In your opinion, which company, Marvel or DC, makes better films? Why?
Marvel uber alles!
Marvel - Raccoon with a machine gun. Have fun!
DC - Still haven’t managed a Wonder Woman film, after 40 years of trying.
In my own opinion, I prefer Marvel movies. I mean, I liked the first couple Superman films with Christopher Reeve and Tim Burton’s Batman films were good as well, but as for consistently entertaining me, I got to go with Marvel. Especially the established Marvel Cinematic Universe … all great in my opinion.
I’m not sure how Marvel wouldn’t win this. There’ve been some good DC flicks, like the first Christopher Reeves Superman, the Michael Keaton Batman, and the first two Christian Bale Batman movies (IMO). In terms both of ratio and absolute numbers, however, Marvel unquestionably dominates. For every Wolverine there’s an Avengers and a Guardians of the Galaxy.
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DC makes movies?
Marvel Studios has Robert Downey, Jr., Don Cheadle, Chris Pratt, Paul Rudd, Tom Hiddleston, Mark Ruffalo, and Samuel L. Jackson in their Marvel Cinematic Universe. Heck, even Chris Hemsworth and Chris Evens have managed to take fairly dull characters and make them appealing, and the MCU has done a good job with the secondary characters like Black Widow and Hawkeye, and Falcon, and casting long-overlooked character actor Clark Gregg as Agent Coulson, then sacrificing him to get the Avengers to assemble was kind of genius. (Bringing him back for the t.v. show was perhaps less so, but I still enjoy seeing him work outside of sitcoms and Mamet films.) And yes, the real star of Guardians of the Galaxy…Awesome Mix, Vol. 1. Oh, and Bradley Cooper is way too excited about doing a vocal track for an animated cybernetically-enhanced raccoon. Who am I kidding? I’d watch a two hour standalone movie with Rocket and Groot rampaging through the galaxy on a crimebender in a heartbeat. I’m hoping for some great casting for Captain Marvel/Carol Danvers; there are so many great choices but I hope they go with someone out of left field just to throw everyone for a curve. I’ve got my favorite “Who is she?” pick.
DC, on the other hand, has Ben Affleck playing a self-absorbed destructive asshole (frankly it’s perfect casting for Affleck), Henry Cantcareabout him as a humorless Superman, Fake Mark Zuckerberg as Lex Looloo, and superskinny Israeli model as Wonder Woman, presumably on the theory that she’s exotic. The only thing they really have going for them at this point is Suicide Squad, and largely because Margot Robbie is apparently the It Girl for the mid-2010s.
This is like asking, “Shakespeare or Webster?” Even if you know almost nothing of either, you know the answer by cultural osmosis. “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.”
Stranger
I can’t think of any way to slice this that doesn’t put Marvel ahead. Recently, they’ve had fewer bad movies than DC, even though they’ve had more movies total, and even if you count the ones that weren’t under their creative control. Even if you count the really bad attempts from decades ago, they’ve still got a better overall record than DC. I think the only thing you can say for DC is that they made a good superhero movie sooner than Marvel did, and given that it was the only good superhero movie on either side for decades, I don’t think that even that is too much to their credit.
What, even if you go back to when Shaq was Steel and George Clooney had nipples on the Bat-suit? It was a GOLDEN age, I tell ya! A GOLDEN AGE!
As a lifelong fan of 50+ years of DC Comics, I say that Marvel does the movies a whale of a lot better.
Is this a serious question? Marvel has been kicking ass up and down the release schedule. DC hasn’t made an objectively good superhero movie since 2008.
There’s tons of reasons, but I’d say the biggest two are:
[ol]
[li]Marvel understands that “dark, grim, and gritty” is best used sparingly. DC hasn’t figured that out yet.[/li][li]Marvel knows how to do an awesome superpowered fight scene. DC only knows punch/crash, punch/crash.[/li][/ol]
The worst Marvel movie is about on par with the best DC movie.
Yeah, I’m a much bigger fan of DC’s characters. But overall, Marvel’s films win out, even though no single Marvel film has eclipsed Donner’s Superman, IMHO.
Hate to keep piling it on, but… Marvel.
Another reason why Marvel makes better films based on their comic book characters than DC on their comic characters:
I re-watched several Marvel films over the last five days (had free STARS on my Satellite for the weekend) and just over two weeks ago I saw Batman vs. Superman.
I noticed this and though it may seem trite, I thought it spoke volumes. Before every Marvel Studios film (or for that matter, any Marvel film) they begin with that red Marvel logo, as it flips through various drawn characters and word balloons, as if you were paging through a Marvel comic. Right there, you’re reminded that the film you’re about to watch is based on a comic book series. A series full of action, fun and adventure.
But, before the DC film is that new, very corporate looking DC Logo. You know the one, it looks like a D being peeled back to reveal a C. When you see that logo you’re reminded that, well, what comes across is a company that doesn’t want to be reminded that this film is based on a comic book. You feel as if they’re embarrassed to have had any connection to it’s comic book roots.
Again, Marvel.
Even Punisher: War Zone is better than some DC movies.
Marvel consistently hits it out of the park. And I don’t mean they get lucky, or that some of their movies are great, I mean they get it right Every. Single. Time.
I think the last bad Marvel movie was 2008’s Incredible Hulk, and even that was a vast improvement over 2003’s Hulk. Agents of Shield started off weak but has improved. Daredevil and Jessica Jones are both excellent shows whose weakest episodes are still above-par television.
The only DC movies on par with the Marvel movies were the Nolan Batman films. The problem is that, outside of Man of Steel and Nolan’s Batman, what movies does DC even have? There was Green Lantern and… ?
Which brings us to Batman v. Superman. The fact that Marvel has a tremendous lead over DC in building it’s chronology isn’t something I would normally hold against DC… Except that being late to the party is definitely impacting the quality of DC’s movies. Marvel spent four years and five movies slowly building up to The Avengers. Rather than exercise patience and discipline, DC is in a rush to catch up. In their haste, they churn out garbage like Batman v. Superman that tries to accomplish in a single movie what Marvel built over five movies. They compromised their own script by trying to force in extraneous characters (like Wonder Woman) at the last minute.
And that, I think, is the key point that DC is missing… Marvel established a reputation for quality BEFORE their first team-up movie. I am keeping my fingers crossed for Suicide Squad, but right now I think that movie just looks good because of the trailer’s composition and editing. If you take away the “Bohemian Rhapsody” soundtrack it looks like a fucking wrist-slitter.
I wouldn’t go quite that far. Batman Begins and The Dark Knight were both better than Thor: The Dark World, for instance. And I’d probably rank the original Superman as the third-best superhero movie of all time (after Avengers and The Incredibles).
Jonah Hex? Maybe the Alan Moore stuff, like League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Watchmen and V For Vendetta?
Good DC
I think the Flash and Green Arrow TV shows are given good reviews. Swamp Thing is a movie from the 80s that I think is very good though a little campy.
Poor Marvel
The Fantastic Four as a movie has consistently produced failure. I was not able to finish the Daredevil movie while on a 14 hour plane flight with literally nothing else to do.
Great Became Marvel
Darkman
In the 70s and 80s and even into the 90s, DC movies were always better than Marvel.
In this century, Marvel is much much better. DC has made one misstep after another, both in movies and comics.
DC is, however, doing great work on network TV: Arrow, Flash, Supergirl, iZombie, Lucifer and Legends of Tomorrow.
DC on television is “enjoyable if you like melodramatic 20-somethings”. I enjoy a good deal of it, but I’d have to honestly say what they do is objectively inferior to either Agents of Shield or Agent Carter in terms of both story and craft.
Marvel, and not just its cinematic studios, are always watchable and usually really fun. Even the relative throw-away movies of Iron Man 2, Incredible Hulk, and Thor 2 were at least entertaining. The director’s cut of Daredevil, while not perfect, is also far better than the theatrical version. Elektra, however, was among the worst movies I’ve ever paid to see.
Marvel is in a bit of an odd place, though, since the movie rights were divided and even now haven’t been entirely unified. So, of course, Sony and Fox are trying to do their own thing with mixed successes. On the upside, X-Men has been strong. On the downside… the four not-so-fantastic Fantastic Four films. People have made reasoned arguments that a film thrown together to technically satisfy that a movie was created. That is kinda sad, especially because this ought to almost be the easiest movie to make.