can you honestly tell she is interesting on her own? Unless it's in the context of that ship nobody cares about her that much.

She is not even a top 5 DCAU female character.

Bruce Timm and the other managed to make people care about his OC Harley Quinn, and even, C-listers like Hawkgirl, Huntress,and Vixen. But their Wonder Woman was bland.

Even they couldn't escape from making Diana a symbol instead of person.

I think they should stop focusing on her as the feminism icon and start thinking of her as a woman if they want people to start liking her more.

 

[Overly Serious]

All but confirmed James Gunn personally killed the casting as Sydney Sweeney as supergirl for politically reasons.

I know everyone love's Wonder Woman in the DCAU because of the Wonder at ship (that canonically never went anywher). But just remove her from Bruce for a sec. Can you honestly tell she is interesting on her own? Unless it's in the context of that ship nobody cares about her that much.

Very hard to really pin any interesting traits on her, tbh. She's more like a straight man for others to play off. Or a dramatic force in her own right, like in JLU when she emerges in the cage fight to give Hawkgirl, Canary and Huntress an "oh shit!" moment. But personality? She's like a Noble Gas. Nothing for anything else to hook onto or interact with. Romance seems forced, character flaws feel forced. The only successful use of her actual personality that I've seen was in B:BatB where she hilariously rescues Steve Trevor from the missile and that only works because they're engaging with the problem directly by giving her over the top corny dialogue. And playing the inverse of the damsel in distress trope for all its worth.

This is an odd comparison but there was a British TV show called Spitting Image that made fun of politicians of the day and one of the writers in interview said they were all completely thrown when John Major suddenly became Prime Minister, because there was nothing interesting about him. He had no especially weird traits, no funny accent or origins, no out there political history. For about three days the writers struggled to come up with a single funny joke about him. Then they realised that this WAS the thing to satirise. They made the John Major puppet literally grey. The skits were about how unutterably mundane he was. Wonder Woman has a similar issue in that there's nothing about her you can really attach anything to. You can only write her engagingly by meeting that head on like B:BatB did. Or undercutting it with massive contrast like having Circe turn her into a pig.

Honestly, the best thing about the Wonder Woman movie was the directing. Not the script, not the casting. Just slow motion shots of her fighting Nazis in a shelled out house while the music goes "nuh-nuh-nuh-nuuuuuuuh--bwaaaaah!" Same in Snyder's Justice League movie. Is she interesting? Not especially. But it's badass when the music kicks in and she jumps off the Old Bailey; or watching her try to headbutt Superman. She's more of an event than a person.

 

[Eventide]

Welp, against my better judgment, I decided to give Supergirl a chance. I figured, "both sides have to be blowing this out of proportion." The last movie I went to see using this logic was The Bride!. I will at least say Supergirl is a least better than The Bride!.

I feel your pain, I made the exact same mistake. I thought to myself "there's absolutely no way Supergirl could be worse than Morbius, or Madame Web. There's no way Warner Brothers executives would allow James Gunn to fuck up the newly rebooted DCEU that badly..." Oh, how naive I was.

The second issue is that her arc is very unclear. The movie wants to make her out to be this flawed hero, but her flaws are never explored.

I'd argue that's a flaw transferred over from the Tom King comics' source material (amplified by the film's shitty script). Tom King's stereotypical: "I made a superhero character depressed!" deconstruction miniseries are always meandering and shallow. King's inexplicably award winning Mister Miracle miniseries has the exact same problem (if anything, it's waaaay worse). Mister Miracle just wastes 12 issues wandering around acting depressed and skitzo. The ending implies he's in some anti-life world or something??? IDK the writing was unclear and I think that might just be a fan theory.

Possibly hot take: if Gunn had any balls (and talented writers), he should have found a way to adapt that 90's Linda Danvers magical goo (IFYKYK) Supergirl, and just made Krypto Superman's dog, as Krypto should have been in the 1st place! It would have gotten around the problem of having to depict/awkwardly explain the existence (than destruction) of Argo City. & canonically Goo Supergirl was the result of a LexCorp experiment in a pocket dimension - something Lex was shown doing in the Superman movie! Not to mention, Gunn depicted Clark's Krypton folks as being evil (colonize Earth and make harems) than backtracks in the Supergirl movie with Argo City being peaceful??? Too complicated - just have Supergirl not be a Kryptonian/be the result of Lex's attempt to make his own superhero more powerful than Superman.

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

I know everyone love's Wonder Woman in the DCAU because of the Wonder bat ship (that canonically never went anywhere). But just remove her from Bruce for a sec. Can you honestly tell she is interesting on her own? Unless it's in the context of that ship nobody cares about her that much.

And that pairing never made sense because Bruce Wayne is only superficially charming. Bats in general is too emotionally closed off to have a relationship like that, which is why the old man is alone.

While we're talking about Wondy, her powers need to be revamped the most. Currently, she's got far more durability than the other Amazons, the Lasso of Truth makes interrogations boring, and depending on the continuity, flight. The result is she's a weaker version of Superman with a weak supporting cast. She should be downgraded to peak Amazon (like how Capt. America is peak human) and the Lasso of Truth is now the Lasso of Hypnosis. The efficacy of lie detector tests aside, being forced to tell the truth leads to flat exposition. Now, what if goons still had the ability to say no? Now Diana has to use her brain and ask leading questions and suggestive language to get the information she wants. So, she can't ask "Where's the boss's hideout?" because the target will just say the boss won't let him answer that, but he can answer indirect questions like "how was your day?" or "who were you meeting?" in detail.

 

[Godzilla@1989]

Hollywood executives need to grow a spine and tell Gunn to stop making the same GOTG movie since 2014. The market and climate of the industry has changed.