With Marvel bigger then ever, Superman and Batman back, superheroes were at their highest and surprisingly, they would not stop there, going above and beyond. Unfortunately there are certain steps that must be taken to actually manage to go above and beyond and, like every genre, the bigger they get, the more stinkers you have to shove to the side in order to get to the good stuff. Today we’ll do a bit of digging starting with My Super Ex-Girlfriend from 2006.

My Super Ex-Girlfriend was a comedy that tried to spoof the superhero genre, it wasn’t Elektra bad but it wasn’t good either. So it only made $22.5 million in North America and $60.9 million worldwide. Coincidence that Uma Thurman’s career took a nose dive after this with her only noteworthy appearance in the past 5 years being a very small role in Percy Jackson and the Olympians? I think not.

Next up is Zoom, a movie I had no idea even existed so I’m seriously scraping the bottom here. This came out in August 2006 starring Tim Allen and from the look of the poster it could be another The Incredibles rip-off… or not, I won’t bother looking more into it. Oh, almost forgot, $11.9 million in North America and $12.5 million worldwide (yes, it made only $0.5 million internationally).

Ghost Rider was the first superhero offering of 2007 and after opening with $45 million, it went on to gross $115.8 million in North America and $228.7 million worldwide. This had been a dream project of actor Nicholas Cage for years and from a financial point of view, it performed well enough but quality wise, the movie, well, it kind of sucked. There’s a sequel coming out next year, probably Sony thinking that people forgot the first one.

In May 2007 Spider-Man, the biggest player of them all back then, returned in Spider-Man 3, an overblown sequel that palled in comparison to the first two movies. What makes matters worse is previews made it look like the second coming and everyone was pumped, it was by far the most highly anticipated movie of 2007 and it showed just that opening weekend, scoring a record breaking $151.1 million. In North America it made $336.5 million, so a good deal less then previous entries but the 554.3 million it made internationally, made damn well sure that worldwide, this would become the new superhero box office standard with a whopping $890.7 million. What happened here was Raimi didn’t know if this would end up being his last Spider-Man flick or not, so he went all out, way all out, going overboard one to many times (emo Peter Parker is not something easily forgotten). What ended up as the highest grossing entry in the series would also bring the death of the Tobey Maguire-Sam Raimi Spider-Man in favor of a new take on the superhero, one very bold reboot slated for 2012 and simply called The Amazing Spider-Man. Naturally, this wasn’t a properly that Sony wanted to lose to Marvel anytime soon considering the Spider-Man movies were the top 3 highest grossing superhero flicks at the time.

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, opening in June 2007, was the sequel to the 2004 Fantastic Four. Everyone returned for this and it showed, as it was that same movie we got three years before, just with a bigger budget. While it did make a decent amount of cash, $131.9 million in North America (down from the first one) and $289 million worldwide (also down), it wasn’t worth it to Fox to risk money on a 3rd movie that could have made a lot less. That being said, neither of these flicks were particularly bad, just really really average and sustaining such a franchise for more then 2 entries is not an easy feat. In other words Fox cashed out on Fantastic Four before the eventual hitting of the bottom.

While Fox avoided the bottom, we won’t, because what comes next is Superhero Movie from March 2008, an abomination of epic proportions, on the same level as Elektra and Catwomen. This is the very definition of a BAD movie. This was so bad that it actually tried to spoof movies that were not even out at the time, talk about a lack of ideas. A superhero spoof done right could be comedy gold but this movie doesn’t even deserve the bottom of a latrine. $25.8 million in North America and $71.2 million worldwide makes me really sad knowing that much better movies made a lot less money.

So there’s a saying, if you’re down, you can only go up and with Iron Man, released just 2 months later, we went way up. This movie really blew it out of the park with fantastic reviews (94% on Rotten Tomatoes) and phenomenal success. With $318.4 million in North America and $585.1 million worldwide, this was the movie that started the best summer superheroes have ever had. Not just that, it also relaunched Robert Downey Jr.’s career and put Iron Man on the map, showing the world that it wasn’t just Spider-Man, Batman, Super-Man and X-Men out there. Now that I think about it, there sure is a lot of “MAN” on there. Iron Man was also the first 100% Marvel produced superhero flick, not bad at all for a first try.

Now what Marvel were gearing for with Iron Man was an epic superhero team-up based on The Avengers comics. For that movie to happen, they needed to first introduce the heroes that would be part of that story in their own movies and hopefully, those movies would become hits. They obviously succeeded  with Iron Man and Hulk was next. Now this wasn’t just any Hulk cause you see, back in 2003 we already had a Hulk that didn’t exactly set the world on fire and wasn’t particularly faithful to the comics either. So Marvel tried their luck with something different, a reboot called The Incredible Hulk. Now because this only features the origin story in a few clips during the intro of the movie, it might as well function as a sequel to the 2003 Hulk. Starring Edward Norton, The Incredible Hulk made $134.8 million in North America and $263.4 million worldwide, hardly the level of success Marvel were expecting from the character. Now because I live in the future (not really) I can tell you that in the end, Marvel went with another Hulk for The Avengers, so that makes it three Hulks in just 9 years, crazy, right?

Next part, well, it’s all been leading to this so I might as well get it out of the way, The Dark Knight and also a bunch of other great and not so great movies.

Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.

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Two months ago we learned that Marvel TV and ABC Studios were pairing up to create a new Hulk TV series, the first to be created by Marvel’s new TV division. Deadline now has the news that the series is in fact being created by Guillermo del Toro (Hellboy, Pan’s Labyrinth), and David Eick (executive producer of the 2004 Battlestar Galactica series).

Apparently the Hulk series will follow the superhero’s “origin story” (we’re getting a lot of those lately, aren’t we?), Bruce Banner being “in his mid-twenties, less reactive and more energized as the world is still his oyster.” I don’t have a problem with that, I just hope they get the actual origin out of the way pretty quickly – the 2008 Incredible Hulk benefitted greatly from getting straight to the point, instead of rehashing the origins yet again. But then I suppose if it’s told in a way that is different enough, it’ll be fine.

Del Toro, who has already had previous experience with comic book adaptations Blade II and the two Hellboy movies, will create the story together with Eick, and subject to availability, will direct the pilot episode. Eick will write the script.

Del Toro’s biggest talent is, arguably, his ability to create wonderfully twisted monsters and creatures, and provide strange and fantastic imagery. Naturally, he will oversee the look of the Hulk character, which will this time employ a combination of puppetry, prosthetics, and CGI, instead of just CGI like was featured in the 2003 and 2008 Hulk films. The new Hulk is “expected to draw on previous comic book incarnations, as well as the original 1978-82 Incredible Hulk TV series, with a few wild tweaks on the old look.” Wild tweaks? How “wild” are they willing to go, I wonder?

Del Toro commented on the matter:

“I have always been attracted at the combination of comic book heroics and monsters, Jack Kirby’s Demon or Kamandi or DC’s Deadman or Marvel’s Dr. Strange, Morbius, Metamorpho, Mike Mignola’s Hellboy, etc,” Del Toro said. He said that The Hulk has been at the top of his list and he first pursued it as a feature film around the time of the 2002 release of Blade II, which he directed. Del Toro added that, with partner Eick “we coalesced a respectful but powerful way of retelling the Banner/Hulk story in a fresh way.”

Not to be pessimistic, but I’d be more excited about new properties such as Deadman or Dr. Strange, than a Hulk show.

Eick also had something to say:

“I’ve enjoyed the challenging, rewarding process of revisiting beloved characters,” he said. Eick called The Hulk “one of the crown jewels of the Marvel world for generations” ans said it was a “dream opportunity to join one of my all-time filmmaking heroes, Guillermo del Toro, in a faithful but unique retelling of the primal, emotionally-rich tale of one of my all-time comic book.”

It doesn’t seem to have been clarified, but it appears as though this will share a separate continuity to Marvel Studios’ current Avengers film universe, and I don’t know if that’s a good or a bad thing. I’d prefer Marvel TV shows about characters that are not already being explored in the movies…but that doesn’t mean I can’t look forward to this, del Toro’s enthusiasm for the project, and the hopefully-large roster of villains that will be employed. Perhaps the terrible Toad Men, pictured above, will make an appearance?

This is still in incredibly early stages, but Marvel is looking to release the Hulk TV series after the release of The Avengers in 2012, so they can exploit the Hulk’s appearance in that film, and get people watching. It will most likely begin airing in fall of that year. Are you excited? Or skeptical?

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With the launch of Marvel Television in June (after the acquisition of Marvel by Disney/ABC), there was to be a push for TV shows based around some of Marvel’s vast collection of characters. Deadline has revealed that the first of these will be The Incredible Hulk.

The live-action series is apparently in “very early stages” of development, and was focused on by Marvel’s TV head Jeph Loeb (who has written and produced for Smallville, Lost, and Heroes). It was one of two priorities, the other being Cloak and Dagger, which will be developed for ABC Family. Loeb is currently waiting to meet with writers for ideas for the latter.

The Hulk previously saw TV fame with CBS’s The Incredible Hulk, which ran from 1977-1982. In said series, the Hulk looked like this - maybe Marvel just want to make sure that the younger generation never see that.

That said, I think I echo the sentiments of almost everyone when I say: “now?” Will it tie into the current Marvel Studios’ Avengers universe? Bruce Banner has been cast as three different actors in recent memory, and a fourth one would just make things worse. Does Marvel Television seek to do something similar to Ron Howard’s Dark Tower project, or would this be a completely separate entity? How likely is it that Ruffalo and the continuity will carry over to TV? Not very. I’m not sure about this – another Hulk in such a little time seems a bit like overkill, especially with so many other projects that could have gone to series. Please not another, different Hulk.

And according to Live Feed, ABC were presented with a lot of potentials: Heroes for Hire, The Eternals, Ka-Zar, Daughters of the Dragon, The Punisher, Moon Knight and Agents of Atlas, Alter Ego. They should have gone with something lesser-known, in my opinion. Or at least one that doesn’t have its own storyline going on concurrently on the big screen. Still, there’s the possibility that it could tie in, and for now, let’s just hope Jeph Loeb and Marvel Television know what they’re doing. It could still be great.

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Yesterday news broke at HitFix that Marvel intends to re-cast the role of Bruce Banner for The Avengers, replacing Edward Norton who we saw in The Incredible Hulk in 2008. Fans have been generally against the idea as it will mean the character will be played by three different actors in three different movies, which obviously isn’t good for continuity.

Now Marvel Studios President of Production Kevin Feige has released a statement on the matter, and from the sounds of it Norton’s lack of team spirit may have been a factor in the re-casting decision.

From HitFix:

“We have made the decision to not bring Ed Norton back to portray the title role of Bruce Banner in the Avengers. Our decision is definitely not one based on monetary factors, but instead rooted in the need for an actor who embodies the creativity and collaborative spirit of our other talented cast members. The Avengers demands players who thrive working as part of an ensemble, as evidenced by Robert, Chris H, Chris E, Sam, Scarlett, and all of our talented casts. We are looking to announce a name actor who fulfills these requirements, and is passionate about the iconic role in the coming weeks.”

With Comic Con 2010 taking place between July 22-25th we may get an announcement then as there will be panels for both Thor and Captain America.

I would much prefer Ed Norton to return, but if they hire a talented actor it may defuse some of the negativity from fans. I just hope they keep The Hulk’s appearance the same as when we saw him in 2008. They can’t expect us to just forget two Hulk movies ever happened.

Who do you think should be Bruce Banner 3.0?

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It’s the weekend and there’s not much news so I thought I’d post this rather cool fanmade trailer I came across today. Earlier this year Marvel Studios released a Hulk Vs. Wolverine DVD, however due to different studios owning different character rights we will probably never get to see such an epic clash on the big screen for many years, if ever. YouTube user silverlightsaber knows this, and had decided to do something about it by making his own Incredible Hulk vs. Wolverine trailer, and it’s not bad.

If the trailer made you tingle in places you never knew existed then you will probably enjoy the Batman vs. Terminator trailer which was posted a few months ago. Click here to watch it!

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In 2012 there’s a superhero party and everyone’s invited. Well almost everyone anyway. Last week producer Kevin Feige revealed that The Avengers line-up will consist of Iron Man, Thor, Captain America and Nick Fury. We may also see appearances from some members of the Hulk universe and Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow. But who are these Hulk universe people? And what about The Hulk himself? Well Edward Norton was recently asked if The Hulk was in his future and he responded with:

“I probably won’t comment on that just because they keep a pretty tight rein on what they are letting out,” Norton said in a group interview today.

Deferring to Marvel suggests a cordial relationship with the studio. Rumors surrounded the release of The Incredible Hulk that Norton was not happy with the final cut. Already he seemed an unusual participant in a major superhero movie, and the scant press he did fueled rumors that he preferred an alternate cut of the film. Now he is suggesting that he’s following company orders.

“I’ll let them [address it],” Norton said.

Now, I don’t really like reading too much into quotes out of context, but if he wasn’t going to be playing Bruce Banner again wouldn’t he just say “no”, rather than what he did say? What makes this more interesting is that NuketheFridge are reporting that we could be seeing Bruce Banner in Iron Man 2:

Our Marvel Movie mole has informed Nuke The Fridge of yet another cameo in the upcoming “Iron Man 2” film due out next summer. Our confidential source first reported that Stan Lee will make a brief appearance in the second Iron Man film as Larry King. Now rumor has it that Edward Norton will have a possible cameo as both Bruce Banner and the Hulk.

This should be taken with a pinch of salt and if it is true we probably won’t know until Iron Man 2 is released next May. However, Robert Downey Jr. did appear in The Incredible Hulk in a scene after the credits, so maybe Marvel want Edward Norton to return the favour?

If Edward Norton and The Hulk do appear in Iron Man 2 then it could mean The Hulk may be attending the superhero party after all. And who wouldn’t want to see The Hulk in The Avengers?

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Last years winner was The Golden Compass

As well as announcing Hugh Jackman as the new host for next February’s Oscars, the Academy have revealed the 15 movies in the running for the 2008 visual effects Oscar.

Here is the list in alphabetical order:
Australia
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
Cloverfield
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
The Day the Earth Stood Still
Hancock
Hellboy II: The Golden Army
The Incredible Hulk
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
Iron Man
Journey to the Center of the Earth
The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor
Quantum of Solace
The Spiderwick Chronicles

This award is probably the one people care about the most, seeing as though this category contains movies people actually see.

In early January the list will be narrowed down to 7, then on January 15th members of the visual effects branch will watch excerpts from the movies, and the list will be narrowed down to 3.

Which movie do you think deserves the Oscar?

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MTV spoke with The Incredible Hulk producer Gale Anne Hurd, who said she has every intention on making a follow-up and that Edward Norton is signed on:

“It’s all going to depend on the screenplay and where his character goes in any sequel, because he does have a multiple-picture deal,” she said of Norton, who told us recently that he’s waiting to hear from Marvel regarding Hulk’s future. “[Norton's situation] is the same with every franchise like this, when you have one of the top actors of his generation.”

But first, we are most likely going to see him in The Avengers:

“Next, he’s likely to appear in an ‘Avengers’ movie, but that’s completely up to Marvel,” she explained. “It’s wonderful that Marvel now controls so many of their own characters, and they can create a Marvel universe in film and populate it with so many of their characters who naturally exist together. I think an ‘Avengers’ film is a very exciting prospect.”

There has been talk recently that if the Hulk does appear in The Avengers, he will most likely be the villain.

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The Incredible Hulk DVD will be released on 21st October and, as with most DVD releases, we get a few previews in advance to show us what goodies the DVD contains. Below are 2 new behind-the-scenes clips off the bonus features for the DVD.  One gives a cool look at Edward Norton “Becoming the Hulk”, another takes a look at the casting and why Edward Norton was selected to play the Hulk, and the third shows Tim Roth getting to grips with the ‘speed running’ scene.

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You see that redish smudge in the snow? Well that’s Captain America apparently. It was found in an alternate opening scene in the special features of The Incredible Hulk DVD. It shows Bruce Banner wandering around in the Arctic. Apparently when an avalanche comes crashing down towards the camera near the end, you can see Captain America and his shield frozen in the ice.

Thanks to FilmSchoolRejects for taking the screenshot and then putting circles in to highlight Captain America’s corpse.

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