Quote Originally Posted by Forsaken Lover View Post

Also WK, Miller is probably best known for his Daredevil work.
True, but he's also well known for his runs on Punisher and how he tends to make everything he touches grim dark and more of an asshole. He helped usher in the Dark Ages of comics that the nineties turned into.

Quote Originally Posted by Ayen View Post
@WK, I think the problem anyone will face with adapting X-Men is choosing between its library of characters and how much time to focus on each to give them equal footing combined with your normal 2 hour runtime constraint to fit all of this in. I supposed Civil War can be seen as an example of how to do this correctly, but it remains to be seen if that was a one time thing, or something filmmakers can duplicate in future superhero movies. On paper something like Civil War doesn't look possible, but the execution was as close to flawless as I have seen, at least when it came to making the whole team look important.

Perhaps if they were to adapt the earlier comics and just have Cyclops, Jean Grey, Beast, Ice Man, and Arcangel alongside Professor Xavier, it'd be easier to give them each equal footing and go more the Guardian of the Galaxy route because that's only six characters in addition to whoever you choose as a villain, who would most likely be Magneto. Or look at the earlier comics as a point of reference and just choose six characters in general from the X-Men mytho that people would want to see. You can still have Wolverine, but don't make the mistake of having him overshadow everyone else.
This is why I feel a planned trilogy would work better than a simply one-shot story. The issue with most of the X-Men films is that they don't build off of each other as well as Marvel films have done. Mainly because most of the focus is just on Wolvie and the Eric/Xavier dynamic, so very few characters never got the benefit of development over the course of the franchise's film history. To make X-Men good, you would have to design the story in a way that opens up the opportunity for the cast to develop over time and through the various films. The other issue is that while mutant rights is a huge thing for the series, it was never the full picture, and so the team loses out on being more like super heroes with origins that give them personal baggage. I mean we would get the series personal moral message one issue, then another Juggernaut shows up for the team to deal with before the Shi'ar beam them up for another space story. The films kind of beat the big message over the head of the viewer, much like I'm sure most people would be happy to get through a Spider Man film without Uncle Ben's famous words being uttered and then turned into the big story of Peter Parker's character, as though he has to relearn the meaning of those words every time he shows up on screen.

My point being that X-Men kind of got pigeonholed and reduced to the basics of its presence and this has prevented the series from really getting traction because most of the films largely reiterate the same themes, without giving the series room to expand into something more. This is pretty much what Marvel has successfully been able to do with long running films like Iron Man and Captain America who both develop as interesting characters over the course of the films including the crossover stuff like Avengers and Civil War. We're kind of getting that with Xavier and Magneto, but again, X-Men is so much more than just these two characters. It's a shame watching one talented actor/actress coming into these films and being squandered because the writers don't feel they are important enough because they can't be bothered to write a good story with dynamic characters without fear of losing the audience. I don't blame Marvel with trying to kill the franchise so they can one day get the rights back, Fox has proven they are mediocre at best with the subject material. I love X-Men, but I can barely watch the films anymore. They are just so sad.

As for Watchmen, I think one of the things that worked against it was the fact it was marketed as a typical superhero action movie, when it was so much more than that. While I was pleasantly surprised at what I got at the cinema I can't fault people for being disappointed if they were expecting something else based on the trailers. Though this is less the movie's fault and more marketing and trying to cater to your general movie audience that is drawn to action scenes and explosions.

Another deal is (SPOILER)Dr. Manhattan replacing the giant squid. Not a bad idea on its own, but, Manhattan is gone by the time the U.S. and the Soviets unite, whereas the giant squid isn't. Meaning they have nothing physical to fight and keep the alliance going so it changes the narrative and doesn't make as much sense. Which can be especially frustrating for a hardcore Watchmen fan as for the most part they were pretty true to the source material.
Honestly it still works perfectly because the point was that Ozymandias plan was a temporary peace at best even in the books. I mean once the Squid was gone, how long before the sheer absence of another "attack" would it take before the U.S.S.R. and U.S. would go back to the Cold War? So switching the culprit to Dr. Manhattan doesn't really change anything from the books ending thematically.

I will agree that the issue was probably marketing. Watchmen was more of a deconstruction of the genre, but it wasn't like that went over the heads of writers and fans back in the day as well. I would honestly say it was one of the better comic book adaptions out there, and it may be more relevant for comic book movie fans now, than it was when it was released.

I think WK has been a bad influence on me because this is the most time I've ever spent on a single post about comic book movies in my entire life. DAMN YOU, WOLF KANNO!
Just doing my job.