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Let's pretend for a second that a major motion picture studio is going to make a new big budget movie based on a major event in either the DC or Marvel Universes i.e COIE, OWAW, IG, WWH etc. Now let's also pretend that the writers of said movie actually care more about making a movie that die hard comic book fans will enjoy rather than making money.
Is there any event in either comic book universe that is so sacred that it would prevent a movie being made according to these stipulations? No matter who is cast, who is directing, or how much money is put into the project.

Dos

What will please "die hard" fans will vary depending on which fan you talk to. I don't think there's a set criteria that a director could work toward thinking "ok, this is for FANS, not profit."

Also, if your criteria for that is simply adherence to the source material, that can backfire as easily as work. The mediums are not equivalent.

I think there's a lot of stories that wouldn't translate well to film, regardless of writer, budget, etc. Many stories are way too unbelievable to produce convincingly on the large screen.

I don't think that there is any "sacred cow" material. As digi pointed the issue is just that some material flat out translates better to the silver screen then others.

I think it's part of the reason Galactus failed so hard in the FF movie (among other things that failed in that film). Would a giant pink and purple douche standing in Manhattan have worked any better? No, at least not without the perfect director and portrayal. There's such an insanely fine line to walk with stuff like that. By contrast, it's WAY easier to, say, make a tragic lizard man run around Manhattan and have audiences not scoff at it. I'm not saying it can't be done, but I wouldn't touch anything cosmic if I were a movie director doing a superhero film.

Same with the GL film. It was bad, sure, but I think the writers and director were fighting an uphill battle trying to portray a yellow monster that represents an abstract concept. Obviously the Avengers is the exception here, but I honestly don't think they did anything as dangerous in terms of subject material. I actually think the initial Thor movie was way harder to pull off in terms of believability.

The biggest issue I could see is the constant Name-Dropping that occurs in comics.

If you had Death of Superman and wanted to make it relevent, you'd need to establish the following characters in a movie setting (Sort of like Marvel Did):

Blue Beetle
Guy Gardner
Guardian
Supergirl (Matrix)
Booster Gold
Maxima
Fire
Ice
Bloodwynd (And establish the fact that Martian Manhunter has changed into him)

I'm sure there's more, but this is if you're TRULY trying to appeal to the hardcorest of the hardcore fans. Frankly, all this would be unnecessary to me.

Originally posted by Blight
The biggest issue I could see is the constant Name-Dropping that occurs in comics.

If you had Death of Superman and wanted to make it relevent, you'd need to establish the following characters in a movie setting (Sort of like Marvel Did):

Blue Beetle
Guy Gardner
Guardian
Supergirl (Matrix)
Booster Gold
Maxima
Fire
Ice
Bloodwynd (And establish the fact that Martian Manhunter has changed into him)

I'm sure there's more, but this is if you're TRULY trying to appeal to the hardcorest of the hardcore fans. Frankly, all this would be unnecessary to me.

If it were for film, they'd change most of that, or ignore it. Stories like these can and should be handled in recurring media, like TV shows. For example, as much as I enjoyed the Avengers movie, Avengers: ESM handled the "invasion" story so much more thoroughly than a movie ever could.

Originally posted by Digi
If it were for film, they'd change most of that, or ignore it. Stories like these can and should be handled in recurring media, like TV shows. For example, as much as I enjoyed the Avengers movie, Avengers: ESM handled the "invasion" story so much more thoroughly than a movie ever could. It's true. You have to hold that fine line well. I like to see crossovers, it's one of the things that makes comics awesome. But there are certain things that must be modified.

I meant EMH* Not sure what ESM is supposed to mean.

Originally posted by Digi
I think it's part of the reason Galactus failed so hard in the FF movie (among other things that failed in that film). Would a giant pink and purple douche standing in Manhattan have worked any better? No, at least not without the perfect director and portrayal. There's such an insanely fine line to walk with stuff like that. By contrast, it's WAY easier to, say, make a tragic lizard man run around Manhattan and have audiences not scoff at it. I'm not saying it can't be done, but I wouldn't touch anything cosmic if I were a movie director doing a superhero film.

Same with the GL film. It was bad, sure, but I think the writers and director were fighting an uphill battle trying to portray a yellow monster that represents an abstract concept. Obviously the Avengers is the exception here, but I honestly don't think they did anything as dangerous in terms of subject material. I actually think the initial Thor movie was way harder to pull off in terms of believability.

You raise an interesting point with regard to Galactus in the FF movie. I remember there being a fanboy outcry that Galactus wasn't shown in his entirety and I was one of those voices. However looking back at it, that probably would have failed as well. I'm just not sure how well that one can portray that concept on film without it being corny. Perhaps familarity with concepts like Godzilla and the like would somewhat compensate for the size factor. But outside of that, just what exactly do you do with the character? I mean it's frickin Galactus, so his demise however it would've came would have almost certainly upset fans as well

Originally posted by dmills
You raise an interesting point with regard to Galactus in the FF movie. I remember there being a fanboy outcry that Galactus wasn't shown in his entirety and I was one of those voices. However looking back at it, that probably would have failed as well. I'm just not sure how well that one can portray that concept on film without it being corny. Perhaps familarity with concepts like Godzilla and the like would somewhat compensate for the size factor. But outside of that, just what exactly do you do with the character? I mean it's frickin Galactus, so his demise however it would've came would have almost certainly upset fans as well There was far more wrong with the fantastic four movie than just galactus, though I believe it is possible to show galactus in a physical form without it being too cheesy.

Originally posted by Blight
There was far more wrong with the fantastic four movie than just galactus, though I believe it is possible to show galactus in a physical form without it being too cheesy.

They seemed to get the core concept right.

The Thing as a tragic monster figure

Red is smart as hell

Sue is eye candy

Johnny is an ego maniac

Doom, like the parasite that he is, sneaks around in the background waiting for an opportune moment to leech on and steal someone else's powers.

What did they miss?

Thing doesn't look good. The actor portraying doom didn't fit at all. The only actor to actually get the character right was Johnny Storm's character and an argument could be made for Grimm. If you think the only thing the fantastic four amount to is "Reed is smart as hell, Sue is eye candy, Johnny is an ego maniac, Doom, like the parasite that he is, sneaks around in the background waiting foran opportune moment to leech on and steal someone else's powers" then you have a lot to learn about them.

Rofl. Go read pretty much any review on the film. There's a lot they did wrong. And I honestly can't believe you think the Doom portrayal was spot on. He was butchered pretty thoroughly by the movies.

Also lulz at Sue as nothing but eye candy. Do you read FF?

Anyway, this is threatening to sidetrack us. My point was about Galactus alone, setting aside the rest of the movie. I think there's a lot to be said for the difficulty in translating anything that isn't Earth-based in comics to movies.

Originally posted by Digi
Rofl. Go read pretty much any review on the film. There's a lot they did wrong. And I honestly can't believe you think the Doom portrayal was spot on. He was butchered pretty thoroughly by the movies.

Also lulz at Sue as nothing but eye candy. Do you read FF?

Anyway, this is threatening to sidetrack us. My point was about Galactus alone, setting aside the rest of the movie. I think there's a lot to be said for the difficulty in translating anything that isn't Earth-based in comics to movies. What makes Superhero movies different from Sci-fi or fantasy movies that tackle similar non-earth based concepts?

Originally posted by Digi
Rofl. Go read pretty much any review on the film. There's a lot they did wrong. And I honestly can't believe you think the Doom portrayal was spot on. He was butchered pretty thoroughly by the movies.

Also lulz at Sue as nothing but eye candy. Do you read FF?

Anyway, this is threatening to sidetrack us. My point was about Galactus alone, setting aside the rest of the movie. I think there's a lot to be said for the difficulty in translating anything that isn't Earth-based in comics to movies. I agree with this. Though I do think certain ones can be done easier than others. The Kree wouldn't be as hard as, say, a flying silver guy on a surf board.

Its not hard to translate there is just a lack of imagination

GL could have been cool but they picked a villain, out of the hundreds available, that no non-comic reader would have any real interest in seeing, same with the FF movie.

UOriginally posted by Blight
Thing doesn't look good. The actor portraying doom didn't fit at all. The only actor to actually get the character right was Johnny Storm's character and an argument could be made for Grimm. If you think the only thing the fantastic four amount to is "Reed is smart as hell, Sue is eye candy, Johnny is an ego maniac, Doom, like the parasite that he is, sneaks around in the background waiting foran opportune moment to leech on and steal someone else's powers" then you have a lot to learn about them. Originally posted by Digi
Rofl. Go read pretty much any review on the film. There's a lot they did wrong. And I honestly can't believe you think the Doom portrayal was spot on. He was butchered pretty thoroughly by the movies.

Also lulz at Sue as nothing but eye candy. Do you read FF?

Anyway, this is threatening to sidetrack us. My point was about Galactus alone, setting aside the rest of the movie. I think there's a lot to be said for the difficulty in translating anything that isn't Earth-based in comics to movies.

Lol. I was being facetious gents. Well mostly.

Originally posted by Scoobless
GL could have been cool but they picked a villain, out of the hundreds available, that no non-comic reader would have any real interest in seeing, same with the FF movie. I think the second was set up for Sinestro to be the villain and that he would have been an awesome.

My brother doesn't read comics but he loves Wolverine (watched all the movies and after that even read a couple of Ult X-men issues) says Logan is badass. I can say for sure he wont appreciate it if Wolverine shows up in the next movie sporting yellow tights and I could waste all my breath explaining that its a uniform and it is symbolic etc the answer would still be - "WTF He's wearing TIGHTS!" Same goes for Galactus and many others. Some things just dont work for movies because they're aimed at bigger audience.

Originally posted by Digi
Rofl. Go read pretty much any review on the film. There's a lot they did wrong. And I honestly can't believe you think the Doom portrayal was spot on. He was butchered pretty thoroughly by the movies.

Also lulz at Sue as nothing but eye candy. Do you read FF?

Anyway, this is threatening to sidetrack us. My point was about Galactus alone, setting aside the rest of the movie. I think there's a lot to be said for the difficulty in translating anything that isn't Earth-based in comics to movies. I think dooms a lot harder to pull off than people think. I think in all the animated and movie mediums the only doom I think was spot on was the one from EMH.

Sinestro is much easier to write. If a GL2 gets green-lit (har!) it will be a lot better almost by default, even if the movie's other flaws remain intact.

Originally posted by Newjak
What makes Superhero movies different from Sci-fi or fantasy movies that tackle similar non-earth based concepts?

...and if I told you there hasn't been a good Superman movie?

313

Different eras, so it's hard to say. We accept Zod and call him badass with the same nostalgia-goggles that we love Flash Gordon with. A similarly hokey movie (it IS hokey) would get destroyed in today's film world.

Like with Superman Returns. They trotted out Kyrptonite, Luthor as played by a competent actor, told Routh to do an exact Christopher Reeve impression (which he actually did remarkably well), and it was killed by fans and critics. We have higher standards for sci-fi films.

That said, Superman doesn't feel as alien because they make it a point to have him hauling hay bales during the exposition. He also lives on Earth and looks human. Try recreating some odd storyline like the rebirth of Krypton on film...THEN it would be comparable to Galactus parking on our lawn, or carting off to Oa while an abstract embodiment hunts you down.

The writers of Doctor Who had, at one point, a standing rule that any new Doctor had to spend their entire first season on Earth...because audiences didn't take to non-Earth stories as well. Even at the end of the 10th Doctor's run, long after the show had become too established to fail, they had a minimum percentage of stories that had to happen on Earth, for fear of losing their audience.

Originally posted by Blight
The biggest issue I could see is the constant Name-Dropping that occurs in comics.

If you had Death of Superman and wanted to make it relevent, you'd need to establish the following characters in a movie setting (Sort of like Marvel Did):

Blue Beetle
Guy Gardner
Guardian
Supergirl (Matrix)
Booster Gold
Maxima
Fire
Ice
Bloodwynd (And establish the fact that Martian Manhunter has changed into him)

I'm sure there's more, but this is if you're TRULY trying to appeal to the hardcorest of the hardcore fans. Frankly, all this would be unnecessary to me. the superman/doomsday animated feature skipped all of those lames

Originally posted by psycho gundam
the superman/doomsday animated feature skipped all of those lames And it was one of the worst DC Animated films...

it was shakespeare compared to public enemies which adhered more to the original material

for the sake of brevity, doomsday just went straight at superman and beat him into a death-like state, no need to prove his lethality against characters dc barely cares about

Originally posted by psycho gundam
it was shakespeare compared to public enemies which adhered more to the original material Okay ermmhappy

at least admit it was better than public enemies, i need to know intelligent life is on the other end of this machine

Doomsday was not better. They were close, but Doomsday is the worst one. The problem with Public Enemies is that the Source Material wasn't really that good. DoS is better.

Originally posted by psycho gundam
http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g386/psychogundam1/gifs/uteu.gif

Originally posted by Newjak
I think the second was set up for Sinestro to be the villain and that he would have been an awesome. If they wanted to make GL a badass movie franchise like Iron Man, Batman, or X-Men then they should have planned for a trilogy from the get go. The first movie could have left out Parallax entirely and focused on Hal, Sinestro, and the eventual betrayal. Kinda like the second Star Wars trilogy, except much less gay.

The only good part of Superman Doomsday was the opening fight. The rest was crap.

Public Enemies had more quality, even if it skimped quite a bit.

Originally posted by -Pr-
The only good part of Superman Doomsday was the opening fight. The rest was crap.

Public Enemies had more quality, even if it skimped quite a bit.

They should do Green Lantern: Rebirth as an animated DC film.

Originally posted by JakeTheBank
They should do Green Lantern: Rebirth as an animated DC film.
100%

I liked the fights in Public Enemies.

Not fond of the Superman/Batman giant rocket thing.

Green Lantern put too much stuff into a 2 hour film. It felt like the film didn't know what it wanted to be and simply threw stuff out there hoping it would be a hit.

Kyle would have made the movie an Avengers-like hit though.

Justice League Doom was the best modern League movie for me.

Also, Hal = Guy > John >>> Kyle.

Guy the Great would make any movie at least B- grade just for appearing in it.

Originally posted by -Pr-
Justice League Doom was the best modern League movie for me.

Also, Hal = Guy > John >>> Kyle.

i agree with Doom, the rest is simply non-sense.

You guys see guy in the new gl episode?

Yes.

Glorious.

Yeah I thought they did a fantastic job with him.

Originally posted by Blight
You guys see guy in the new gl episode? I have yet to watch the show. Is it half as good as YJ?

Originally posted by JakeTheBank
Guy the Great would make any movie at least B- grade just for appearing in it.

Guy would actually be necessary for any live action GL movie, IMO.

The Iron Man franchise has proven that a...lively..personality can carry a movie far. Hal's too boring, frankly, to carry a movie. John's too stereotypical, and Kyle's too complex to flesh out.

Originally posted by Zack Fair
I have yet to watch the show. Is it half as good as YJ?
It's a bit more than half as good as Young Justice.