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DC Movies- if at first you don't succeed...


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2 hours ago, Matt the Bruins said:

Snyder has been sufficiently dismissive of any criticism about his work 

 

He barely has anything he can truly call 'his'...300, Watchmen and BvS (his 3 most successful) are basically works by other, much more talented, creators.  300 (admittedly a good movie) is nearly a page for page copy.  Life is a lot easier when your storyboards are already done for you.

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Comic books are essentially storyboards and its deeply annoying to me that nobody seems to grok this and just use them for shows and movies.  Its all right there, the dialog, the characters, the story, the scenes.  For God's sake why not take advantage of that???

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2 hours ago, Bazza said:

Maybe that is why Joss rewrote parts of the film—turn moments into scenes. 

According to the rumor mill, they hired him to cut as much as he could, which is why Cyborg's story was cut as a start. In my opinion, if they wanted Cyborg to be the key player, which Terrio says they wanted, they should have cut the rest of the League and just did a Cyborg movie until the end where it's the League versus Steppenwolf and/or Darkseid.

 

Justice League: Cyborg.

CES  

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As much of a bastard as Whedon was to the actors, I think he got better performances out of Ray Fisher than Snyder did. Cyborg's story came through loud and clear for me in the theatrical release despite having half or less the screentime, and I think his interactions with Silas, Wonder Woman, and Flash were deeper and more nuanced. I'd just have cut that slow motion opening montage for time and kept his scenes with Elinore instead to round out his story.

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5 hours ago, zslane said:

I can get on board with that edict. Applying it to other franchises would mean that, for instance, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ought to drop their obsession with pizza. Which I am perfectly fine with.

 

Before the pizza it was beer. Understandable they changed that with redirecting the franchise towards kids.

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On 4/9/2021 at 8:51 PM, Bazza said:

And one minor point about the actress insisting her character change her hairstyle. While on Game of Thrones Kit Harington, actor for Jon Snow, had a contract on his hair (1). 
 

 

When I read that actor's complaint I got an eye tic. Actors are not in charge of the shooting schedule or the continuity. If she had had her way you could easily wind up with a change of hairstyle every time the character appeared on screen. Just... aaarrrghh!

 

 

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1 hour ago, drunkonduty said:

I liked the video. It really explains Snyder's problem - he's a pretentious film student. 

 

46 minutes ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

In a nutshell

 

JJ Abrams has the same kind of problem, all of his work is focused around dazzling imagery and awesome shots

Both of which can work, if they have a good storyboard/script and stick to it, then pick moments in them to show your style.

 

I think one problem that is being mentioned and that Snyder and Ray Fisher didn't seem to really grasp. Justice League, like the Avengers movie, isn't a solo movie about 1 character with supporting stars, it is an Ensemble piece. in Avengers, the moments worked because we knew the characters and their moments just fit them. Now, assuming (I don't) the general public knows the characters of the JL through the 50+ years of inundation, you don't need the movie to be an origin for anyone. It should have been enough that Batman and Wonder Woman wanted Cyborg. Save his backstory for his movie, same with Flash, whom most people know some of his backstory through the series and his comics. This should have been the JL vs Steppenwolfe, nothing really more. In gathering the boxes, he hands them their butts, but they learn, and one thing they learn is they need Superman. I don't hate the Whedon movie, but I have a sarcastic humor and like one liners, but I also saw the characters in it. A tired, sore, older Batman who is out of his league but learning to be a hero again; Wonder Woman who is learning to be the inspiration she started as but left behind with the death of Steve Trevor; Flash and Cyborg realizing they belong with this group in more then just power; Aquaman grasping there is more to the world then just the sea, something that would be nice to see continued in his own movie.

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3 hours ago, Greywind said:

 

Before the pizza it was beer. Understandable they changed that with redirecting the franchise towards kids.

 

Yep, I have a few of the original comics I bought when they first came out and it was not a kiddy show. 

I don't really follow them anymore since the focus changed.  If I want Loony Tunes I'll watch Loony Tunes (the original cuts, not the "sanitized" versions they show now).

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8 minutes ago, Spence said:

 

Yep, I have a few of the original comics I bought when they first came out and it was not a kiddy show. 

I don't really follow them anymore since the focus changed.  If I want Loony Tunes I'll watch Loony Tunes (the original cuts, not the "sanitized" versions they show now).

 

It's interesting to compare the various versions.  The original Eastman and Laird books were brilliant, absurdist hyperviolent parody of '80s comics.  They never really nerfed those.  The '80s-'90s cartoon was really a kids show.  I never saw the '03 version, but I understand it was slightly less kiddy than the first animated series.  My kids watched the CGI show for a few years around ten years ago; I really liked it.  It was probably still too violent for kids but the writing was great.  (There were also crossovers with the original show, now defined as a canon alternate reality.)  I saw the Michael Bay film, which was basically a Transformers film only with turtles.  It was explodey in the way that Michael Bay films are.  I guess it was okay once you got used to the turtles having nostrils.  I understand Nickelodeon has rebooted the Turtles again recently in 2D, I haven't seen it.

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Quote

Both of which can work, if they have a good storyboard/script and stick to it, then pick moments in them to show your style.

 

Which is why, I think, 300 and Watchmen worked, because each had a solid story behind it, not just moments and visuals.  The moments like the Persian ambassadors being kicked into the pointless huge hole in the middle of Sparta was not just a badass moment, but a well crafted one that helped move the story along: this is how the Spartans deal with greasy manipulators and liars.  Frank Miller can write a hell of a story, Alan Moore can write a hell of a story.  With that as a framework, then you can have your slow-mo "this is going to look so awesome" moments because they're panels or sequences of a master storyteller.

 

Cut him loose from this and you get what we get from Snyder.  Sucker Punch was nothing but a series of flashbacks/dream sequences/moments.  It looked incredible, until it didn't and you realized that there was nothing to this but sadism and misery.  Its Zach Snyder's most Snydery film and the least palatable of everything he's made.

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22 hours ago, slikmar said:

 

I think one problem that is being mentioned and that Snyder and Ray Fisher didn't seem to really grasp. Justice League, like the Avengers movie, isn't a solo movie about 1 character with supporting stars, it is an Ensemble piece. in Avengers, the moments worked because we knew the characters and their moments just fit them. Now, assuming (I don't) the general public knows the characters of the JL through the 50+ years of inundation, you don't need the movie to be an origin for anyone. It should have been enough that Batman and Wonder Woman wanted Cyborg. Save his backstory for his movie, same with Flash, whom most people know some of his backstory through the series and his comics. This should have been the JL vs Steppenwolfe, nothing really more. 

 

Full disclosure: I haven't seen Justice League. Neither of them. And I'm not going to bother. So please take anything I say with that in mind.  (ie: based on hearsay🙂)

 

There's no doubt the movie suffered from being put out too soon; doing so put them (the movie makers) in the bind of choosing between including the characters' backgrounds or not. I don't think there was ever going to be a good answer to that problem. So I feel that many of the movie's problems originated with the suits at WB.

 

That being said, I've seen enough of Snyder's work to know he was never going to make a good movie out of it. It might have been possible to make two adequate movies (assuming you like Snyder's take on things, I don't.) But, and correct me if I'm wrong, that was never going to be a choice as WB wanted one movie.

 

You know what's funny? I hate Snyder's work. But I have gotten a great deal of joy out of discussing and watching videos about how much he sucks. 

 

 

 

 

 

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37 minutes ago, drunkonduty said:

Full disclosure: I haven't seen Justice League. Neither of them. And I'm not going to bother.

 

Didn't miss much.  If you watch it as a loose collection of super-powered people doing super-powered things it amy be sorta OK.  As a movie it kinda lacked story, plot and any real chemistry.

It was basically a bunch of scenes created by someone with no idea of who the characters were supposed to be, just showcasing the "powers". 

So while individual actors may have done a good or even great job with their individual scene, as a whole it was just a mess. 

 

I actually liked Ben Affleck as Batman, Henry Cavill as Superman, Jason Momoa as Aquaman and most of all Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman.  It is a display of magnificent skill (negative skill) that the director was able to turn a movie starring such a talented cast into a hot steaming mess of crap. 

 

I thought the Star Wars prequels were bad when Lucasfilm took so many fantastic actors and turned them into things with the acting and emotional properties of card board cutouts. 

 

I was really pissed since it really lowers the probability of more Wonder Woman or Aquaman movies.

 

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6 minutes ago, Spence said:

I thought the Star Wars prequels were bad when Lucasfilm took so many fantastic actors and turned them into things with the acting and emotional properties of card board cutouts. 

 

 

And that was the result with the *good* actors...

I still think Hayden Christensen's Anakin was one of the most cringeworthy performances of a major character in a major movie I've ever been unfortunate enough to watch.

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1 minute ago, unclevlad said:

 

And that was the result with the *good* actors...

I still think Hayden Christensen's Anakin was one of the most cringeworthy performances of a major character in a major movie I've ever been unfortunate enough to watch.

 

How were you able to pick him out of so many bad performances.  I had actually wondered why with so many big names they were not able to bury it unseen.  John Wayne buried the Genghis Khan movie until he died.  I am surprised the cast of the prequels didn't do the same.  Then again, the prequels actually look good compared to some of the SW stuff planned for the near future. 

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