Get Serious

As much as I love to hem and haw about the missteps of comic book movies from the past few years, I do have to admit that things could be much worse. Things could be like the 90s, when comic book adaptations seemed to be filmed with the sole purpose of selling toys to the little ones. The straw that broke the camel's back was 1997's atrocious Batman & Robin; a film seemingly designed to be as campy and stupid as possible, and not in a good way. It was a two hour long commercial for plastic toys and rampant product placement. If I could point to one movie that triggered the glut of more mature, darker, more serious superhero movies of today, Batman & Robin would be that movie.

Thank god that Hollywood got smart, realized that comic readership is skewed towards an older demographic, and started making comic book movies that finally targeted a logical demographic. And just look at the success they've had. I can complain all I want about some of these movies, but the truth is, they're no longer absolute garbage, and that's got to be worth something. Comic movies got serious, and not a moment too soon.