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Comments
Hurm, true. I was just thinking of Alba and elastic dude whose actor's name i forgot
Ioan Gruffud, I think.
Alba was a pretty terrible choice because she herself is pretty terrible.
Ioan Gruffudd.
Really I want Marvel to get Spider-man, Daredevil, Punisher, and Wolverine back so we can have a street-level crossover film.
Wolverine is gonna be harder than Spider-Man but who has Daredevil rights?
Fox as well, I'm pretty sure.
So Fox had half of Marvel rights and didn't try this, why?
Because Fox is one of those companies that really enjoys being mediocre for a giant profit.
ETA: More to the point, as you pointed out, a movie around the Avengers is relatively innovative and a somewhat risky move, if by concept.
It's still really idiotic that they didn't do anything with Daredevil and the X-men
Also, when will there be X-Men four and First Class 2 and Deadpool? fuck! Make those movies, FOX, or give the rights back.
It's also important to remember that Daredevil did pretty badly. I think Fox's idea is that they assumed that after a bad adaptation, people would be more reticent to a sequel. Which is true, mind you, but only if it followed the same precepts and problems the original did, such as casting ben affleck, for starters.
Michael Clarke Duncan was a mean Kingpin though.
One thing that sorta kinda had me thinking during this film:
> marvel universe
> New York battle
> no Spiderman
I mean, I know, I know, separate blah blah blah BUT STILL.
I'm not certain I would want Spidey in an Avengers movie. He works better at lower levels, and I'm still not too fond of him being an Avenger in the comics, though Avenging Spider-man is warming me up to it.
It just keeps kinda weird 'cause it was New York of all places, you know? I'm pretty sure Spiderman would be all over that "help other superheroes prevent alien invasion" thing.
Oh he would. I wouldn't be against something like a cameo of Spider-man showing up and rescuing some people. I just wouldn't want him on the Avengers proper.
Yeah, I don't necessarily think Spidey should be a consistent member of the team, but "shit's goin' down in New York, a bit of help?" seems like a pretty clear-cut situation. And in context of film as a medium, there were good reasons Spiderman didn't make an appearance (upcoming reboot and all), but it's just one of those little things that left me thinking.
Marvel needs to get their lawyers to find some loophole to get their characters back.
Honestly, even without hindsight I don't get why they would agree to give them in perpetuity.
If in the next movie Thanos doesn't own a bitchin' helicopter with his name on it, then we're done talking.
At a guess, it's probably to do with the shrinking plausibility of comic books as a widely profitable medium as films and games are. Both Marvel and DC have made huge pushes into transmedia experiences over the last decade or so, with mixed results in terms of quality but ultimately coming out successful.
I predict that at some point in the future, characters from popular comics will be less "comic book characters" and more "cultural characters" owned by their respective companies, appearing with equal regularity in a bunch of different mediums (even moreso than now).
Well, stuff like Avengers just proves to me that the problem comics have isn't so much accessibility as much as it is image. While there's truth to how insane continuity is, it's kind of blown out of proportion and there are a good deal of Spider-man and Captain America comics you could read without ever having read another of their stories.
It also comes down to a more literal form of accessibility. You have to go to a comic book store to get comics, and this is an an era where huge novel retailers have been shutting down. These days, most comic stores stay afloat by expanding their product line and becoming "nerd culture" stores moreso than anything else. As significant as their comic book selection might be, you'll also find action figures, art books, anime, manga, tabletop games, DVDs (often with reasonably obscure stuff, from Heisei Godzilla to old-school horror anthologies and moer) sometimes even video games or imported albums from Japan and other highly unusual (and expensive) fare.
Comic books aren't nearly as profitable or widely-consumed as they once were, and this kind of change reflects that. With all that in mind, it's pretty interesting that certain comic book characters are enjoying a peak in popularity via transmedia, which makes me confident that those stories and the experiences associated with them will stick around, whatever ends up happening to comic books themselves. Not that I think they'll disappear, but times are changing and it's trivial for the internet to send the data needed to express a comic book on a screen as compared to, say, a film or game. Ergo, you get stuff like widely-read web comics that far outstrip browser games in terms of volume of material.
If you ask me -- you did ask me, right? Right? -- I think we might be coming close to the death of the widely distributed issue-by-issue comic in favour of the graphic novel format as a new physical standard, rather than exception. If issue-by-issue distribution is going to continue, I think it might move towards digital distribution. And I don't necessarily think these are bad things, although I am biased because I prefer graphic novels to sequential issue comics every time. It's all part of the movement of these IPs from comic books as a primary mode of consumption into wider transmedia experiences, and I think that will do a lot to open new audiences to these characters and perhaps even lead them towards the comic books if they want more.
After all, the biggest flaw with the current comic book scene is the difficulty with which it encourages newcomers to consume its products. But if a film like The Avengers or a game like Arkham Asylum can expand the fanbase of established characters, that can only be good for an industry struggling to maintain wider consumer relevance in a digital era based upon immediate, easily-accessible experiences.
>If you ask me -- you did ask me, right? Right? -- I think we might be coming close to the death of the widely distributed issue-by-issue comic in favour of the graphic novel format as a new physical standard, rather than exception.
Considering the sales differences between serial issues and graphic novels I really don't think this is true. I do agree it's going more towards digital distribution, but I think that's true of almost all media. However, I don't serial format is going anywhere for the same reason I don't think serial television is going anywhere.
That said, there's something I like about picking up physical comics each week that outdoes having a physical copy of a book or a game.
>After all, the biggest flaw with the current comic book scene is the difficulty with which it encourages newcomers to consume its products
Again, I think this comes down to image and advertising. You almost never see tv or web spots for comic books. But when they did for the New 52? Aquaman outsold every single Marvel title for eight months straight.
I think the difference between a TV serial and a comic serial is in the mechanics of ownership. You can watch a single episode of a series on TV, but you can't buy a single episode to watch at home; you have to buy a DVD with multiple episodes, and in many cases, a whole season. This allows someone who's putting down money for a TV series (rather than watching it when it airs) to enjoy the product in context of its own completeness. A lot of popular comic series get graphic-novel-format releases with entire plot arcs in the single purchase and volume for exactly the same reason.
It's even becoming more and more common for old games to be released as part of packages, both physically and digitally in the same kind of single-product-serial-completeness format. A graphic novel format for releases (or a movement into the "true" singular-story graphic novel format) would circumnavigate the perception that comics are too difficult to get into. Whether that's true or not, newcomers might well be encouraged to purchase a complete story that self-contextualises over a single introductory issue.
Given, this perspective comes from someone who isn't exactly a "comics fan" but also someone who certainly appreciates the format. When I do get around to reading comics, I tend to prefer graphic novels because of their completeness while I find serial releases frustrating. An issue of a comic book is over too quickly for me, especially given where I shop when I choose to acquire some. I'll generally have finished a fair bit before the train ride home is over, but a graphic novel will have me glued to the pages for hours, you know?
With that in mind, I probably better represent the general public's approach to comic books in many respects, or at least those members of the general public who read comics but don't consider themselves fans of the medium.
>I think the difference between a TV serial and a comic serial is in the mechanics of ownership. You can watch a single episode of a series on TV, but you can't buy a single episode to watch at home; you have to buy a DVD with multiple episodes
Have you never been to Amazon? XBLA? itunes?
>A graphic novel format for releases (or a movement into the "true" singular-story graphic novel format) would circumnavigate the perception that comics are too difficult to get into.
I think you're overestimating the appeal of GNs. As much as I like them and have a number they're far more accessible than singles. (Every book store has them) And still, they serial comics outsell them. It's also worth noting that manga (which barely has any serial format outside of the Shonen Jump) does the GNs only and American Comics far outsell them, in America at least.
Besides the emphasis of Graphic novels and 'complete' stories would be antithetical to the serial nature of a lot of stories. Especially since a good deal of them are anything but complete, leading sequel hooks, and picking up from older adventures. It simply doesn't work as well in 'completed arcs' unless you can release the GNs with the same level or regularity you could the floppies (which I honestly wouldn't mind)
Though I do think another problem is less and less people read these days.
Well, that's how it's done for manga, no? Chapters of a manga series are usually released one at a time every week or month or so in a magazine, and after a certain number of chapters, they compile them into a tankoubon. Granted, they're not generally paced in such a way that each book corresponds with a complete story arc, so I guess it's not really much of a solution anyway.
>Well, that's how it's done for manga, no? Chapters of a manga series are usually released one at a time every week or month or so in a magazine, and after a certain number of chapters, they compile them into a tankoubon.
...which is what American comics do too. Granted, it's not in one big telephone-sized book, but still.
>implying I've ever read an American comic book
In Australia, I think manga outsell traditional comic books. In fact, I think every comic store I've been into (although that's not a huge amount or anything) has had a significant manga section as well as a traditional Western comics section.
I've read a few, they indeed aren't really thick.
Yeaaaah, considering that even here, people still buy Superboy and Sin City individual issues like the plague, I'm not exactly expecting for the monthly 23-ish pages issue format to die any time soon.
Either way, one of the guys I went to watch the movie with did say the movie was perfect "Except for the complete and utter lack of Spiderman". I kinda agreed, but that's because I actually like Spiderman as an avenger. He brings a good dynamic to the team, even if it goes against what he normally is.