Four-Color World: The Comic Book Thread

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

Agreed.

It also breaks my heart that such a fine actor like Hackman retired on Welcome to Mooseport. The Royal Tenenbaums would have made a great last picture for him. The guy was also a workhorse. Ever check out his credits? He did like 12,000 movies a year it seemed. The guy never stopped working. Then again, he played Gene Hackman in a lot of his roles, so how hard could that be?

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

I think I heard Robert Duvall say on one of the podcasts that Hackman was in pretty bad health and had been for awhile... If I remember the story correctly, Duvall, Hackman and Dustin Hoffman were all roommates at one point very, very early in their careers...

Something I've found out the hard way about any of the superhero movies... If you enjoyed the film, don't ever say that in front of someone who falls into the "comic book nerd" category since they're all pretty much incapable of enjoying any of these movies, although Batman Begins and Dark Knight might have slightly escaped some of that whiny criticism.

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

Hmmm, I had read other places that Hackman was in decent shape for his age.

According to Wiki he has not been "reclusive" -- he's made some cable TV appearances and done a few other things, including dabbling in writing historical novels.

Supposedly last October Hackman got in a minor kerfuffle when he slapped a homeless guy (or bum, if you will) who was bugging him for money in Santa Fe, where he lives.


He was very good as the sleazy amoral lawyer in his penultimate movie, "Runaway Jury," which came out in 2004 just before the dumpy "Mooseport" (mainly sunk by Ray Romano's deadpan mugging).

In "Runaway Jury" Hackman's Rankin Fitch is a perfect model for how he could have played the slimy businessman version of Lex Luthor:

WENDALL ROARK (played by Hoffman): You know what, Fitch? You're gonna lose.

FITCH (Hackman): Oh, I doubt it.

ROARK: Well, maybe not this case, maybe not the next, but someday, you know -- some day. I've seen it before with guys like you. You wanna know why?

FITCH: Why?

ROARK: Because you cannot carry that much contempt without it becoming malignant, until you're gonna be all alone in a room full of shadows, and all you're gonna have is the memories of all those people's lives you have destroyed.

FITCH: That's a good story, Wendall. But it's just further proof of why you can't beat me. Because you may be right. But the thing of it is: I don't give a shit. And what's more: I never have.



Substitute "Superman" for Roark and "Luthor" for Fitch, and you could not possibly write a better encapsulation of what their whole battle is supposed to be about.

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

I remember him getting hit by a car while riding his bicycle last year.

http://www.tmz.com/2012/01/21/gene-hackman-bike-damage-photos/

Favorite performances were French Connection, Unforgiven, and Crimson Tide. Just love that guy.

And while I'm not a big critic of comic book movies getting every single thing right, I still think Batman would have bled out from that stab wound.

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

There are levels of comic book nerd. I'm sure most people would consider me to be one, but more often than not I've enjoyed the comic book movies I've seen.

It's real simple. Just remind yourself that it's not the book. It's based on the book and should at least try to get the characters' right, but don't drive yourself nuts over the details.

Then again, I'm a big fan of alternate universes in comics, so that probably helps.

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

Sony had to reboot Spider-Man. They weren't getting the cast back for an SM4, so they had to start over or the rights would've reverted back to Marvel, who would love to get them. A small part of me hoped that ASM would be a train wreck so Sony would give up on the franchise and let Marvel have it.

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

You just don't know the right nerds. I've enjoyed plenty of them; I just accepted a long time ago that they weren't going to be super-true to the comics.

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

With the proliferation of alternate universes over the last decade (DC's ongoing mess, Ultimate Marvel, Marvel Zombies, etc.), I think it's gotten a bit easier for people to accept that the movie versions are just an extension of this. As long as they don't betray the core character traits, like having Superman or Batman suddenly become serial killers, there's not much outrage.
The problem comes when they base a movie script off an existing comic book story. The "Days of Future Past" movie, for example, was so well-regarded in comic book form that to wander too far from it would be a disaster. If the climax of the movie isn't Wolverine getting fried by a Sentinel, there's going to be issues.

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

I'm holding out for the Green Arrow movie.

I know there's a TV show. Haven't seen it though.

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

Spoiler alert, dammit!

(kidding)

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

Watchmen was perfectly true to its book and it was terrible.

Comic book fans are like newspaper readers. They know what they want, but they don't know what that is.

 

Re: The Dark Knight is done, now is it Superman's turn?

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10102261205268336

The previews make this look fantastic.