The DCEU Is Dead So Isn't It Time For A New Direction?

[thecolorsblend]

Super Mario Bros. opened to $377.6 million.

If you ask me, that means this thread is officially obsolete. Between Sonic and Mario (and honestly, I don't think we should count Mortal Kombat out yet), I think it's clear that the way forward from here is shared cinematic universes based on video game properties.

All of those video game franchises have been developed by their parent companies for decades and have virtually endless sources of inspiration to draw from.

I'm not guaranteeing that video game franchise movies are the future. But right now, they're showing life and vitality that comic book franchise movies are not.

[The Joker]

Super Mario Bros. opened to $377.6 million.

If you ask me, that means this thread is officially obsolete. Between Sonic and Mario (and honestly, I don't think we should count Mortal Kombat out yet), I think it's clear that the way forward from here is shared cinematic universes based on video game properties.

I'm very interested in seeing what Legendary does with "Street Fighter", myself.

Overall, with the partnership with Nintendo, and all the other franchises already in-house (Fast/Furious, Jurassic, Minions, ect) Universal is sitting very pretty right now.

[The Laughing Fish]

You know, I think Colors might be onto something about video game franchises becoming the next big thing. Last year, a Streets of Rage movie project was announced by Sega and Lionsgate, and it's planned to be written by John Wick creator Derek Kolstad. That could be something pretty f***ing cool. The Sega fanboy in me would love to see SOR crossover with Shinobi as a mini-shared universe just for the thrills.

If Legendary can get Street Fighter right then they should consider doing a Final Fight spinoff.

[Silver Nemesis]

Super Mario Bros. opened to $377.6 million.

If you ask me, that means this thread is officially obsolete. Between Sonic and Mario (and honestly, I don't think we should count Mortal Kombat out yet), I think it's clear that the way forward from here is shared cinematic universes based on video game properties.

All of those video game franchises have been developed by their parent companies for decades and have virtually endless sources of inspiration to draw from.

I'm not guaranteeing that video game franchise movies are the future. But right now, they're showing life and vitality that comic book franchise movies are not.

Some commentators are framing the success of the Mario movie as a devastating blow to Disney, and I can see why.

Disney's last two big animated movies, shaped according to the company's "not-at-all-secret agenda", crashed and burnt at the box office. Lightyear grossed just $226.4 million on a $200 million budget, while Strange World made just $73.6 million on an estimated budget of $135-180 million. The company's net loss from these movies is estimated to be in the hundreds of millions. Disney apologists have offered endless excuses for why they failed, citing everything from sluggish box office to COVID-19.

But if animated movies are struggling, then why did Minions: The Rise of Gru make $940.5 million on an $80 million budget? Why has the Mario Bros. movie made more in its opening weekend than Lightyear and Strange World combined made in their entire runs? While Mario's success is clearly a big win for Nintendo, it also illustrates just how badly Disney is faring in the animated feature market.

But at least The Mouse still has Star Wars, right? Kathleen Kennedy recently brought out the big guns by announcing that Rey Skywalker, the most beloved character in modern fandom, is returning in a new movie. The plot will depict Rey fixing Luke's mistakes by founding a new Jedi Order in the wake of the Empire's collapse. So basically they're taking Luke's storyline from the Expanded Universe, which should have been the basis for the Sequel Trilogy, and giving it to Rey. I'm sure that will go down extremely well with fans. And if Rey's return wasn't exciting enough, the new movie is being directed by political activist Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, whose previous credits include Climate Change (2018) and Fundamental: Gender Justice No Exceptions (2020). What could possibly go wrong?

Getting back to Mario, the new film's success is being hailed as a victory in the culture wars. Supposedly the Hollywood writers originally wanted to pull off a bait-and-switch by depicting Mario as incompetent and making Princess Peach the real hero, but Nintendo sent the script back ordering them to change it so that Mario was the heroic focus. As long as Japanese companies like Nintendo and Sega are calling the shots, movie adaptations of their games have potential.

It's my eldest nephew's birthday this week and he's a huge Mario fan, so my brother's taking him to see the movie. I might go too. Our mum took us to see the Bob Hoskins Mario film back in 1993. I can't believe that was thirty years ago. The critical reception for the new movie has been mixed (bad modern film criticism goes hand in hand with bad modern cinema, and is thus completely useless for gauging a movie's quality – the fact audiences are ignoring the 'rotten' RT score is a good sign), but viewers seem to dig it. I've been a Nintendo fan since I was little, so I'm pleased to see the movie doing well.

Nintendo owns many other great gaming properties that are ripe for adaptation:

•   The Legend of Zelda
•   Metroid
•   Fire Emblem
•   Star Fox
•   Donkey Kong
•   F-Zero
•   Eternal Darkness
•   Kirby
•   Pokémon
•   Kid Icarus
•   Xenoblade Chronicles
•   Pikmin
•   Advance Wars

Sega's got:

•   Sonic
•   Streets of Rage
•   Shinobi
•   Phantasy Star
•   Golden Axe
•   Ecco the Dolphin
•   Altered Beast
•   Shenmue

I gather The Last of Us TV adaptation has been very popular. Christophe Gans is currently filming a new Silent Hill movie based on Silent Hill 2, which is one of the greatest horror games ever made and the best instalment in Konami's SH franchise. John Carpenter has said he'd like to adapt Dead Space into a film. Isn't it about time we had a Metal Gear Solid movie? How about Devil May Cry, The Elder Scrolls, Splinter Cell, Fatal Frame/Project Zero, Grand Theft Auto or Soul Calibre?

Videogames are a comparatively untapped source material for filmmakers. Just keep Uwe Boll and Paul W. S. Anderson away from them and make sure the original Japanese companies retain creative oversight. It'll be interesting to see if and how this trend develops.

[thecolorsblend]

It doesn't take much imagination to see how Kirby could succeed as a cutesy kid movie, Metroid could fit into a sci-fi milieu (a very toned down version of Scott's first Alien) and The Legend Of Zelda could fill the void that The Rings Of Power is clearly not interested in filling. The list just goes on from there.

Honestly tho, any of those games getting adapted sounds fine by me if Nintendo is taking an active hand in their development. If anything, the message Nintendo probably received from Mario's success is they need to take on more of a leadership role with these films. Their way works; Hollywood's way doesn't. I don't think that message was lost on anybody from Nintendo. Going forward, I would expect Nintendo to be MORE involved in the films. There's absolutely no reason for them to become less involved at this point.

For Mario specifically, there's a zillion games to use for inspiration. A ten minute animated short based on Luigi's Castle or a feature length version of Mario Is Missing could be great vehicles to develop Luigi a little more. Again, the possibilities just go on and on for continuing the Mario franchise. And who says we can't get a Princess Peach solo film? I bet the little girl audience would love that.

[The Dark Knight]

I have mixed feelings about Nintendo. I owned several consoles and handhelds as a kid, but eventually moved towards Sony. I thought the Switch was a great concept, and I bought one soon after release. But modern Nintendo is a joke. The momentum of launch died away and was left to wither on the vine. Way too many remasters of old games. I wish they were focusing on their software a lot more instead of branching out to films. Because after coming back into the fold a couple of years ago they quickly lost me again.

[The Joker]

You know, I think Colors might be onto something about video game franchises becoming the next big thing. Last year, a Streets of Rage movie project was announced by Sega and Lionsgate, and it's planned to be written by John Wick creator Derek Kolstad. That could be something pretty f***ing cool. The Sega fanboy in me would love to see SOR crossover with Shinobi as a mini-shared universe just for the thrills.

If Legendary can get Street Fighter right then they should consider doing a Final Fight spinoff.

Yeah, there's some possibilities for sure. Seeing the would be Street Fighter '89 "Final Fight" become a cinematic extension of SF would be a pretty cool way in broadening out the SF universe without having to make a direct sequel right away. Honestly, if Legendary's "Street Fighter" is a success, "Final Fight" could be a venue to formally introduce (or acknowledge by cameo) some key fighters prior to the 2nd 'World Warrior' tournament. Sodom was in Final Fight and in the SF Alpha series, so that's a easy one. I could easily envision Balrog having a cameo in a "Final Fight" movie and being evoked as a serious threat, but also one with his own personal ambitions that extend outside of the 'final fight' itself. I don't believe Thunderhawk would feel out of place either in Final Fight. Perhaps saving either Guy, Cody, or Haggar but choosing to remain a mysterious figure....

Videogames are a comparatively untapped source material for filmmakers. Just keep Uwe Boll and Paul W. S. Anderson away from them and make sure the original Japanese companies retain creative oversight. It'll be interesting to see if and how this trend develops.

True. It will be interesting to see how this plays out this go around. As with the early 2000's, following the success of the "Resident Evil" films, and "Tomb Raider" with Angelina Jolie, Hollywood attempted to adapt several video game properties to the big screen with variable success. Properties such as "Mario", "Sonic" Mortal Kombat", "Street Fighter", "Grand Theft Auto", "Legend of Zelda", ect are rather strong and are likely to get a lot of attention due to the brand, while other's would be more of a wild card at the box office. Something like F-Zero, and others, would fall into this category. For instance, even if a cinematic F-Zero is visually stunning, the brand isn't no where near or even close to that of Mario, and could easily tank. The Wachowskis' "Speed Racer" movie is indicative of this. A toon brand sure, but one with name recognition. Especially by late-night early-mid '90's MTV viewers where SR was a staple for awhile there.

[thecolorsblend]

Videogames are a comparatively untapped source material for filmmakers. Just keep Uwe Boll and Paul W. S. Anderson away from them

By my count, 2.5 generations of kids have been coming of age playing video games. The last time comic books were a relevant medium for kids was 1993. You could argue even that, honestly. But at no time after 1993 did kids give much of a toss about comics.

But video games are different. The personal investment that Gen X, Millennials and the Zoomers have in video games is not to be underestimated. If I'm right that video game-based movie franchises are next on the docket for Hollywood, my prediction is that it won't take very long for at least one of these video game films to blow the doors off Endgame's box office numbers. If people flocked to Endgame even though they only had a relatively shallow seven year investment in the Avengers, what will happen when a beloved video game movie comes along that ALL of those generations have fond memories of?

I don't think anybody is qualified to say.

make sure the original Japanese companies retain creative oversight.

I will try to put this delicately. But the Japanese are notoriously protective of their markets, their companies and their IP's. And Nintendo just got the message that their approach works while Hollywood's approach doesn't. They have no reason to let Hollywood movie studios have too much freedom in adapting these games into movies. If anything, Nintendo might be even more hands-on going forward.

I think everything will be okay on this.

[thecolorsblend]

Super Mario Bros. opened to $377.6 million.

If you ask me, that means this thread is officially obsolete. Between Sonic and Mario (and honestly, I don't think we should count Mortal Kombat out yet), I think it's clear that the way forward from here is shared cinematic universes based on video game properties.

All of those video game franchises have been developed by their parent companies for decades and have virtually endless sources of inspiration to draw from.

I'm not guaranteeing that video game franchise movies are the future. But right now, they're showing life and vitality that comic book franchise movies are not.

Mario looks poised to cross $1 billion. Which solidifies my not-as-clever-as-I-thought notion that video game franchises are the future.

Still, there could be room to navigate these new waters. New challenges mean new opportunities.

I'm not a video game guy. At all. I'm an old curmudgeonly comic book guy. But the DC brand has two -- arguably three -- strong video game properties. The Batman: Arkham stuff as well as Injustice: Gods Among Us.

Now, I've about had my fill of Evil Superman. But if the show must go on, well, there's an idea right there with Injustice.

As to Arkham... it seems like that could be organic to what Reeves is already doing. Maybe. I defer to anyone who has actually played the Arkham games when it comes to that. In all media, Batman is a survivor. So, he's the character I'm least concerned about. This is a viable direction for the character tho. I think TDK mentioned this at some point long ago. I thought he was right then and nothing much has changed there.

The arguable third item on the menu is Mortal Kombat Vs. DC Universe. I have to be honest and say that as a DC fan, I would find it highly undignified if the only way a profitable DC movie can be made is a crossover with something else. The fact that the something else is a video game franchise adds insult to injury. But, again, if this is the only way forward, then I guess this is what has to be done.

Years from now, film buffs and historians will look back at how WB (and its heirs) mismanaged and bungled their way through a once-in-history opportunity to capitalize on their most famous characters. I don't want to sound too much like another member around here. But there is mojo to the idea that the DC universe's story in cinema for the past twenty years is one poor management decision after another.

The fact that I'm reduced to suggesting that video games based on DC properties be adapted into feature film should say everything you need to know about how badly these characters have been marketed for decades.

[The Dark Knight]

As to Arkham... it seems like that could be organic to what Reeves is already doing. Maybe. I defer to anyone who has actually played the Arkham games when it comes to that. In all media, Batman is a survivor. So, he's the character I'm least concerned about. This is a viable direction for the character tho. I think TDK mentioned this at some point long ago. I thought he was right then and nothing much has changed there.

There are aspects of the Arkhamverse in The Batman, but I wouldn't say it holds a major influence. I think it's still too real world oriented to have that label. I think characters like full blown Clayface and Killer Croc would feel out of place and would still have to be altered ala the Nolan trilogy. After Reeves they could take that next step, which is less gritty crime drama and more of a heightened BTAS ambience that presents the characters in all their glory, straight off the page. I'm not interested right now (but probably will be when it comes closer) but the Brave and the Bold film could perhaps be that vehicle. Retain Batfleck's fighting style (the warehouse scene) and we're good to go.

As for Nintendo, they'll probably make another movie after this box office result. Perhaps the Legend of Zelda? But again, I'm feeling annoyed by the focus on films when they're a software company. Where's my Super Mario Odyssey 2? Where's my new Metroid game? And so on. It's been years now. They need to up their game (ha) and make me feel excited about them again. Because right now, it feels like they're living off past glories and aren't as hungry as they should be in the realm of their current console.