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Thread: The Batman - 2022
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2021-10-18, 10:36 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
Tony Stark is a snarky playboy who struggles with personal relations, responsibility, and alcoholism. There's plenty there for an audience to relate to. He's basically a perfect protagonist for a Whedon film.
Compare to Superman who's biggest issue is that he's just so perfect and powerful that he has trouble relating to the people he protects, but chooses to be human anyway. You might enjoy his story, but you don't relate to it the way a former alcoholic or partier will with Tony. Or the way a broke college kid relates to Spidey.
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2021-10-18, 11:25 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
Superman is a foreigner in America who was raised in the Midwest by blue collar people and has a working-class job, while his greatest foe is a billionaire who wishes to consolidate as much wealth and power as possible.
Yeah. Totally unrelatable for most Americans. The billionaire genius who is also drunk a lot is so much more like us!Last edited by Peelee; 2021-10-18 at 11:25 AM.
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2021-10-18, 11:32 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
I actually found the Gods and Monsters iteration of Superman to be interesting for reasons like this. It showed just how little you need to change about Clark's origin story to create a recognizable but very different person, how much influence the Kents had in shaping who he became and what a Superman raised into a very different perspective on humanity looks like.
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2021-10-18, 11:33 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
My point is the snarky playboy who struggles with personal relations, responsibility, and alcoholism isn't the core of Tony Stark. The core of Tony Stark is just the invincible Iron Man. The other bits were added later to flesh him out into an interesting character.
Superman as his core is a powerful hero that fights for truth, justice, and the american way. He doesn't have to be a perfect god; he can still be a person with struggles underneath all that and still ring true as Superman.
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2021-10-18, 11:33 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
I'd argue Tony Stark is a lot easier to make sympathetic than Bruce Wayne. Tony pretty exclusively fights in his weight class (aliens, metahumans, mad scientists, PMCs etc). Batman meanwhile - as shown in this very trailer - seems incapable of being separated from the street level crime that made him famous. They have a similar ceiling, especially these days with Tony having broken into the A-List, but Batman's much lower floor results in multiple portrayals where he's at least perceived by audiences and thinkpieces to be quite literally punching down.
To put it another way, Tony usually isn't patrolling alleys at night in the Mark V looking for muggers and henchmen so he can break all their arms and legs, nor is he repeatedly throwing the Joker in prison only for him to break out next week and kill more bystanders. Marvel made the very savvy decision of splitting out that specific fantasy into their grittier heroes like Daredevil and Moon Knight and Punisher, people for whom you don't need to contrive various excuses for why clobbering goons makes more sense than effecting social change.Plague Doctor by Crimmy
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2021-10-18, 11:46 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
I think people harp on/overrate relatability in this kind of thing.
after all, we are discussing this in a BATMAN thread. the guy who makes Tony Stark look relatively tame in terms of how freaking ridiculous and far from the common man he is:
*insert billionaire playboy philanthropist list difference joke here*
you can't discount charisma/style in this kind of thing. sure a stand up guy with relatable common man backstory is safe, but they can also be plain. Batman? has that dark mysterious brooding charisma he can stoically do the quiet badass thing of being this inevitable doom for the villains but also can have his moments of caring for his bat-family or friends, Tony Stark has this egotistical Vegeta-like attitude of "hold my beer I'm going to do something awesome" which is always fun because its always a coin flip whether he actually succeeds and proves that he is not all talk or fails and is taken down a peg and you enjoy it either way.
escapism can also be a factor: sure not everyone is rich, but people sure do want to BE rich and if you tie in that wealth fantasy with a bunch of spy gadgets and cool tech to fight badguys that can lead to a wealth fantasy of using the money for good in cool way rather than a boring one.
while Superman? can't really feed into the fun part of being a superhero because he is too busy being responsible with it. sure he is a good guy for being so responsible, but it can also make him come across as stiff because if your in his position you can't really have any fun with said powers if your held to such high standards. not really feeding into the escapist fantasy.
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2021-10-18, 12:28 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
I wonder how people would react to a superman flick where there is no zod, no braniac, no doomsday, no darkseid. Its just clark kent trying to live his life as clark kent while not being able to ignore all the pain he can hear all the time in metropolis alone. Where its not an action film, its a dramatic one with character growth being the primary focus. Maybe put it so its right after he gets to metropolis and starts to experience how different it is from smallville. Living on the farm he isnt being exposed to literally millions of people with dozens to hundreds of crimes going on every day that he can hear taking place. He gets to experience the difficulty in being clark kent when superman is needed so often. A different version of tobys spiderman 2 where everyone sees him as unreliable because his time in the suit keeps getting in the way of time as himself. He is trying to be a reporter, trying to make friends, but he keeps getting called away to save lives and stop crimes and doesnt know what to do.
"Interdum feror cupidine partium magnarum Europae vincendarum"
Translation: "Sometimes I get this urge to conquer large parts of Europe."
"If you don't get those cameras out of my face, I'm gonna go 8.6 on the Richter scale with gastric emissions that'll clear this room."
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2021-10-18, 12:33 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
Get a solid character actor and you could make it work. Joaquin Phoenix made Joker a billion dollar smash hit without Batman or Harley Quinn on the strength of drama.
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2021-10-18, 12:39 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
His best friend is also a billionaire, and his home is a giant ice castle filled with alien luxuries, robot butlers, and super weapons. He spends the other part of his free time on a literal space station. It's comics so if you want to cherry pick nonsense we'll be here all day.
I actually read Superman comics fairly regularly, and I can't begin to tell you the last time one was actually about his human side. The last one I can think of was American Alien which was 5 years ago and in an alternate timeline. Now, I don't read every issue ever released or anything, but those stories are rare. And yes. Tony acts like an actual human. Superman does not. It's all him flying around, punching things, and lamenting how powerful he is. Everyone always says the best Superman stories focus on his humanity, but in reality those stories are extremely rare. He has small town roots, but his actual story is about leaving those and moving on to bigger things.
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2021-10-18, 01:20 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
I would love it. No small part of my complete lack of interest in the MCU currently is that every single story revolves around huge, world-affecting problems. Smaller stakes can still be interesting and matter a lot.
ETA: Yeah, but the more down-to-earth aspects of superman are more relatable for more people, was my point.
And this is totally the problem (well, a problem). They can, and should, tell more stories focusing on the Clark Kent side. More human stories with problems that can be solved by being Superman but can be solved by being a good man. I agree that his superpowers can easily make him boring, and a good way to captlitalize on who he is would be to focus on who he is instead of what he is.Last edited by Peelee; 2021-10-18 at 01:43 PM.
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2021-10-18, 01:50 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
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2021-10-18, 01:57 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
Sounds incredibly dull for a blockbuster, but might work as a slice-of-life tv show.
And didn't Spiderman 2 have a literal doomsday device plot?
That was a Start of Darkness though, and a mystery besides. How/why does Clark Kent become Superman is a lot less narratively interesting, especially since Man of Steel and '78 Superman already answered that question in detail, and still had half the movie left that they needed to fill with Big Bad stuff.
Jimmy Olsen is just his pal IIRCPlague Doctor by Crimmy
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2021-10-18, 02:06 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
Back to Batman, I think a batman that rampages around in a tank and beats thirty armed thugs simultaneously could still have meaningful physical and emotional conflict; it's been done well before. The problem is: it's been done well before. Nothing in this trailer makes me want to watch a new batman movie instead of just rewatching the Dark Knight again.
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2021-10-18, 03:38 PM (ISO 8601)
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2021-10-18, 04:27 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
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2021-10-18, 05:00 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
The mayor was barely even a character, he was more of a wall in human form, and I can't think of who the their would be (Quint would be my best guess but I'd disagree with that if so).
But regardless, my point was that Jaws, which practically invented the summer blockbuster, was "not an action film, its a dramatic one with character growth being the primary focus", which was what I figured was what made you say it'd be dull for a blockbuster. I hadn't imagined that the number of antagonists might be what you were looking for.Cuthalion's art is the prettiest art of all the art. Like my avatar.
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2021-10-18, 06:06 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
Plague Doctor by Crimmy
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2021-10-18, 06:13 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
Last edited by Peelee; 2021-10-18 at 06:24 PM.
Cuthalion's art is the prettiest art of all the art. Like my avatar.
Number of times Roland St. Jude has sworn revenge upon me: 2
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2021-10-18, 07:55 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
I mean, he is still fighting crime, its just not anybody that a movie revolves around. He isnt trying to stop the world from ending, but he is still stopping crimes. You could even toss in some of his C listers. No real threat but they keep showing up and he has to put them down again because they are too dangerous for the cops to handle and would destroy innocent lives if he didnt step in. He feels resentment for losing his time as clark kent, but that also makes him feel selfish because he is literally saving lives and is annoyed that he cant hang out in the employee break room shooting the breeze with lois and jimmy. The film is him coming to terms with all of this and setting up who he wants to be in the real world. And yes, im aware spiderman 2 had a doomsday device plot, I DID say a variation after all. :p I was more talking about how his personal life fell apart in that film because of what being a responsible hero was doing to his friends and family.
"Interdum feror cupidine partium magnarum Europae vincendarum"
Translation: "Sometimes I get this urge to conquer large parts of Europe."
"If you don't get those cameras out of my face, I'm gonna go 8.6 on the Richter scale with gastric emissions that'll clear this room."
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2021-10-18, 08:09 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
I honestly wonder if Batman wouldn't be better off being set in the past. Set him in the 20s or thereabouts, don't give him anything more than a few Bond style spy gadgets and so on. Let a goon with a tommygun be a realistic threat to him and have him face off with a member of his rogues gallery that's taken control of one of Gotham's mobs as part of a scheme.
Sanity is nice to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there.
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2021-10-18, 08:14 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
Batman is supposed to be the world's greatest detective, so I'd really like a movie that leaned into that. Riddle is a great villain for going that route too. And as long as there's Riddler, there's me rooting for Jim Carrey to knock it out of the park....
Cuthalion's art is the prettiest art of all the art. Like my avatar.
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2021-10-18, 08:19 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
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2021-10-18, 09:49 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
I wouldn't hold your breath - judging by his yelling and punching the crazy-guy glass at 1:04, I think we're just going to get more memes
I fully agree, but your original question was asking whether I didn't like Jaws. Of course I like Jaws, because Jaws has way more stakes than the boring Clark Kent character meditation that was being floated earlier, even if they weren't "world-changing" ones. (And I'd further argue that the people whose livelihoods depend on that town staying open would consider those stakes to be fairly world-changing for them.)
"How can I choose between being Spiderman and being Peter Parker?" was the undercurrent for a reason. It's an interesting question, but what makes it interesting are the stakes that surround the question "what happens if I stop being Spiderman right this minute?" Removing Ock and his ticking clock from the equation would have hurt that dilemma, not strengthened it.Last edited by Psyren; 2021-10-18 at 09:51 PM.
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2021-10-18, 10:02 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
Yeah for Superman, you don't make some big superthreat that is going to kill the world RIGHT NOW. for him that is no question, he'd just save the world then go be normal afterwards.
for Superman you want Lex Luthor to go "okay Supermans great, but behold! I've invented this super-robot model that replicates supermans feats which I can legally produce and sell to more widely protect the world!" because then Superman has to furrow his brow and go "I know Lex Luthor is always up to no good but this is completely legal and I can't just go off the handle to attack him when these robots could actually protect people, but those robots could also be used to fight wars which would cause more suffering, so its not as if the robots are a 100% good thing for the world even if Lex has turned a new leaf for real and he didn't say what these things are powered by to make sure they can achieve great power, how can I sure if they are ethically....." that makes it so even if he is presented with an opportunity to just hang up the cape because Lex supposedly got it, its Lex Luthor so its like how can he be sure?
and then you can play the suspicion from drama where everyone else goes "maybe he has finally turned over a leaf" and Superman insists on figuring out whether Lex actually has and when Superman turns out to be right and Lex is still evil, he just sighs and goes "I was hoping I was wrong and that you had redeemed yourself" instead of anything triumphant.Last edited by Lord Raziere; 2021-10-18 at 10:06 PM.
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2021-10-18, 10:29 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
Oh, I'm not expecting it out of this one. Or anytime soon. I'm just wishlisting.
Jaws is low stakes as opposed to space farmer getting magic pebbles to genocide the galaxy, is what I mean. Not every story needs a Death Star or super hotshot pilot (looking at you, entire Sequel Trilogy). "Low stakes" doesn't mean "practically irrelevant". It just means that the world doesn't need to be in danger because the evil secret organization took over the good secret organization and will blow up half the country because like 90% of the heroes are doing macramè or something.
You could make an awesome story about Superman coming to grips with the fact that despite being effectively a god, he can't save all the people all the time, and he even has to find out where to draw the line and how to emotionally deal with that. That maybe sometimes, Clark Kent can help people in ways that Superman can't. You could have an absolutely fantastic story based on that, because not every superhero movie needs a bad guy to just be punched in just the right way. You can hit dramatic and emotional notes on superheroes just like you can with regular people. Hell, a superhero grappling with dealing with the real world out of their element is dang near what First Blood was, and it was near universally critically acclaimed, dominated the box office in the third quarter, and took until just thee years ago to be toppled in ticket sales in China, for example. It not only works, it works globally. But punching someone in a silly costume sells right now, and that's all that's really important, apparently.Last edited by Peelee; 2021-10-18 at 10:34 PM.
Cuthalion's art is the prettiest art of all the art. Like my avatar.
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2021-10-18, 10:57 PM (ISO 8601)
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2021-10-18, 11:07 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
I think we're talking past each other a bit; I certainly don't want every movie villain to be Thanos or Palpatine either, and furthermore I think "smaller stakes than Thanos" is readily achievable for a blockbuster.
I... honestly don't know how much I can safely say about First Blood and its surrounding context here, but while it was certainly a character study, it was also very much about specific events and themes that I don't know would translate to a Superman story very well. (Not that a superhero property couldn't incorporate them at all - while it didn't do nearly as good a job as First Blood did, the better parts of Falcon and the Winter Soldier did visit some of these themes.)
Yeah okay, I could see that - but no matter how slow a boil you put it on, do you see how Lex having an army of superbots still ends with a pretty big stakes third act? Maybe not global, but still. Not to mention that Far From Home among others followed fairly similar beats.Last edited by Psyren; 2021-10-18 at 11:08 PM.
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2021-10-19, 12:20 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
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2021-10-19, 12:38 AM (ISO 8601)
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I'm not saying the specific themes of "soldier who fought in war has difficulties acclimating" (and, having actually seen Winter Soldier, I would argue that it handled that theme cartoonishly, but that's neither here nor there). I was more referring to the general theme of a highly competent person whose skills are not suited to the world they now occupy. It's not a perfectly straight 1:1 analogy, but just as Rambo was in charge of million dollar equipment over there and over here can't even get a job parking cars, so too is Superman capable of fighting off galactic threats but can't treat depression or fix world hunger. He can stop murders, but he lives in Metropolis - even though it's no Gotham, crime is still abundant enough in a city of 11 million people. He can't stop every mugging, every assault, every extortion. And hey, he can even stop a mugging, but he can't stop the underlying cause. He's one of the most powerful beings in the universe, and he dedicates himself to helping mankind, but there are some problems that he cannot solve as Superman. And that can be interesting. There could absolutely be a character study done about that, about how Clark Kent could help in ways that Superman can't (just as an example, not as a mandate that must be touched on). Hell, Joker grossed a billion dollars, and was nominated for gobloads of Oscars, so it's not even like an idea like this is completely out of left field. And Superman is way more interesting than the Joker as a base character to build on.
Seriously. If SMBC can come up with interesting moral and logistical issues for Superman (albeit veering sharply into the absurd with its outcomes, because it's a humor-based format), then Hollywood with all its resources sure as hell can.Cuthalion's art is the prettiest art of all the art. Like my avatar.
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2021-10-19, 01:08 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: The Batman - 2022
I just don't see a Superman movie working the way a Joker one could. I can't quite put my finger on why, but "rise of villain" where he spends the entire movie not being the icon until the very end, just seems to end up more satisfying than an origin story where the hero does the same.
The closest I can think of is season 1 of Daredevil, where he doesn't get the outfit or name until the finale... but even without those things, by the hallway fight he IS definitely Daredevil (whether they know to call him that or not), and that happens in episode 2.
I wouldn't call anything relating to Isaiah Bradley "cartoonish" myself. I agree the Flagsmashers were undercooked though.
As for SMBC - I'd say the last thing DC wants is anyone applying their levels of fridge-logic to anything Superman related in an official property. Some kind of parody maybe. (Also, I think you're vastly overestimating the degree to which general audiences would want a SMBC-style story of Superman's obsolescence played straight on-screen, but that's neither here nor there.)Plague Doctor by Crimmy
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