WFNY talks about Pizza
June 22, 2020Baseball is back, but at what cost?
June 24, 2020wfnycraig – For today’s roundtable, we’re going to talk about movies. Sadly, director Joel Schumacher, who among other works made the two campy Batman movies of the 90s, passed away on Monday at 80 years old. So, we turn our attention to the superhero movie genre.
As I’ve discussed with @andrew on the podcast, my family recently completed the Marvel rewatch. It was incredible to see how everything came together. There were very few down moments, although, rewatching The Hulk and Thor: The Dark World showed that even Marvel is capable of missing the mark from time to time. Now, that we’ve finished, my kids are still craving some superhero movie action. We watched Wonder Woman, and the Ryan Reynolds Green Lantern over the weekend. Those films are good and alright, but leave something to be desired. It made me think about some of the worst superhero movies of all time, and maybe some of the under-rated ones too. So, what are your under-rated superhero films, and what are the worst ones, where you know you’re just never going to watch them again?
wfnycraig – For me, when I think about underrated superhero movies, I think about the ones that don’t fit neatly into the larger franchises and universes. Anyone remember Chronicle from 2012? That was three high school kids who develop powers. Michael B. Jordan was already known, but not to the degree he’s known now. It’s also a bit of a “found footage” film, which is pretty dated by this point. Still, I remember this one fondly and I would gladly watch it again. Another of the underrated films for me is Hancock starring Will Smith. I probably enjoyed it too much in the moment, but I could totally see myself watching that a few more times. As for the worst? Catwoman with Halle Berry was an absolute mess. My kids see that one on HBO Max, and I just can’t imagine pulling the trigger and sitting through it. Unfortunately, Batman and Robin sticks out too. Schwarzenegger as Mr. Freeze? Nothing but punchlines.
gerbs – Super, from James Gunn and Rainn Wilson is an under-rated “superhero” movie. Always enjoyed Gunn’s takes on things and Wilson went a very different way than his Office character. That one is very dark, so don’t let your kids watch it.
As far as “bad” movies, I don’t really quantify movies as good or bad. I mean I have favorites and I can tell a good movie, but like pizza, as long as you gave me 1.5 hours of entertainment, I’m in. I love rewatching movies and pointing out flaws or such. Like the Transformers series, why is there a plot to bring Cybertron to earth if they were planning on blowing up the planet in the second movie?
The grand plan of the MCU, Thanos and the Infinity Saga dating back even to the first Iron Man, have made world building and “-verses” extremely hard to replicate.
mgbode – First, have to give credit to Schumacher for knowing the importance of soundtracks to advertising movies. While other comic movies like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were out there having Vanilla Ice write original terrible songs for their movies, he was out there with Seal and U2 creating absolute magic.
Any superhero movie from before the Tobey Maguire Spider-man films are just so dated. I loved Blade when it came out and it is a big reason comic movies continued to get funded back then… and also, it is a painful re-watch now. On the more current films, DC just has a way of having a great concept and missing the mark; well, in the cinematic realm, as they have some great television shows. Whether it is taking themselves too seriously or having an entire plot line hinge on the name of the characters’ mothers1 , I usually leave those disappointed. A great recent example is Shazam! The entire premise of this storyline is ridiculous and silly, which is not a complaint. Silly and ridiculous can create fun especially when everything revolves around kids. Instead, the movie is not light nor fun though, like Suicide Squad, the trailer hinted it would be. Sigh.
mitchell – Responding to your middle point, Bode, it’s this sentiment that makes me feel like the Dark Knight trilogy is slightly…underrated? It’s so clear that DC tried to do something similar, or take influence, from those Christopher Nolan movies, but they completely missed the mark on what made them good. Instead, they were like: “People like Dark Knight. Dark Knight is dark. Therefore, we make dark movie.”
mgbode – I don’t know if the Dark Knight trilogy is under-rated as it is often referred to as the exception to the DC-norm; though I think you are correct in that they wrongly decided to copy the overall style rather than having different styles for different characters (which MCU did well until they started to gear all more towards action-comedy like Guardians of the Galaxy near the end of the last phase).
gerbs – Hard to say TDK trilogy is underrated when they actively added movies to Best Picture after The Dark Knight did so well but wasn’t included.
mitchell – Yeah, it’s definitely a hot take, but I stand by it. When everyone is trying to copy you, and no one is able to do it, that means people who make movies don’t necessarily understand what made these movies so great.
mgbode – I would say it is story-based though. Gotham copied the style rather well based on the same comic foundation.
mgbode – Also, I’m not helping @wfnycraig here as it is another “not for kids’ movie” but Kick-Ass was wildly entertaining. If not for a wretched sequel, then I think that movie would get brought up more in comic movie discussions.
There are a ton of good ones for kids though. Going to list a bunch of my favorites in case there are any Craig’s kids haven’t yet seen: Big Hero 6, Incredibles (and the second one), Lego Batman Movie, Sky High, and, of course, the best one Into the Spider-verse. If you want one for the adults who love heart-warming drama, then I suggest Batkid Begins. Note: this is a documentary about a Make-A-Wish day, not a movie… but dangit, I’m including it here. If you want a more obscure one that is sort of and sort of not a super-hero movie that the kids should really enjoy; The Adventurer: The Curse of the Midas Box.
gerbs – We are a Disney+ household and with two under two and both girls, it’s pretty clearly a princess movie on most days, but Big Hero 6 is a great one that’s underrated
mitchell – I’ll answer in more of the spirit of the question now, Seth Rogen’s The Green Hornet is not good. It’s not the trainwreck that is The Green Lantern, and I think they came out around the same time, so it gets lost in the fog a bit. But it’s bad.
wfnycraig – Big Hero 6 is one of my favorite kids movies of all time. The Incredibles is high on that list too. I bought BH6 toys for my kids without asking them if they even wanted them. :slightly_smiling_face:
mgbode – I think The Green Hornet was so bad that people try to ignore that it ever happened. Like those Daredevil and Elektra movies. Wait, what movies?
gerbs – My wife had an armored Baymax keychain that my oldest found early on and would say “Baymax” pretty easily. So yeah it’s a big deal here
gerbs – Real quick question for Bode here: you mentioned the “Guardian-ing” of the MCU as seemingly pejorative. Which movie in Phase 3 flopped or performed badly for behaving that way? Ragnarok rejuvenated the Thor series and was arguably the best “solo” movie (Winter Soldier is tops for me) in the MCU. Ant Man and the Wasp had its issues but it wasn’t the quips, Captain Marvel…Brie Larson was the right choice but the script made it hard for her to work her best parts, and it’s hard to classify the Infinity movies as being too comedy laden.
mgbode – Captain Marvel was a miss for me, but only becauase I’ve never really liked the all-powerful, unbeatable Super-Man style story lines. My point though wasn’t that any individual movie missed. It was that there was bound to be style-fatigue if that path continued. One of the chief strengths of the MCU was being stylistically diverse. I am confident that they realize it though as the next batch of movies appear to be going back to this method.
tom – I am completely out of my depth weighing in on superhero movies, but I will say two things: 1. I will drop whatever I’m doing if I see any of the Dark Knight movies on TV. 2. No matter how bad or mediocre at best “Batman Forever” is considered, it will always have a soft spot in my heart because I was probably the perfect age for its campiness when I saw it in the theater, and the production gave us the most Tommy Lee Jones line ever, delivered to Jim Carrey: https://www.indiewire.com/2017/10/tommy-lee-jones-jim-carrey-batman-forever-1201884164/
tom – I guess Joel Schumacher was less of a fan https://twitter.com/briancgrubb/status/1275126350106562561?s=20
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