My Proposal...Or, What DC Can Learn from Marvel and "The Avengers"

I have always been a fan of DC Comics.


In the realm of movies, however, it can readily be argued that Marvel is doing a superior job marketing their properties.

Why?  Why is there such an issue in DC pumping out movies based upon their comic book properties?  Let's have a look....

Marvel Comics, initially, outsourced their movies.  Basically, they created Marvel Entertainment, and rented/sold their product to the highest bidder:

New Line Cinema - Blade, Blade II, Blade: Trinity

Fox - X-Men, X2: X-Men United, X-Men: The Last Stand, Daredevil, Elektra, Fantastic Four, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer

Universal - Hulk

Lionsgate - The Punisher

Sony - Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man 3

Surely I'm missing some movies in there, but you get the point.  Marvel Entertainment, however, tried to maintain a say in the movies produced.  To further this point, Marvel Studios became more bold and confident, and started to produce their own movies, giving companies distribution rights instead.  This started with the more-modern era of Marvel comic movies:

Iron Man, Iron Man 2, The Incredible Hulk, Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger

and ultimately culminated in Disney taking notice, buying Marvel Entertainment, and releasing this year's box office smash, The Avengers.  For a more in-depth explanation and history of Marvel Studios, follow this link.

So, what started with Marvel "selling out" its properties resulted in a unification under one corporate head (for the most part, Sony still has rights to Spider-Man, hence Sony's reboot of The Amazing Spider-Man).

What about DC?  Where's their gusto, their go-get attitude?

Well, DC Comics has been under Warner Bros for an insanely long time.  Superman from 1978, for a leading example, was a Warner Bros production.

So, what's the deal?  Sure, not all of the Marvel films have been particularly spectacular - even Marvel has acknowledged this - but they took a swing at the ball.  And for every Marvel bomb, like Ang Lee's Hulk, most fans can still quip, "At least it's not Catwoman" - a DC property.  I know the obvious intent is to not lose money, but with "hero" comic movies at an all-time high, you'd think they would quit dragging their feet.  Maybe they feel they don't have to jump into the game, I mean, look at The Dark Knight.  Well, even for uber-successful DC films like The Dark Knight, you have films like Marvel's The Avengers.


"If You're So Smart, Why Aren't You Rich?"

Go ahead, call me on it.  I may not have all the answers, but I do recall reading something about how Warner Bros was so wrapped up in the Harry Potter franchise, that now that they've exhausted a good eight movies, they will be putting their attention into their comic book properties.  Let's see if that comes to fruition.

But until then, here's my proposal...

Christian Bale is done with the Batman franchise.  While the final movie of this trilogy hasn't been released yet, even if it's unlikable, this trilogy has garnered enough buzz that it will likely do well in the box office.  Spider-Man 3 did well in the box office, though it's well-accepted it's the worst of the three.

So now what?  Reboot Batman?  No.  It's done.  I know it sounds like blasphemy, especially from a dear fan of the protector of Gotham City.  But it's unnecessary to reboot.  Just move on, and pump up your other franchises.  Release next year's Superman film, Man of Steel.  Make Green Lantern 2.  Flash.  Wonder Woman.  Green Arrow.  Aquaman (with or without Vincent Chase).

You want to bridge these movies?  Find yourself a new actor to play Batman if Bale is definitely out, and have him fulfill the role of Samuel L. Jackson's Nick Fury, recruiting the heroes for a global threat under the title of the Justice League.

Wow.  Seems pretty simple, right?  Once more:

1. Get some actors willing to sign 5 to 9 movie contracts (sounds extensive, yet Marvel is able to do it with high profile actors).
2. Introduce the characters with modern retellings of their origin stories.
3. Have Batman, a now properly established character with an origin story already firmly in place, bring the characters together to stop some sort of intergalactic force Wayne Industries detected - Darkseid, or perhaps Batman has already received a tip from J'onn J'onzz that the White Martians are ready to invade, whatever).

Warner Bros should have the chops to pull this off - they just seem to continuously shoot themselves in the foot with their own legal mumbo jumbo.  "We can't do this because Warner TV is doing that."  "We can't do this because the comics are doing that."  It's this short-sightedness that's leaving DC Comics any chance at franchising their properties always a few steps behind their competitor.  And now with Marvel having Disney's big bucks behind them, well, only Thanos himself could stop them now....

Oh, and kudos to anyone who noticed If You're So Smart, Why Aren't You Rich is the title of an episode of BTAS - the first appearance of The Riddler, to be exact.