Things crashing into other things: or, my superhero movie problem
The problem with the superhero movie as currently practiced by Disney/Marvel (the interlocking “universe” series) and Sony/Marvel (“The Amazing Spider Man” and “The Amazing Spider-Man 2”) and DC (whose recent “Man of Steel” aped that Marvel feeling and is busy building its own version of Marvel’s feature film universe) has nothing to do with the genre’s component parts, and everything to do with execution.
Specifically, the problem is the visual and rhythmic sameness of the films’ execution.
via Things crashing into other things: or, my superhero movie problem by Matt Zoller Seitz. Read the whole thing. My favorite quote:
What do “Little Big Man,” “The Wild Bunch,” “Blazing Saddles,” “Silverado,” “Unforgiven” and “Open Range” have in common besides horses and ten-gallon hats? Almost nothing. What do modern superhero movies have in common? Entirely too much. Once in a great while you get an outlier like “Hellboy” or “Watchmen” or “Kick-Ass.” There’s a reason why anybody seeking to counter gripes of superhero film sameness brings up “Hellboy” or “Watchmen” and “Kick-Ass”: because most superhero movies are not “Hellboy” or “Watchmen” or “Kick-Ass.” They’re “Thing Crashing Into Other Thing 3.”
Exactly a week before Fox is slated to present its schedule to advertisers, the network has given a formal series pickup to Gotham. The project, based on characters from the DC universe, had a series commitment and had been considered a lock for the spot on the 2014-15 schedule. An origin story of the great DC Comics supervillains and vigilantes, Gotham explores the early years of Commissioner James Gordon (Ben McKenzie) as an idealistic rookie detective in Gotham City and the rogues’ gallery of villains that made the city infamous. The pilot for the project, from Warner Bros TV, was written/executive produced by creator Bruno Heller and directed/exec produced by Danny Cannon.
