Fucking Comic Book Movies!

If you didn't guess by the title this one is about comics and movies and when the two collide. Before I get into it though I want to give you a short timeline of my comic book fandom. This should allow you to take the rest with an appropriate grain of salt.

1993: Was given a box of old Marvel and DC comics by my uncle and read them all (mostly shite).

1994: Started to buy shitty 50 cent comics at the Quick Stop Mart by my house.

1995: Discovered Spawn, a comic my mother hated and did everything to keep me from (i was 8) and one I loved and started to collect.

1995-2003 Kept reading comics and Collecting Spawn.

2004: Decided comic were for kids and lamers and Sold my Complete Spawn collection (including #1-6 in pristine condition) to help pay for my first car (a shitty red Ford Escort).

2007: Met one Mr. Ryan Jones and read my first couple of comics in 3 years.

2008: Kept reading comics occasionally liking them but feeling like I should not

2009: I came out of the "Nerd Closet" started reading like crazy and trying to catch up on a lot of lost years.

2010: I proudly buy comics every week and love to talk about them and try to convert people who don't read them.

Now,

FUCKING COMIC BOOK MOVIES!

Over the past 10 years the movie industry has seemed to have a huge boner for comics. Each summer at least one or two of the most highly anticipated and highest grossing movies of the year are straight from their pages. Spiderman 1 & 2 and The Dark Knight even managed to be in the top ten highest grossing movies since 2000. But why?

Don't ask a comic book nerd I can tell you that. By in large there are few, if any comic book movies that are universally accepted as good by "true comic fans". This may be in part because fans of comics are the most ravenous and steadfastly loyal fans there are in the world. When they like something they LOVE it. They memorize every nuance and detail. They buy the shirts, the toys, the posters and the trades (for those who don't know a "trade" refers to a trade paperback version of a book that compiles the single issue comics).

These fans can be some of the best and the worst fans in the world . They will support you for years and make you very rich (sort of, I mean we're talking about comics) But on the other hand if you mess with that thing they love, no fans hate more passionately then comic book fans either. A simply change of artist or character decision (say you decide Thor has 40 fucking hammers now. Am I right Jones?) This can insight true and undying rage.

This brings me to comic book movies. The major issue all filmmakers run into when they are deciding what to do with the juicey new comic licence they just picked up is (I'm guessing) finding how to go about making a movie that the general public will eat up and love but that will not piss off too many nerds. This is IMPOSSIBLE. You see, by in large, the things that make comics appealing to their fans are things that also set them apart from mainstream consumption. Whether through ideas or content comics express themselfs in a unique way that rarely can be transfered to another medium.

Another problem is that comics ARE books and because of that fact a huge amount of the what a person gets from them comes from how an individual interprets them. Whether it is as simple as how a character sounds (Batman?) or the intended tone, a book is often much more open for individual experiences than a film.

The final problem with comic book movies is even if someone makes a perfect interpretation of a fans favorite comic, down to every last detail, they will have already seen it.

Oh shit! I almost forgot here's my lame-ass video review of Kickass