Warner Bros. may have one of the most successful comic book franchises in Batman, and it may be about to launch a potential new one with Green Lantern, however Marvel are leaps ahead in the movie department. As we already know, they’ve got plans up until 2012 and beyond with The Avengers and possible sequels to Thor, Iron Man and Captain America.

DC, on the other hand, cancelled production Justice League: Mortal (for a number of reasons) and the rights to Superman are currently in a bit of a legal mess. However, things may be about to change. Time Warner announced today that Networks and Film businesses posted record profits this quarter, and a few hints as to where the DC films are headed were dropped in their conference call.

Tuna Amobi – Standard & Poor’s Equity Group

“…on the DC comics initiative it seems like you have a bunch of paddles in the [works] right now can you talk a little bit about the upcoming release strategy there I know you are working on Green Lantern then The Flash, Wonder, Justice League those titles any time frame and how you see the economics of the overall comics really this kind of affect in the studio margins as a whole and any multi platform implication would also be helpful for that area.”

Jeff Bewkes – Chairman & CEO

“If you go to your question on DC, we are going to have a fairly interesting set of announcements and presentations pretty soon like in a matter of weeks I think. About our plans for DC and basically if you look across the title of the whole band of hits whether its Batman, The Dark Knight, Green Lantern coming up, Superman, there have been a huge number of franchised films that have been part of the Warner [tent pole] strategy that’s been the reason for Warner’s unparallel high and consistent earnings advantage over the other studios and DC has already been a part of that and we are now going to outline an even more expansive plan for that in the coming months.”

It will be interesting to hear what they have to say in their big announcement, but it seems they are taking a leaf out of Marvel’s book and are working their way towards a big team movie with the Justice League. The next decade should be a good one for comic book movie lovers!

Despite having a wealth of characters from the DC world, Warner Bros have only managed to make Batman profitable with Batman Begins and The Dark Knight. Catwoman had the wrong creative team and Superman Returns didn’t meet expectations. More recently they have been trying to follow Marvel’s road by having a team movie, the Justice League. However the main problems were that fans didn’t particularly want it, and neither did Australia.

From Variety:

“We’re not off the notion of a Justice League,” Robinov says. “There’s a massive interest and knowledge in the comicbook industry and it takes time to sort of catch up and understand the characters and the history, where they’ve intersected with each other and what their worlds are. That’s part of the education that we’re going through.”

“These are big, iconic characters,” [Greg] Noveck says. “So when you make them into a movie, you’d better be shooting for a pretty high standard. You’re not always going to reach it, but you have to be shooting for it. We’re going to make a Justice League movie, whether it’s now or 10 years from now. But we’re not going to do it and Warners is not going to do it until we know it’s right.“

This is the best thing that could happen. Batman and Superman already have their franchises (well Batman has anyway), so to cross them over and mix them up would be stupid and it wouldn’t work.

So where do DC and Warner Bros go from here?

“We’re having a lot of internal discussions on it,” Horn says. “We haven’t committed to any change at DC at this point,” adding that both Warners and DC are committed to turning “the properties into viable movie product in an intelligent way so that we introduce them like planes on a runway. They have to be set up the right way and lined up the right way and all take off one at a time and fly safe and fly straight.”

So they have decided to do what Marvel are doing. Marvel have launched Iron Man, rebooted The Incredible Hulk, and will soon be giving us Thor and Captain America. All of these will then join together for a big old bash in The Avengers movie in 2011.

DC’s first solo movie off the blocks will most likely be Green Lantern, which already has a script and is apparently ready to go.

Wonder Woman, The Flash, Green Lantern and Robin may not be getting any action in the movie world (yet), however in the gaming world they are taking over. A trailer for DC Universe Online is now up, and if you are a fan of creating your own superheroes, online multiplayer games and DC characters then this game is made for you!

DC Comics are known for their villains such as The Joker and Lex Luthor, however some villains are underused and therefore less known. Take Tyrannosaurus Reich, the Nazi Dinosaur for example. He only appeared in one comic but from the looks of things he should have been in more.

T. Reich was pulled to earth through a dimensional portal from a dimension of Nazi dinosaurs. He briefly wreaks havoc in the downtown before being driven back to his home dimension by a housecat which changes sizes when agitated.

If they used him more often I’m sure DC could have made a movie out of him. A cross between Jurrassic Park and Schindler’s List maybe?

The last thing we heard about the Thor movie back in December, was that the strike had halted things, and when the strike was over production could begin. However, fast forward to now and the writers strike is well and truly over, but it seems production hasn’t started as we were told. Stardust director Matthew Vaughn told Empire Magazine:

“We’re in a holding pattern at the moment,” he said. “It’s up to Marvel, they have to decide if they want to make the movie and then we take it from there.”

From what I recall the script has already been written, it may just need a polish. Screenwriter Mark Protosevich said that audiences will be “pleasantly surprised” by this interpretation of the character. Yet now Vaughn doesn’t even know if it is happening. He also said:

“Well, the main role is going to be played by someone totally unknown,” he said. “It can’t be a star, it’s got to be someone totally unknown.”

“I think you have to respect that it is comic book and silly to be frank, so you have to combine that with a modern style and hopefully come up with something fresh. I think we can come up with something special.”

I am glad they are planning on an unknown as it will make things more believable, rather than ‘oh look that’s Sean Bean standing on a bucket with prosthetic muscles’. Not that Sean Bean has been cast, I just think he looks a bit Thorish.

It is now up to Marvel, whom I truth will make the right decision.