The Big Picture: Wrongs & Rights

[DSQ]

One of my favorite Marval people Black Panther will never make it in to Marval Studio films since he is married to Storm and his name is maybe a little contraversial. Maybe they could make a period 60's film about him but I'm pretty sure the attual black panthers would not like that.

I really want Scarlet Witch to make an aparence and if she isn't gonna be a 'mutant' any more then maybe they could do an colour blind casting or something with her and cast my favorite actress right now Naomi Harris as her despite her age or go the more traditional route and cast Kaya Scodelario or Jessica Brown Findlay. (for some reason I can't think of any suitable amarican actresses. EDIT: Lily Collins?)

As much as I like Andrew Garfield I hope that his reboot Spiderman film maybe ends up not being worth the money to make a number two so that Marval ends up getting the rights back but I hope that Fox keep making Xmen films since I think the whole civil rights metaphore loses its poignancy when theere a a whole lot of non mutant superheroes kicking about.

 

[BehattedWanderer]

Nick Fury's line about the world filling up with powerful people or whatever lends credence to the idea that some of the reclaimed IP is probably going to be put to use soon. Though, I wonder how long they'll let out the properties before they just make enough Avengers gold to buy the rights back outright, saving themselves some trouble. The problem being that the longer the Avengers goes on, the more it's going to be awkward to get the other properties in again. Spider Man and the X-Men are both pretty prominent in Avenger-related shenanigans, but without setting up their own stories in universe, it's going to be tricky. Fans will undoubtedly be confused about which story they have.

 

[LadyRhian]

http://ideologyofmadness.spookyouthouse.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/doctor-voodoo.jpg

Marvel already has a magic man who isn't white, i give you brother voodoo , who is a bit of a badass.

Because, yeah, he's not a flaming stereotype, and I don't even want to think about the number of people who cry out about a stereotypical depiction of voodoo... or outraged parents decrying a film that makes voodoo/Vodun/Vodou look cool- just look at the backlash from Harry Potter, and that kind of magic isn't even based on anything REAL. At least Doctor Strange isn't based on any kind of real magic (but as you can see, that doesn't mean some kind of backlash anyhow). I see the same kind of problems happening with ANY magic based hero, except maybe Meggan, Captain Britain's girlfriend/wife(?), who is some kind of faery. I think. Nah, mutant. Oh well, there goes that idea...

Snowbird from Alpha Flight? Puck (also from Alpha Flight)? The problem with so many heroes in the Marvel universe is that so many are their nation's version of (Fill in the Blank) . Captain Britain is English Captain America. Silver Samurai is Japan's Iron Man (more or less) and so on.

Maybe Luke Cage

There is no maybe on Luke Cage, they got the Old Spice guy for him.

Ha! I guess this means a Luke Cage/Iron Fist movie! Or.... ooh! Moon Knight!

snowbirds a shaman
does that count as two ethnic
and silver samurai is just a samurai lol crimson dynamo or red guard are better examples of that.

And i don't think media ought be censored because some crybabies disagree with certain types of magic on the screen, ffs we have a genre called torture porn i think we can handle voodoo.

Snowbird is a goddess. An elemental goddess. I think you are thinking of Shaman, (Michael Twoyoungmen and/or his daughter), and I remember Silver Samurai as being more of a techno-samurai rather than straight Samurai, but it's been a while and I might be mis-remembering. The only problem with most of the mages of the Marvel universe is how stereotypical they are. I mean, they are all stereotypes, like "Doctor Druid" and "Brother Voodoo". Even Shaman has his "Native American Shamanistic powers", which is just really insulting to anyone sharing those ethnicities/religions. TV Tropes "Magic Negro" for the EPIC FAIL. Just because someone comes from a culture or religion that believed in magical powers doesn't mean there should be a superhero with those stereotypical magical abilities. Magik is about the only one can think of who isn't stereotypical, because she is a white Russian girl who got blipped to Limbo and studied magic there, but she is the X-men universe, so is out of the running.

And Daimon Hellstrom is "The Son of Satan"- you can just imagine how the Christians would LOVE that...

Sorry got confused with talisman (i only have two "flight" based books, one is the ultimate one where talisman/snowbird are merged and omega flight which didnt have snowbird my mistake.

Whilst they shouldn't inherently have to come from said racial backgrounds it does seem like a more logical place to tell stories of that nature, in the same way you would set a chupacbra story in mexico rather than dorset.

Because there are interesting facets behind those mythologies which wouldn't be able to be explored otherwise.

True. It is possible to tell respectful stories about various other religions and beliefs- usually it's the character's writer/creator who does that. It's when the book switches hands that the more exploitative stories come out- or at the hands of someone who hasn't done their homework or has a stereotyped idea of that religion/magical tradition. Like if Brother Voodoo gets a sidekick named Houngan and fights a sorceror named Bokor, well, all of those come from actual Voodoo/Vodou/Vodun. And then someone else comes along and has him playing with snakes and raising the dead and equating Damballah with the Devil. And lets not forget the chicken sacrifices! Many characters only remain "respectful" as long as the original creator/creatrix is involved, and after that, it's a crapshoot. DC did this with Starfire in the recent reboot where Starfire becomes a whore who barely even remembers who she's slept with and comes on to her teammates, well, apparently "Just because". There is a scene where her teammate who she is coming on to asks her if she remembers Dick Grayson (who she almost married in Teen Titans), along with a bunch of other characters, and she says, "No." And as the list gets longer, "You're boring me. If you're not interested, I'm going." And I was just D:. Oy... But I suppose that's more of a problem with all comics, not just magicians.

 

[Quiet Stranger]

If I'm not mistaken, isn't Apokolips the first mutant technically??

 

[Katya Topolkaraeva]

Waw, I always wondered how rights worked for this stuff. Thank you so much for making this your topic this week! I guess now it makes more sense why they keep popping these movies out. Frankly i wish there were more adaptations of more obscure interesting comics rather then redoing the same old stuff. For example, i'd love to see a movie based off of X-Statix (Marvel).

 

[MasterOfHisOwnDomain]

Great video, Bob, very much taps into the questions that are circulating in the wake of the movie, and clears up a fair bit of stuff.

Also, Marvel are going to need to get their game on and release quite a few more new hero movies because ...

Spoiler

... otherwise Thanos will absolutely obliterate The Avengers in the second film.

 

[MonkeyPunch]

Don't really fancy another DareDevil or Fantastic Four at all...
Mind a DareDevil could be alright without Ben Affleck, though no high hopes there either.

 

[Taunta]

I thought the recent Superman movie did well? Bob seemed to like it, cause he showed it as one of his examples of great superhero movies.

Warner Bros. doesn't totally suck. Besides Batman, Watchmen did really well. But yeah, I was wondering if we would ever see Spiderman with the Avengers, thanks for explaining that. I had fun learning about copyright laws today!

Besides Justice League, the idea of which I'm still kind of "ehh" about, what about a live action Teen Titans movie? Whether it follows the original comics or the silly cartoon theme, I could see it doing well. And Nolan doesn't plan on using Robin ever so...

 

[Insideout Ink Demon]

If we wanted to get Spider man, x-men, et cetera back under Marvel's roof does that mean we should boycott the new Spider-man film?

ok, i'll join the boycott movemant to get Spidey on the Avengers

 

[Sphinx86]

I think Warner Brothers problem is they're afraid of failure. Which ironically leads to it happening. Every time they make a super-hero movie, they go in with the attitude of, we need a really big budget to make sure this comes out right. Then usually make something lackluster and boring.

Before Marvel super-hero movies took off, they scattered the rights around and a bunch of low budget turkeys got made. But it showed all the mistakes that could be made. Got that stuff out of their system. Now they know to trust the source material.

Warner Brothers and DC, need to make a bunch of more modestly budgeted movies to try out various characters and interpretations, with less risk and less need to be a blockbuster. Once they learn to not suck, they can start building a universe franchise and the Justice League movie the comic fans want to see.

I actually see this where I work. While teams that have constrained time/budgets can pull out things that are well balanced and efficient, a lot of the projects that have the 'Business backing' to blow huge amounts of money end up being over-cost, behind schedule and complete shit.

In movie terms look at X-Men First Class. As Bob said this movie was rushed and low-budget, but people who cared made an awesome movie. I think this is directly related to needing some restraint involved. Whereas the people who made Green Lantern spent far too much money on CGI, when I can so desperately see a decent movie under there had someone just said 'No. You only have the money for one CGI bad-guy, not two. Now go back and rewrite your story to make sense'

 

[Bloodstain]

The rights for both Punisher AND Blade have already reverted to Marvel Studios. http://www.comicbookmovie.com/blade_movies/news/?a=42706

I am now imagining an Avengers film with both Punisher and Blade in it.

Woah.
The money they would make.

 

[Bloodstain]

black panther was around for ages before he got married to storm, there isn't even a question that he's not an x-character. And i don't see what's controversial about naming yourself after a powerful animal,(see phoenix).

...do you not know who the Black Panther Party was/is?

 

[MasterOfHisOwnDomain]

If I'm not mistaken, isn't Apokolips the first mutant technically??

I've been complaining about wanting to have an X-Men film with Apocalypse in for about a decade now, I kid ye not. Don't get me started again.

... although after the failure that was Galactus in FF2, I'm not sure I want to see how badly a villain of that sort of ability can be portrayed.

 

[Pat Hulse]

The rights for both Punisher AND Blade have already reverted to Marvel Studios. http://www.comicbookmovie.com/blade_movies/news/?a=42706

I am now imagining an Avengers film with both Punisher and Blade in it.

Woah.
The money they would make.

Blade could be fun. I think he teamed up with Doctor Strange and S.H.I.E.L.D. a few times, so it wouldn't be too much of a stretch for him to at least have some degree of involvement, though I don't know if he'd really be all that interested in being an Avenger.

As for Punisher, well, if you've read "Civil War", you'd know how the rest of the superhero community feels about him and what would happen if he ever did team up with them.

Short version: Superheroes don't much like Punisher because he kills people. And when they did try to team up with him during a lapse of desperation? Surprise, surprise, he killed people!

But if they ever do a Civil War-based movie, I think you can bet on Punisher being a part of it.

 

[Bloodstain]

black panther was around for ages before he got married to storm, there isn't even a question that he's not an x-character. And i don't see what's controversial about naming yourself after a powerful animal,(see phoenix).

...do you not know who the Black Panther Party was/is?

I do but i fail to see why their acts should influence what the world gets to watch in its movies

I agree. Sadly, that does not stop people from causing an outrage, which is bad for a film's publicity and thus the money its creators make.

 

[Dasick]

So to recap, we have lawyers, briefcases, suits and all, sitting around, arguing whether Submariner is a mutant or not, what technically is a mutant, which continuity is the cannon one etc etc.

Am I the only one that wants to see a case like this make to court?

Judge: "This is Baloney, Spider-Man is totaly a mutant, as demonstrated in the 1994 Animated Series Season 2, Episode 17: The Mutant Agenda. Fox really shouldn't worry about loosing the license and should really stop making that unnecessary re-boot."

Lawyer: "Your honor, Fox film 'X-men First Class' demonstrates in the scene 'Xavier the douchbro', conversation of 'Xavior v. Easily Impressed College Girl', the broadness of the 'mutant' label used within the Marvel Universe. However, it was established in the 2003 4chan thread of 'Pedo1337 v. WilSux4Hax' that the term 'Mutant' fully applies only to named characters first introduced as a full-fledged memeber of the 'Xavier Institute for Higher Learning' or 'Brotherhood of Mutants'"

 

[WolfThomas]

Not having the FF, Spiderman, Wolverine or Daredevil isn't really a problem for the Avengers (it is more for Disney making shitloads more money). Most of them haven't been Avengers until recently. You've still got a lot of great classic avengers and other marvel characters like:
Black Panther
Ant-man, Wasp
Vision (with Utlron as villain)
Luke Cage, Iron Fist and Jessica Jones
Spiderwoman (wouldn't that piss Sony off)
Captain Marvel, Ms Marvel, Noh-varr/Protector
Doctor Strange
Black Knight, Captain Britain and non-mutant Excalibur/MI13
Nova, Guardians of the Galaxy
Runaways

If I'm not mistaken, isn't Apokolips the first mutant technically??

Namor is the first mutant, in the sense he was the mutant invented by Marvel, back in the thirties. And he is generally considered the first modern mutant of the 20th century, a herald for the huge population boom that was to occur. Previously people like Apocalypse were just rare flukes of nature.