The problem I have with superhero movies is not a problem with the actual genre. I am a self-confessed film-lover, and I pretty much enjoy most films I watch. And superhero movies are cool because they take some of the oldies back to the days of Marvel and DC comics for some brainless “Ker-pow!” action.
My problem is that superhero movies have sort of crept up on us and suddenly bombarded the box office with Hulk after Iron Man after Superman after Spiderman after Spiderman, after – hang on! Just how many Spidermans have there been?
What annoys me is that it’s just getting a bit boring. Nobody ever heard me complain about graphic novel movies like Sin City and 300 because, although they were comic-based, they were appreciated for a totally different reason: they actually looked like a comic book – but on a screen. Awesome!
Does Superman Returns look like a comic book? No. It’s just one long green-screen shot after another.
And no, I don’t have an issue with CGI (computer generated imagery), I think technology is advancing and we should use it. I have even grasped the complex notion that superhero stories aren’t meant to be realistic. But they’re just so monotonous.
Normal guy discovers crazy power(s), has fun testing them out. Fancies a girl. A villain comes along, often with his own kind of superpower. They battle. It looks like baddie has bested our hero, but wait, no, the hero has saved the world. The End. PS. He gets the girl too.
The one superhero franchise that stands out is Batman. We all remember those cheesy sequels: Batman Returns and Batman Forever, but suddenly, in 2005 Christopher Nolan brought us Batman Begins, which looked really original and gothic. It showed us that superhero films can be so much more than brightly coloured CGI-fests featuring flying men in tights.
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