A vision for how they should have adapted DC Comics heroes in the 2000

[Frodo]

A little shorter summary of the plot this time.

The film deals with the reincarnation version of the character that originated in ancient Egypt:

Young prince Khufu and Chay-Ara, priestess at the royal court, have a secret love affair. It begun as a little shy flirt where they would start to share sideway glances before looking away, blush and bite lips. Cute, but cheesy.
Their feelings are passionate but forbidden. Noble blood is considered holy and shouldn’t mix with lower ranks (a bit of the same theme as in Wonder Woman)
The temple priest Hath-Set, former mentor of Chay-Ara, is jelous beyond reason. He becomes an evil sorcerer, a path that he’s already started. Perhaps under the influence by gods (Set, god of chaos… or Anubis, god of the dead… you can choose).
At the same time, there's talks around the court about having gotten a gift from the gods. Some time prior to the film, a meteorite had crashed in the desert and bird-like armor were found at the site. These items were stored in a chamber, awaiting to be put on display in the throne room. For showing the pharao's might to visitors.
Khufu doesn't really believe in the gods. He find it hard to understand how Egypt, the greatest civilization the world has ever seen, can be so stuck up in the old ways. These beliefs were ancient already then. Priests and science existed side by side at that point. For example, Egypt studied mechanics and laws of nature. The kingdom had astronomers, architects, mathematicians and doctors. It was a very modern society for its time. But all science had to answer to the stronger priesthood. This prevents progression in Khufu's eyes.
Playful as he is, he likes to fool around and put on the "falcon helmet" as he calls it. There's not much excitement in being a prince all day long
One late evening, he invites Chay-Ara to join him. They try on the wings as well and find that they are able to fly. They take a short flight outside, Some people who's still awake believe the gods have returned.

Back at the palace, Hath-Set awaits them. The lovers are killed and cursed with being born again and again, and never be able to live their lives together. As soon as they meet, the curse will get activated.
A montage of them through history follows: Ancient Rome, Medieval Ages, Wild West. Their looks change but they're always ending up as heroes (because the last happy moment they had together was feeling they looked very heroic).
The same dark magic spell had affected the priest too. He' gets reborn too, always as a evil tyrant. He's the one who kills them every time.
In present day, he’s known as Vandal Savage.

Archeologist Carter Hall (still a man of science) currently lives in Egypt. He's made half British in the film, not all American. When he finds the armor in Prince Khufu's tomb, he regains his memories of all past lives. One of the important things to do is to locate his former love. As it’s always been. This time, she’s not what he expected.
And for the first time since they were murdered, the armor is back in their lives. Maybe they have a chance to survive?

I have to add that we won’t see any gods in the film. The thing with Egyptian deities is that they are less human than the Greek ones and more of cosmic forces. They are beyond what we can grasp. But this doesn't make them less real.

The final script was promising. Khufu has a River Poenix vibe to him, Carter more of a Richard Burton/John Wayne element.
Chay-Ara borrowed from Judy Garland and Vivien Leigh, and there are some traces of Ingrid Bergman in her modern day version. But we hardly notice that because she's a real bad ass Hawkgirl.

A problem did arise for the film. How could they possible find an actor that could don the Hawkman outfit and not look totally wrong? Was it even possible to have the hero look like a warrior and not a complete dork?
Gerard Butler was offered the role but he declined. That says something about the difficulty in adapting the character for the big screen.
On the other hand though, Clive Owen showed some interest but he wasn’t wanted.
We can ask ourselves why they could possibly say no to an actor willing to play the hero, and one that even would suit the character’s fierce, yet noble, persona?
The production halted. Cruise had to go with one of his previous co-stars as a final solution, or else the film wouldn’t get made at all.

Hawkman (Universal Pictures, 2007)
Filmed on location in Luxor, London and Detroit

Directed and produced by John Carpenter
Co-produced by Tom Cruise, Bernd Eichinger

Written by Matthew Robbins, Brian Yuzna, Bannon Braga, Craig J Nevius
Additional writing by John Carpenter

Music by Mike Post in a joint with Eric Wurst & David Wurst (incl a theme)
Costume design: Bob Ringwood
Set design: Bo Welch, Dante Ferretti

Main cast
Carter Hall/Hawkman: Dougray Scott
Shiera Sanders/Hawkgirl: Jessica Biel
Vandal Savage: Kurt Russell

Minor cast
Chay-Ara: Marion Cotillard
Prince Khufu: Jack Ryder
Hath-Set: Rupert Everett
Pharaoh Ramesses II: James Woods
Queen Nefertari Meritmut: Nastassja Kinski

Cameos
Egyptologist: Maggie Smith
University professor: Alan Arkin
Museum curator: Kevin Sorbo
Egyptian royal guard: Ryan Philippe
David Thewlis appears as an Egyptian peasant who gets shocked by seeing the flying couple and drops a clay pot. He reprises it in modern day.

Dougray was surprised by the offer. It seemed weird for him. “Shouldn’t I play Batman instead?”

For the easily offended people, it’s a bit cringe-worthy with the lovers’ age difference. Mostly so when it comes to Scott and Biel. It’s an even bigger gap than between Daniel Craig and Eva Green in Casino Royale. But this is ackowledged in-film, it gets pointed out.

In case you wondered why there are different actors for the ancient Egyptian and the modern day settings, It’s to tell the characters apart because they aren’t really the same. It's just the soul, the essence, that is reborn

The reason Carpenter was hired? Look at the two pics below, the mood they have. That's the right energy for a film like this

If you wish, one could also say that there not that much difference between Hawkman and Snake Plissken.
Vandal Savage? A fleshed out Michael Myers who talks and rejoice in the evilness. For a start, he loves his big knife

The film feels epic, especially the flashback.
Granted that there's a love triangle behind the story. But there's so much more present here.
Before the filming started, they looked back at old films such as Battleship Potemkin for inspiration because of its seriousness among the big shots.

I have to really put the light on the set designers a.k.a. production designers in all of the projects I've presented, not just this one.
There’s always a special kind of people brought in when extraordinary locations are a part of my superhero visions. What would the films be without those designs?
This time, the guys had done previous work on The Name of the Rose, Beetlejuice, The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, Ghostbusters 2, Edward Scissorhands, Batman Returns, Wolf, Kundun, Wild Wild West, and one Hamlet adaption etc. Not a bad resume!

I can explain some trivia behind the film. The very first starting point for this DC adaption was Wolfgang Petersen’s Troy in 2004. Cruise had just seen the film and thought Brad Pitt would suit a superhero role. Specifically one that’s rooted in ancient times.
He contacted the actor and told about his idea. Brad Pitt had been the number one candidate from day one. He was the actual Hawkman actor, but he never played the character.

“Brad, I know we haven’t always been on good terms with each other. But I want to tell you that I’m impressed with your performance in Troy. It was really awesome.
Well, as you know I’m involved with superhero movies these days. There’s one particular character that I think will suit you very well, I mean really well. It shares some similarities with Akilles, in fact. There’s a guy in present day who becomes a warrior type in battle armor and a helmet… and there are also a pair of huge wings that makes him able to fly. Brad, I want you to play Hawkman!”

Brad reacted with a second of silence before he laughed really hard and needed to calm down and apologize.
“Hawkman, you say! But Tom, to be honest. I rather play Aquaman”

Awesome Cast ! I don't know the Hawkman character too well other than appearances on CW shows, but the story sounds very interesting. Universal also sounds like the perfect studio given their connection to the classic monsters films like The Mummy.

 

[Frodo]

It's NOT directed by Cameron. There's no Vincent Chase/Adrian Grenier either. I only picked the poster because of the fonts. I like it a lot. That’s the one my Aquaman should go with
.
The Aquaman emblem with the “A” should be like THIS:

Aquaman was actually in production very early. The first scenes were shot BEFORE Wonder Woman and Hawkman. It was during the early summer of 2005, but it had to be temporarily put on hold because Paramount thought their Zatanna was underperforming.
It wasn’t anything major being filmed, just a flashback part of the story.
Rick Berman, known for Star Trek, was at that point set to helm the film. But how could a producer with no directing merits take on something of this size?
After the shutdown, more people were added to the creative process. The script needed polishing. A couple more writers entered the process. Another, shorter, flashback was also added.

It was difficult to make Aquaman.
How do one really make a film out of what's known as one of the least useful heroes, a man who just talks to fish?
We fans already know he’s super strong, and possesses telepathic powers. In the film, he's also almost as fast as a jet plane while in water. But what about the general audience’s view on the hero?
It's important to treat the property seriously. It can still be a fun adventure..

As difficult it was to get the film right, finding actors was really easy.
Some of the cast that looked questionable on paper turned out really good in the film. These knocked it out of the park with their performances.

This adaption took some steps away from the comic books. It goes to “steal” ideas from legendary Georges Méliès. His creations were imaginative and fantastical. That worked well for the Atlantis setting.
The sunken continent is depicted as a retro-futuristic version of ancient Greece. More detailed, it’s a sort of steam punk civilization. A clean one that is. No steam power machinery here (Martian Manhunter went that route instead). The Atlantis technology is instead made from highly advanced clockwork mechanisms and similar stuff. While they still mainly use stone for building, the use of metals and electricity is prominent,
With Atlanteans way ahead of us in science, we hardly recognize it as steampunk anyway unless we can spot it behind what’s seen.
Add the film’s use of the classic wide screen 1950s cinemascope look, and Atlantis surely turns out amazing.

It’s revealed that The Bermuda Triangle is in fact connected to Atlantis. All the stories about the place are true, it does swallow boats and sometimes planes too.
The actual explanation is that it’s simply a powerful airlock that provides Atlantis with fresh air. Despite used to living in the sea, they are still mammals who need to breathe. More about this is described further down.

It's important to get Aquaman himself right. He isn’t a joke.
This is not Superfriends, but the film does pay homage to the cartoon a couple of times. This is done so that we can be wonderstruck by his powers later on.
We meet Arthur Curry at two points during his younger days when he lives in Florida.
First as a kid that likes to splash around in the water. We’re shown that he’s becoming a very skilled swimmer. Here we get a scene that makes fun of the character’s bad reputation. He finds out that he can actually talk to fish. And then he goes and tells his friends about it. They will tease him repeatedly for that. “Arthur talks to fish”.

Some years forward, it's early 1980s. He’s a young surfer dude in Miami. This is a longer flashback that goes on for close to 25 minutes.
He’s likable, carefree, popular with the girls. He’s always seen with a bunch of them around. He doesn’t really get himself emotionally involved with any of them though.
Now and then, he swims with dolphins and have a really great time. His close friends call him Waterboy, Merboy or simply shorten his name to “Art”.
School isn’t hard for him. He learns fast. It seems like his brain is wired different
Can you picture how this Arthur Curry will react when he finds out that Atlantis is real?

Another guy close to his age has started hanging around the beach. A thoughtful type who doesn’t talk much, with a weird aura to him. It seems he’s observing Arthur a bit, which makes him start talking to the stranger. They hang out a bit a couple of times until the nameless youngster suddenly disappears without a trace.
Sometime later, he is approached at the beach by another mysterious person who presents himself as Vulko. What a strange name! Arthur mishears it first as "vulgo"

All that happens before he dons the copper/green outfit in present day.
I decided that they should go with the copper-colored, metallic orange, version for the film. Not the golden one.

When Arthur has become Aquaman, the film gets a bit of the same style as the 1930s family-friendly adventures starring Errol Flynn. The superhero is a swashbuckler too.
Yes, he will ride a beautiful sea-horse at one point. That’s a given!!! Another one of the homages.
His personality isn’t only an adventure-loving guy though, he will meet challenges along the way that affect him. There are some issues with politics in the underwater kingdom. Then there’s injustice in the surface world. His first heroic deed, when he truly becomes Aquaman, is by dealing with modern day pirates outside the coast of Somali.

As in the previous DC adaptions, the works of real-world actors inspire the main character. Other than Flynn, it’s Peter O’Toole, Roger Moore and Burt Lancaster.

Pieces from the vast backstory of Atlantis is explained, mentioned and hinted at during the course of the film
To sum everything up, it was the first and greatest empire ever, during what’s called the antediluvian period. The size of the place was huge. It almost reached Puerto Rico in the west, and The Canary Islands in the east. Those were unpopulated places back then.
When it sunk beneath the waves more than twelve thousand years ago, the refugees fled to Egypt which was one of their colonies. They had lost most of their technology in the disaster and had to live a simpler life. A couple of centuries later, they were fighting off an invading force with another culture. The Atlanteans lost and were driven out. That other civilization built the old Egypt we know today (pyramids and such). Before that, Sahara was a lush place very similar to Atlantis but the wars devastated the region.
Being forced to flee a second time, thery ended up on Crete where they established the Minoan empire.
One day the people of Knossos just vanished, just like in the real world. The reason was that they wanted to return to their lost homeland. A couple of bases were set up by the Mediterranean. By doing this, they would lean on mainland resources to be able to get out in the Atlantic Ocean and locate the sunken island. These towns were meant as tempoary but grew into cities and are known today as Athens and Rome.
That’s right, the major part of ancient Greece and the whole Roman Empire were originally created as bases for the search for Atlantis. To get resources and to fund the mission.
This is how the existence of Atlantis is put into the context of real history.
Historical figures are hinted at being Atlantean to a minor degree, like Pythagoras, Alexander the Great, Copernicus, Galileo Galilei, and Leonardo DaVinci.
Around the 1500s, that’s when the descendants of Atlantis finally found what they’ve been looking for. They tried to retrieve some of the technology there, then slowly rebuild the sunken place to its former glory. During this, their bodies adapted fast to the sea because even their biology is more advanced than that of a regular human. It only took a few generations for them to grow gills and become partly a marine humanoid. A few even got webbed hands/feet
300 years later, they had finally succeeded. A dome of pure energy protected the kingdom from the surrounding water. They could start repopulating the place in a bigger sense. Since then, Atlantis has had an invisible influence on the surface world. That’s why our technology has developed so fast the last centuries.

Aquaman (Paramount Pictures, 2007)
Filming was done in Miami and Alexandria, Egypt
Directed by Mike Hodges
Co-directors: Lawrence Kasdan, Rick Berman

Produced by Rick Berman, Jan Kikumoto, Tom Cruise

Written by Dick Clement, Stephen Tolkin, John Logan, Lawrence Kasdan

Music by: James Horner (incl. a theme)
Costume design: Brad R Loman
Set design: Francesca Lo Schiavo, Robert Christian

Cast
Arthur Curry/Orin: Brad Pitt
Mera: Alicia Witt
Orm/Ocean Master: Clive Owen
Vulko: Kevin Costner
Atlanna: Jessica Lange
Tom Curry: Sam J Jones
Young Arthur: Taylor Hanson
Young Orm: Gaspard Ulliel
Arthur as a boy: Cole Sprouse

Cameos
Goldie Hawn as Arthur’s high school teacher
Dennis Hopper as a marine biologist
Meg Ryan as an Atlantean scientist
Corey Haim as the captain who gets rescued by Aquaman
Josh Hutcherson as Garth (Only Garth, with the purple eyes. No Aqualad here!!!)

Another excellent one. Brad Pitt and Alicia Witt would make a good Mera and Arthur.

 

[Airwings]

Awesome Cast ! I don't know the Hawkman character too well other than appearances on CW shows, but the story sounds very interesting. Universal also sounds like the perfect studio given their connection to the classic monsters films like The Mummy.

Thanks
While watching the film, it feels the actors are born just for playing these characters. Every previous role had just been training for this film. The characters in Hawkman is what all their acting careers have been about, the first-hand purpose of them becoming actors in the first place. Like, James Woods has always been meant to be play the specific pharaoh who's the father of the first Hawkman LOL
Higher powers give every human a mission in life but they don't tell about it. One has to search the soul find one's purpose. For Jessica Biel and the cast, it was this film.
If this is the feeling we get from the film, it means they scored big with the cast.
I have to wonder though, what the film would be like if Cruise had gotten what he wanted, Brad Pitt as Carter Hall.

Maybe you have become interested in the Hawkman character and want to to look more into him after this presentation?

 

[Airwings]

Here's the top grossing films of 2006.
Scorsese disliked strongly that DiCaprio had signed on to play Barry Allen and was thinking he didn't want to work with him again as long as he was a part of that despicable CBM genre.
The Departed making less money than three of those gloss superhero adaptions made him furious.

1. The Da Vinci Code
2. Ice Age: The Meltdown
3. Casino Royale
4. Night at the Museum
5. Cars
6. Mission: Impossible III
7. Happy Feet
8. Over the Hedge
9. The Flash
10. The Devil Wears Prada
11. Wonder Woman
12. The Pursuit of Happyness
13. Martian Manhunter
14. The Departed
15. Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
16. Doctor Fate
17. Click
18. The Holiday
19. The Break-Up
20. Open Season

As Deja Vu and Blood Diamond ended up outside of top 20, it made actors like Leo and Connelly understand that superheroes are really a thing now.
Denzel Washington regretted not playing John Johns even if he had been too busy to sign up.

 

[Airwings]

Another excellent one. Brad Pitt and Alicia Witt would make a good Mera and Arthur.

I think the same.
It's also great to see a shorthaired, shaved Aquaman. So you didn't get it really right with that pic, sorry

 

[Airwings]

MGM had the rights to not just Green Arrow but Green Lantern too.
The studio doesn’t really like these larger-than-life superheroes. Their only creative demand was that Green Lantern should be treated more like pure sci fi, and that the space opera theme should be avoided.
Oa gets the look of a high tec planet
The Guardians aren’t midgets but humanoids with blue skin. All interstellar travel is done in space ships. Longer distances include either light speed or wormholes

What we got was 3-hour brick stone of a film. Not by MGM themselves but another brand name.

You might have guessed, by the two logos above, that the golden age and the silver age GL both appear.
Unlike previous year’s adaption of Flash, it’s more focus on the first version of the character but at least a third of the film includes Hal.
The suits from the comic books are changed into technological custumes here, and made out of actual fabrics instead of energy.
Hal even has the white gloves

The works of Howard Hughes was an influence, as well the Star Trek films 1979-94 and the 1970s TV shows Space 1999 and Buck Rogers
James Stewart and Gary Cooper is infused into Alan Scott
Hal Jordan, a more modern guy, is written to imitate the onscreen personas of Burt Reynolds and Chevy Chase

The plot revolves a lot around Starheart, the green flame.
Its backstory is already explained so well online so I use quotes. This can be explained during the opening credits.
The Guardians had decided something:

to rid the stars of magic to pave the way for science to prevail. It was hidden in the heart of a star before becoming a sentient being.

Favoring technology shouldn’t be a bad thing it itself. But they actually gathered all that magic into one single place. Of course it’s not all that well thought through.

a mystical green meteor fell down to Earth after wandering the cosmos

Hmm, what can that be?

It was "carved into a lamp" by someone
There's also mentioning of "an ornate railroad lantern"

the power within the Lantern was actually the Starheart

Oh, who would have guessed this?

Let me do a short summary. The magical green flame ends up inside a lantern. Hmm, how convenient for the story.

The lantern got on a train with young railroad engineer Alan Scott on it. Scott picked up the lantern and held it. Then, as the train was passing over a bridge, there were explosives on said bridge. The train derailed, and everyone except Scott died.

This take place in, and around, Coast City during mid 1980s. San Diego is used for the setting, and then it changes to Houston for modern day.

What happens to Alan then?
Starheart starts whispering to Alan, telling him that a piece of metal can be a conductor for its powers. If he carries it with him, he can have access to them everywhere. He just needs to recharge now and then.
Alan goes and picks up a wedding ring from a drawer. He’s just divorced his wife and haven’t thrown it away yet.
He puts it on. The flame whispers “yess, that’s right. Now, come closer.”
The ring starts to glow green and transforms into another shape.
So it begins. The journey of a hero. Alan can make simple energy constructs with it, and the powers also allow him to fly. His costume is gathered from pieces of the latest extreme fashion clothes of that time. A hero deserves to be fancy, doesn’t he?
Superheroics help him to deal with the loss of the woman he truly loved. His thoughts get on other things
Criminals are brought behind bars. The police force is happy for the help. This Green Lantern guy becomes popular around town. Especially for a nerdy boy who loves comic books. “Finally, there’s a real superhero!”
He gets Green Lantern’s autograph along with “For Kyle Rayner”.
What a meaningful moment for the audience who knows about the GL comics!!!

The FBI are interested in this Green Lantern guy. On one side, his vigilante business isn’t seen with just good eyes. One the other side, they could get some help on a national scale.
Alan Scott becomes an American icon. Everybody loves him. Kids idolizes the hero.
The train terrorist is still out there though. Several more people are killed. There are attacks on both public and military properties
FBI had caught the wrong person. It wasn’t a guy they have had on the list for a long time. It turned out to be Albert Dekker, the railroad owner.

There’s an exhibition set up by the joint military forces of America. Here we also get a glimpse of young marine soldier John Stewart.
Dekker strikes again. This time the victim is Martin Jordan, a test pilot at Ferris Aircraft. He had also his young son Hal with him on the plane because he looks up to his father a lot. Even more than the Green Lantern hero.
It wasn’t an accident with the malfunctioning plane. It’s a tragedy.

With the help of the superhero, Dekker gets tracked down. When GL later confronts the him, he behaves like a madman and starts blabbering about destiny and other forces before he vanishes in thin air. They can't understand what happened.

The news about the Earth superhero soon reaches the Guardians. They want to check up on this guy. It’s not acceptable according to their law to deal with the Starheart. It corrupts the mind.
When they monitor and spy on Alan for a while, Starheart starts to notice their presence and alerts him. He locates the aliens to find out what they’re after. This doesn’t go well. They need to remove the ring from him, he’s become too powerful.
Alan is put down and imprisoned. The green flame is then taken to outer space.

The Guardians argue a lot. They are split. Great things that can be done with the Starheart flame. Is it possible they’ve made a mistake with hiding away all magic? Maybe it can be used for the sake of good, like the example with Alan. There are conflicts all over universe, it lacks saviors. The flame can help with that. It only needs the pure and good-hearted to wield the power, the kinds of beings with the will to help those in need.
The Guardians decide to refine Starheart with the help of science. Their leader Krona disagrees with the plan. It’s too dangerous to deal with that power. He resigns.
The remaining Guardians grow the flame bigger and put it inside a huge Lantern battery to contain it. Then they transport it to the center of the universe so that it can reach all of its corners. They must forever watch over Starheart so that it doesn’t corrupt anyone.
The Guardians form The Green Lantern corps. Inspired by Alan Scott, the members are also wearing rings because it’s practical. These rings are not just conductors but also mini computers.

One thousand years pass. The search for ringbearers have failed. There are not more than a handful of them. There is chaos on Earth and a lot of other planets. Something is not right. Things aren’t going the way it should, the universe has become dystopic.
It turns out that Krona is responsible for this. He’s been using a forbidden powerful device to travel in time and kill off many inhabitants on a lot of planets. Among them were a number of key players that would steer the course in the right direction.
This must be corrected. The Guardians have a lot to do around the universe. They must also break the law and go back in time.
Alan Scott, who hasn’t aged while on Oa, is set free and tasked with Earth. He must save all the people killed by Dekker because that was in fact Krona in disguise, he can actually change his shape.
It’s important that Alan he doesn’t change anything else, like saving his marriage. He must also prevent to run into his previous self of that time.
The train incident still needs to happen of else he won’t become Green Lantern. The Guardians wouldn’t find out about the use of Starheart either.
All of the other killed people are saved. Except the test pilot Martin Jordan. The only difference Alan could make was to not have him invite his son onboard for a flight.

Then we head to present day, 2007
Alan is nowhere to be seen. He disappeared after his time travel. Kyle Rayner is now a comic book illustrator who makes adventures about the Green Lantern of his childhood.
John Stewart has just completed his architect studies after having a career in the military.
Hal Jordan is a test pilot just like his father. He’s also a daredevil persona with a need to prove himself. He’s not like Superman, that’s for sure.

Green Lantern leader Abin Sur crashes outside the city late one night. He’s wounded after a solo encounter with Krona and needs to find a new member for the corps.
The ring flies off to the closest suitable candidate and almost lands in his hand. But then Hal happens to drive his car nearby. The ring has Starheart’s consciousness, as all the other rings, and deems the pilot a better choice. It takes off in another direction. Hal gets selected as a new Green Lantern and is taken to Oa to get a briefing about what is means to be a part of the corps.
Who that other guy was, we don’t know.
When Hal performs his first heroics in public, people notice the ring with the faint glow on his finger and the powers. It’s all over the news. They still have a vague memory of Alan.

Krona soon arrives with the determination to wipe out every Lantern, one by one. Starting with Earth because that’s where it all started.
He suspects Kyle knows something and force him to reveal the whereabouts of Alan because it seems they are in touch. But the artist simply doesn’t know. He stands up to the former Guardian who is now full on evil and almost gets killed.

Krona goes to wreck havoc on a military base. Puny humans don’t deserve having weapons, much less going to space. It just so happens that John is visiting his former colleagues there. They try to fight back as good as they can.
The ring alerts Hal about the danger. He shows up but is taken by surprise by the might of his opponent.
When Hal is taken temporarily down and there’s still a threat, the ring flies to another candidate. It turns out to be John because he’s showing strength and leadership in moments of distress.
The ring also sends an emergency call to the Lantern battery on Oa.
The corps is alerted and ready to send assistance but the Guardians prevent them. One rule of the corps is to not interfere in each other’s sectors unless there’s no Lantern there.

But the green flame has a mind of its own. Krona has always been against the idea of the corps. In his original form, he’s too powerful for one Lantern. Starheart knows this. It wakes up Alan from his limbo somewhere on the edges of the universe and brings him to Earth.
The two Green Lanterns Alan and John together finally defeat Krona.
The corps decide to grant John with his own ring so that he can share the duty with Hal. They also give out two more, one to Kyle for standing up to someone really powerful and for his artistic insight in superheroics. Alan gets the other one, an official GL ring, along with a new uniform.
The Guardians don’t really approve of this but the new corps leader Sinestro thinks they can make their own decisions. That’s why they made Abin Sur an honorable regular citizen of Oa. Yes, he was nurtured back to life so that he can enjoy a peaceful retirement.

Green Lantern (United Artists, 2007)
Directed by Peter Hyams
Produced by Tom Cruise
Written by Peter Hyams, Ian La Frenais, Paul De Meo, Philip Kaufman, Tom Cruise

Music by: Howard Blake (incl new theme)
Costume design: James Acheson
Set design: Cheryl Carasik, Norman Garwood

Cast
Alan Scott: Cary Elwes
Krona: Christopher Plummer
Albert Dekker: James Brolin
Hal Jordan: Jerry O’ Connell
Carol Ferris: Tara Reid
Carl Ferris: Dennis Quaid

Abin Sur: Patrick Stewart
Sinestro: Richard E Grant
Killowog: Ron Perlman
Tomar-Re: Brent Spiner

John Stewart: Eddie Murphy
Kyle Rayner: John Leguizamo
Martin Jordan: Charlie Sheen
Young Hal: Freddie Highmore
Young Carol: AnnaSophia Robb

Young Kyle is an unknown

Cameos
Jeff Bridges as chief of police
Ethan Hawke as a cop
William Shatner as the mayor of Coast City
Dean Jones as William H Webster, FBI director
Peter Fonda as John E Otto, acting director of FBI
David Duchovny as an FBI agent (in-joke and a wink to the audience)
Terry Jones as the new leader of the Guardians

Some lightweight actors in front of the camera. It's still not a comedic film.

 

[Airwings]

Time to return to Gotham City. Admit you've been waiting for this.

Warner Brothers had looked at the finished Superman Reborn a month before the release.
They were satisfied with the quality of the film and the talent of everybody involved.

Then, the day after the opening in December 2000, they called Tom Cruise back in the office and told him that Batman is going to be next project. He said they could just go ahead.
WB wanted him to help in getting the right approach because he did mostly well when assemblin the creative people for Supes, and they're unsure how to do it without him.

Cruise felt like he was a little split here since he was already involved with Green Arrow for MGM/Orion.
He agreed to give suggestions for designers and writers, and added that's up to the studio how they should continue with that.

The director matter was another problem for WB.
Cruise said that the character should return to his noir setting. People have to feel that they can take Batman seriously. Ditch the camp!
Sydney Lumet could do that. Francis Ford Coppola would be even better, but he has to be convinced that he's the right man for this.

The film was entering pre-production during 2001.
This time, they were going to show the origin story. How the family had just seen a fictional The Phantom film (no Zorro this time), they get robbed in an alley, the boy lose his parents and grow up to be Batman.
As New York is used for Metropolis in Superman, Gotham City is obviously Chicago!!!

The word were out about the upcoming film. It got attention before they even started filming.
Someone got a passionate interest for taking on the lead and called Cruise
"I want to be Batman!"
"Don't call me, buddy. I'm not in charge! Let Warner know you want the role"
That guy was Johnny Depp.

In this alternate scenario, the Pirates of the Caribbean films never happened.
Batman became Depp's comeback that year, and he was nominated for an Oscar. This was a real boost for the superhero genre.
Don't worry. He didn't act funny here. Bruce Wayne isn't Jack Sparrow.
The actor played the role straight and showed a rare seriousness, something that was later seen in Michael Mann’s Public Enemies.
Batman made sure Depp didn't evolve into a joke in Hollywood.

WB really went a long time back in time for the look of the new Batman. To the earliest design.
One has to look back sometimes, in order to move forward.

How would that suit have looked in live action?
The answer is in the pic right below.
Look at the body suits underneath all the armour and you will know.
Gone were the thick, heavy rubber outfits of Schumacher's films.

What kind of Batmobile should they go for? It needs a retro feel just like the suit.
Something similar to this was considered for a while before they ditched the idea

In the end, they went with a tweaked Phantom Corsair. Thankfully!

The plot however isn't only based on older comic books. There is some inspiration from The Long Halloween (the film takes place around the holiday), but it didn't follow that particular storyline much.

A rivalry grew between this and the previous year's Green Arrow. People started bickering about who's the best masked crime fighter.
Can be compared to the eternal Star Trek vs Star Wars discussion.


Batman: The Caped Crusader (2003)
Directed by Jonatan Demme

Written by Rospo Pallenberg, Stephen Tolkin, Steven E de Souza, Channing Gibson

Music by Jerry Goldsmith (incl new theme) (incl. re-arr of Elfman’s theme, just to pay homage once)

Costume design: Julie Weiss
Set design: Ken Adam

Cast list
Bruce Wayne: Johnny Depp
Alfred Pennyworth: Alan Oppenheimer
Gordon: Scott Glenn

Black Widow: Gena Rowlands
-A serious take on the 66's villain
(Robert Wagner wanted to be in the film too, so they wrote a new character for him. He played Widow's dead husband in flashbacks - and as an illusion, because she's crazy)

Mayor of Gotham: Peter Weller

Young Bruce Wayne: Logan Lerman
Thomas Wayne: Bill Paxton
Martha Wayne: Geena Davis

And it's time to look back at the films Joel Schumacher did in the 1990s. He’s not a bad director.
No, not the Bat nipples LOL
I mean his REAL films. Some ideas from A Time to Kill and The Client are used as a part of the story.

Batman has a new suit, the Neal Adams one (the illustrator also got involved in the production)
There’s more action this time. It’s not acceptable that the Green Arrow films have more fights and chases than Batman. If this stuff could be done already 1968 in Bullitt and in the 70s cop drama/crime drama films (Dirty Harry, French Connection, Death Wish etc etc), Batman should definitely have it too. So why not go the same gritty route?

Here's ideas for new Batmobile:

Aside from action, there is also the expected suspense and darkness that a Batman film should have. The first film from 2003 had been a generic film noir, a bit slow in pace, but they went further into noir this time. When Cruise is in charge, the freedom is bigger.
The sequel is tonally similar to specific noir films. In this case, it’s a love letter to Fritz Lang – the creator of film noir.
The film borrowed from more modern stuff too, Francis Ford Coppola’s Godfather trilogy, because organized crime has been a part of comic book Batman from the beginning.

Here, there are also influences from François Truffaut’s The 400 Blows, Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in America and a few films by Louis Malle.
Inspiration from French New Wave among other things, gives the sequel a partly non-american style. Now and then, it feels like it could have been made in Europe.
Well, to some degree it is. Batman goes overseas.
The action scenes still are very American however.
In addition to having a typical action director and a faster pace this time, a creator of horror films came onboard to deal with the darker stuff.
One of the villains will make you wonder how this could possibly turn out a serious film. Trust me, it could!

Coppola was actually once again approached about doing Batman. He had been negative about it earlier, now he was not sure. Is he softening and opening up for the possibility?
The offer went to Oliver Stone and then Scorsese. They are the kind of directors who could do Batman justice
The latter just:



Cruise wanted to have the hero written more fleshed out so that he can be seen as a character on the same level as the roles played by legendary actors.
As Bruce he’s a mix of Rock Hudson and David Niven. When he’s Batman, he heads towards Robert DeNiro and Clint Eastwood. Because then we can we actually imagine them play Bruce/Batman. This will justify the character as a part of actual film history, not just a comic book adaption. He’s more than that.

There’s a new cast. Johnny Depp wasn’t interested in doing sequels, he had only signed a one-film contract.
It's no reboot though. To remove any such doubts, the greyish and black noir suit from the previous film hangs on display in the Batcave and is talked about in a short dialogue between Bruce and Alfred.
Who could take on such an iconic role? Depp had brought him back to the top. What should they do without him? They can’t go with a lesser actor.
Not only American ones were tested but British too, and that would be the first such a thing happens, having a European playing a well-known U.S. superhero (No Nolanverse exists here). But it was important to find the best possible guy, no matter what nationality.
Colin Farrell was not the right type, not yet. He didn't have the gravitas, he needed to mature as an actor first. There are in fact two characters here, Bruce AND Batman.
Billy Cudrup was among the better and almost got the role. This is how things can turn out in the film industry. Talent alone isn’t all, not even being a versatile actor. There are more factors: personality, acting style and how well someone can portray what’s been written in the script.
The bar was set high. Maybe too high?

Dick Grayson enters Bruce’s world and shakes it up. He’s easy-going and full of life, not weighted down by the experience in crime fighting. But under his mentor’s influence, Dick will become more like him personality-wise. He slowly goes from a young Roddy McDowall/Mark Lester character to be more like a troubled Sal Mineo type.

For his origin, a classic circus is a bit old-fashioned. Schumacher had also already gone that route. What if The Graysons can be a part of something else this time, more relevant for today’s audience?
Street performance acrobats? Breakdance? Parkour? Anything that would help Robin become cool in pop culture. But then again, there’s something special about a circus. The shows are impressive and bigger in scale.
It’s decided to change it to the different, more modern Cirque du Soleil.
The Grayson family is among their flashy acrobat dancers. Dick already goes by The Boy Wonder alias there
We can question why Bruce doesn’t mind taking a kid out on the streets. It happens rather quickly. Alfred is against it, unlike in Batman Forever (1995).
Is it to distract the criminals? As Robin he’s the opposite of the dark knight with the bright and colorful costume.

What should they look for when casting the sidekick as he’s re-introduced onscreen? It’s crucial they get it right. Has he ever been done justice at the big screen?
He shouldn’t be an annoying one-dimensional joke but a real character. Not be acting overly cool in a forced manner like Chris O’Donnell.
Ideas were tossed around. Maybe they could go an unconventional route with a blond or ginger actor, to make the visual contrast to Bruce/Bats even bigger? There were possible candidates and it could have happened.
However, this was deemed too risky. Fans would rage over the radical change to Robin.

When the news was out that Robin was to be in the film, a lot of young actors tried out. After the success of the previous film, this was a role that many wanted to play. Almost on pair with our real world’s Spider-Man nowadays.
To find the right actor was as difficult as it was to replace Depp.
It has to be someone who can play out every aspect of Dick/Robin: be energetic and fun, mourning and emotional, angry and revengeful. That is for the acting part only.
The actor must be willing to get acrobat/dance training prior to filming, and even take lessons in street parkour in addition to mastering fighting skills. (Both Batman and Robin are physically demanding roles).
They can’t repeat the mistake with getting a 25-year-old this time. Dick Grayson is definitely younger than that. A problem is that there aren’t many actors in the right age group who have what's required for all of the above.
A certain guy around 16/17 was a good natural actor who had the right look but he lacked the bright energy that Robin should have in the beginning. The choice fell on someone who could both be serious and fun-loving

Batman Continues (Warner Brothers, 2007), shot in Chicago and Prague

The title is a double pun, he does actually continue his heroic journey from previous film and the character gets a franchise too
(First they wanted to call it Batman: Triumphant, or Batman: Unchained because the sound of them will suit the film. But they were both scrapped because they are too tied to the possible sequel to Schumacher's B&R which would work against this film)

Directed by Michael Mann
Produced by Tom Cruise, George A Romero,
Written by Michael Mann, Tom Stoppard, Allan Scott, Jeb Stuart, George A Romero, Tom Cruise

Music by Ennio Morricone (incl re-arr of Goldsmith’s theme)

Costume design: Michael Wlkinson, Neal Adams
Set design: James Edward Ferrell, Maggie Gray

Cast
Bruce Wayne/Batman: James Purefoy
Dick Grayson/Robin: Rollo Weeks
King Tut: Philip Seymour Hoffman
Catwoman: Asia Argento
Alfred Pennyworth: John Nettles (suggested by Purefoy)
Com. Gordon: Sam Elliott
Bullock: Michael Madsen
Mayor of Gotham: Michael Biehn
Helen Hunt plays a reporter that Bruce gets interested in

Cameos
John Cusack as the circus director
Ian McKellen as an English lord who visits Gotham/Bruce
Charles Grodin as CEO at Wayne Enterprises
John Philip Law as a board member of Wayne Enterprises
Debra Winger as a financial executive at Gotham City Hall

There are some easter eggs too, hints about heroes from my previous films:
Blue Beetle (Dan Garrett)
Atom (Albert Pratt)

AND these two

Star-Spangled Heroes (CBS/Universal, 2005)
Directed by Stephen Sommers
Produced by Sean S Cunningham, Tobe Hooper
Segment 1 - "The Earthly Staff"
Ted Knight: Stephen Dorff
Brainwave: Rick Moranis
Here we see a golden age-esque heroic suit, and the how the the gravity belt and the energy staff were created by a space engineer, who later starts a heroic path.
The name Starman is replaced by Spaceman here because they wanted to save it for another segment

Segment 2 - "Star-Spangled Kid"
Young Sylvester Pemberton: Rory Culkin
Pat Dugan: Brendan Fraser
Gloria Pemberton: Claudia Wells
John Pemberton: Ilan Mitchell-Smith (CBS talked him into doing this cameo)
Rich boy obsessed with comic books fights crime in a superhero costume with his family's chauffeur

 

[Frodo]

View attachment 43882

View attachment 43881

MGM had the rights to not just Green Arrow but Green Lantern too.
The studio doesn’t really like these larger-than-life superheroes. Their only creative demand was that Green Lantern should be treated more like pure sci fi, and that the space opera theme should be avoided.
Oa gets the look of a high tec planet
The Guardians aren’t midgets but humanoids with blue skin. All interstellar travel is done in space ships. Longer distances include either light speed or wormholes

What we got was 3-hour brick stone of a film. Not by MGM themselves but another brand name.

You might have guessed, by the two logos above, that the golden age and the silver age GL both appear.
Unlike previous year’s adaption of Flash, it’s more focus on the first version of the character but at least a third of the film includes Hal.
The suits from the comic books are changed into technological custumes here, and made out of actual fabrics instead of energy.
Hal even has the white gloves

The works of Howard Hughes was an influence, as well the Star Trek films 1979-94 and the 1970s TV shows Space 1999 and Buck Rogers
James Stewart and Gary Cooper is infused into Alan Scott
Hal Jordan, a more modern guy, is written to imitate the onscreen personas of Burt Reynolds and Chevy Chase

The plot revolves a lot around Starheart, the green flame.
Its backstory is already explained so well online so I use quotes. This can be explained during the opening credits.
The Guardians had decided something:

Favoring technology shouldn’t be a bad thing it itself. But they actually gathered all that magic into one single place. Of course it’s not all that well thought through.


Hmm, what can that be?

It was "carved into a lamp" by someone
There's also mentioning of "an ornate railroad lantern"

Oh, who would have guessed this?

Let me do a short summary. The magical green flame ends up inside a lantern. Hmm, how convenient for the story.



This take place in, and around, Coast City during mid 1980s. San Diego is used for the setting, and then it changes to Houston for modern day.

What happens to Alan then?
Starheart starts whispering to Alan, telling him that a piece of metal can be a conductor for its powers. If he carries it with him, he can have access to them everywhere. He just needs to recharge now and then.
Alan goes and picks up a wedding ring from a drawer. He’s just divorced his wife and haven’t thrown it away yet.
He puts it on. The flame whispers “yess, that’s right. Now, come closer.”
The ring starts to glow green and transforms into another shape.
So it begins. The journey of a hero. Alan can make simple energy constructs with it, and the powers also allow him to fly. His costume is gathered from pieces of the latest extreme fashion clothes of that time. A hero deserves to be fancy, doesn’t he?
Superheroics help him to deal with the loss of the woman he truly loved. His thoughts get on other things
Criminals are brought behind bars. The police force is happy for the help. This Green Lantern guy becomes popular around town. Especially for a nerdy boy who loves comic books. “Finally, there’s a real superhero!”
He gets Green Lantern’s autograph along with “For Kyle Rayner”.
What a meaningful moment for the audience who knows about the GL comics!!!

The FBI are interested in this Green Lantern guy. On one side, his vigilante business isn’t seen with just good eyes. One the other side, they could get some help on a national scale.
Alan Scott becomes an American icon. Everybody loves him. Kids idolizes the hero.
The train terrorist is still out there though. Several more people are killed. There are attacks on both public and military properties
FBI had caught the wrong person. It wasn’t a guy they have had on the list for a long time. It turned out to be Albert Dekker, the railroad owner.

There’s an exhibition set up by the joint military forces of America. Here we also get a glimpse of young marine soldier John Stewart.
Dekker strikes again. This time the victim is Martin Jordan, a test pilot at Ferris Aircraft. He had also his young son Hal with him on the plane because he looks up to his father a lot. Even more than the Green Lantern hero.
It wasn’t an accident with the malfunctioning plane. It’s a tragedy.

With the help of the superhero, Dekker gets tracked down. When GL later confronts the him, he behaves like a madman and starts blabbering about destiny and other forces because he vanishes in thin air. They can't understand what happened.

The news about the Earth superhero soon reaches the Guardians. They want to check up on this guy. It’s not acceptable according to their law to deal with the Starheart. It corrupts the mind.
When they monitor and spy on Alan for a while, Starheart starts to notice their presence and alerts him. He locates the aliens to find out what they’re after. This doesn’t go well. They need to remove the ring from him, he’s become too powerful.
Alan is put down and imprisoned. The green flame is then taken to outer space.

The Guardians argue a lot. They are split. Great things that can be done with the Starheart flame. Is it possible they’ve made a mistake with hiding away all magic? Maybe it can be used for the sake of good, like the example with Alan. There are conflicts all over universe, it lacks saviors. The flame can help with that. It only needs the pure and good-hearted to wield the power, the kinds of beings with the will to help those in need.
The Guardians decide to refine Starheart with the help of science. Their leader Krona disagrees with the plan. It’s too dangerous to deal with that power. He resigns.
The remaining Guardians grow the flame bigger and put it inside a huge Lantern battery to contain it. Then they transport it to the center of the universe so that it can reach all of its corners. They must forever watch over Starheart so that it doesn’t corrupt anyone.
The Guardians form The Green Lantern corps. Inspired by Alan Scott, the members are also wearing rings because it’s practical. These rings are not just conductors but also mini computers.

One thousand years pass. The search for ringbearers have failed. There are not more than a handful of them. There is chaos on Earth and a lot of other planets. Something is not right. Things aren’t going the way it should, the universe has become dystopic.
It turns out that Krona is responsible for this. He’s been using a forbidden powerful device to travel in time and kill off many inhabitants on a lot of planets. Among them were a number of key players that would steer the course in the right direction.
This must be corrected. The Guardians have a lot to do around the universe. They must also break the law and go back in time.
Alan Scott, who hasn’t aged while on Oa, is set free and tasked with Earth. He must save all the people killed by Dekker because that was in fact Krona in disguise, he can actually change his shape.
It’s important that Alan he doesn’t change anything else, like saving his marriage. He must also prevent to run into his previous self of that time.
The train incident still needs to happen of else he won’t become Green Lantern. The Guardians wouldn’t find out about the use of Starheart either.
All of the other killed people are saved. Except the test pilot Martin Jordan. The only difference Alan could make was to not have him invite his son onboard for a flight.

Then we head to present day, 2007
Alan is nowhere to be seen. He disappeared after his time travel. Kyle Rayner is now a comic book illustrator who makes adventures about the Green Lantern of his childhood.
John Stewart has just completed his architect studies after having a career in the military.
Hal Jordan is a test pilot just like his father. He’s also a daredevil persona with a need to prove himself. He’s not like Superman, that’s for sure.

Green Lantern leader Abin Sur crashes outside the city late one night. He’s wounded after a solo encounter with Krona and needs to find a new member for the corps.
The ring flies off to the closest suitable candidate and almost lands in his hand. But then Hal happens to drive his car nearby. The ring has Starheart’s consciousness, as all the other rings, and deems the pilot a better choice. It takes off in another direction. Hal gets selected as a new Green Lantern and is taken to Oa to get a briefing about what is means to be a part of the corps.
Who that other guy was, we don’t know.
When Hal performs his first heroics in public, people notice the ring with the faint glow on his finger and the powers. It’s all over the news. They still have a vague memory of Alan.

Krona soon arrives with the determination to wipe out every Lantern, one by one. Starting with Earth because that’s where it all started.
He suspects Kyle knows something and force him to reveal the whereabouts of Alan because it seems they are in touch. But the artist simply doesn’t know. He stands up to the former Guardian who is now full on evil and almost gets killed.

Krona goes to wreck havoc on a military base. Puny humans don’t deserve having weapons, much less going to space. It just so happens that John is visiting his former colleagues there. They try to fight back as good as they can.
The ring alerts Hal about the danger. He shows up but is taken by surprise by the might of his opponent.
When Hal is taken temporarily down and there’s still a threat, the ring flies to another candidate. It turns out to be John because he’s showing strength and leadership in moments of distress.
The ring also sends an emergency call to the Lantern battery on Oa.
The corps is alerted and ready to send assistance but the Guardians prevent them. One rule of the corps is to not interfere in each other’s sectors unless there’s no Lantern there.

But the green flame has a mind of its own. Krona has always been against the idea of the corps. In his original form, he’s too powerful for one Lantern. Starheart knows this. It wakes up Alan from his limbo somewhere on the edges of the universe and brings him to Earth.
The two Green Lanterns Alan and John together finally defeat Krona.
The corps decide to grant John with his own ring so that he can share the duty with Hal. They also give out two more, one to Kyle for standing up to someone really powerful and for his artistic insight in superheroics. Alan gets the other one, an official GL ring, along with a new uniform.
The Guardians don’t really approve of this but the new corps leader Sinestro thinks they can make their own decisions. That’s why they made Abin Sur an honorable regular citizen of Oa. Yes, he was nurtured back to life so that he can enjoy a peaceful retirement.

Green Lantern (United Artists, 2007)
Directed by Peter Hyams
Produced by Tom Cruise
Written by Peter Hyams, Ian La Frenais, Paul De Meo, Philip Kaufman, Tom Cruise

Music by: Howard Blake (incl new theme)???
Costume design: James Acheson
Set design: Cheryl Carasik, Norman Garwood

Cast
Alan Scott: Cary Elwes
Krona: Christopher Plummer
Albert Dekker: James Brolin
Hal Jordan: Jerry O’ Connell
Carol Ferris: Tara Reid
Carl Ferris: Dennis Quaid

Abin Sur: Patrick Stewart
Sinestro: Richard E Grant
Killowog: Ron Perlman
Tomar-Re: Brent Spiner

John Stewart: Eddie Murphy
Kyle Rayner: John Leguizamo
Martin Jordan: Charlie Sheen
Young Hal: Freddie Highmore
Young Carol: AnnaSophia Robb

Young Kyle is an unknown

Cameos
Jeff Bridges as chief of police
Ethan Hawke as a cop
William Shatner as the mayor of Coast City
Dean Jones as William H Webster, FBI director
Peter Fonda as John E Otto, acting director of FBI
David Duchovny as an FBI agent (in-joke and a wink to the audience)
Terry Jones as the new leader of the Guardians

Some lightweight actors in front of the camera. It's still not a comedic film.

Very good cast Airwings!

It's pretty epic including the cameos. Cary Elwes would make a great Alan Scott, and it would be fun to see Elwes and O'Connell act off of each other.

This certainly would have been a great , sprawling, Green Lantern epic film.

 

[Frodo]

Time to return to Gotham City. Admit you've been waiting for this.


And it's time to look back at the films Joel Schumacher did in the 1990s. He’s not a bad director.
No, not the Bat nipples LOL
I mean his REAL films. Some ideas from A Time to Kill and The Client are used as a part of the story.

Batman has a new suit, the Neal Adams one (the illustrator also got involved in the production)
There’s more action this time. It’s not acceptable that the Green Arrow films have more fights and chases than Batman. If this stuff could be done already 1968 in Bullitt and in the 70s cop drama/crime drama films (Dirty Harry, French Connection, Death Wish etc etc), Batman should definitely have it too. So why not go the same gritty route?

Here's ideas for new Batmobile:

Aside from action, there is also the expected suspense and darkness that a Batman film should have. The first film from 2003 had been a generic film noir, a bit slow in pace, but they went further into noir this time. When Cruise is in charge, the freedom is bigger.
The sequel is tonally similar to specific noir films. In this case, it’s a love letter to Fritz Lang – the creator of film noir.
The film borrowed from more modern stuff too, Francis Ford Coppola’s Godfather trilogy, because organized crime has been a part of comic book Batman from the beginning.

Here, there are also influences from François Truffaut’s The 400 Blows, Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in America and a few films by Louis Malle.
Inspiration from French New Wave among other things, gives the sequel a partly non-american style. Now and then, it feels like it could have been made in Europe.
Well, to some degree it is. Batman goes overseas.
The action scenes still are very American however.
In addition to having a typical action director and a faster pace this time, a creator of horror films came onboard to deal with the darker stuff.
One of the villains will make you wonder how this could possibly turn out a serious film. Trust me, it could!

Coppola was actually once again approached about doing Batman. He had been negative about it earlier, now he was not sure. Is he softening and opening up for the possibility?
The offer went to Oliver Stone and then Scorsese. They are the kind of directors who could do Batman justice
The latter just:



Cruise wanted to have the hero written more fleshed out so that he can be seen as a character on the same level as the roles played by legendary actors.
As Bruce he’s a mix of Rock Hudson and David Niven. When he’s Batman, he heads towards Robert DeNiro and Clint Eastwood. Because then we can we actually imagine them play Bruce/Batman. This will justify the character as a part of actual film history, not just a comic book adaption. He’s more than that.

There’s a new cast. Johnny Depp wasn’t interested in doing sequels, he had only signed a one-film contract.
It's no reboot though. To remove any such doubts, the greyish and black noir suit from the previous film hangs on display in the Batcave and is talked about in a short dialogue between Bruce and Alfred.
Who could take on such an iconic role? Depp had brought him back to the top. What should they do without him? They can’t go with a lesser actor.
Not only American ones were tested but British too, and that would be the first such a thing happens, having a European playing a well-known U.S. superhero (No Nolanverse exists here). But it was important to find the best possible guy, no matter what nationality.
Colin Farrell was not the right type, not yet. He didn't have the gravitas, he needed to mature as an actor first. There are in fact two characters here, Bruce AND Batman.
Billy Cudrup was among the better and almost got the role. This is how things can turn out in the film industry. Talent alone isn’t all, not even being a versatile actor. There are more factors: personality, acting style and how well someone can portray what’s been written in the script.
The bar was set high. Maybe too high?

Dick Grayson enters Bruce’s world and shakes it up. He’s easy-going and full of life, not weighted down by the experience in crime fighting. But under his mentor’s influence, Dick will become more like him personality-wise. He slowly goes from a young Roddy McDowall/Mark Lester character to be more like a troubled Sal Mineo type.

For his origin, a classic circus is a bit old-fashioned. Schumacher had also already gone that route. What if The Graysons can be a part of something else this time, more relevant for today’s audience?
Street performance acrobats? Breakdance? Parkour? Anything that would help Robin become cool in pop culture. But then again, there’s something special about a circus. The shows are impressive and bigger in scale.
It’s decided to change it to the different, more modern Cirque du Soleil.
The Grayson family is among their flashy acrobat dancers. Dick already goes by The Boy Wonder alias there
We can question why Bruce doesn’t mind taking a kid out on the streets. It happens rather quickly. Alfred is against it, unlike in Batman Forever (1995).
Is it to distract the criminals? As Robin he’s the opposite of the dark knight with the bright and colorful costume.

What should they look for when casting the sidekick as he’s re-introduced onscreen? It’s crucial they get it right. Has he ever been done justice at the big screen?
He shouldn’t be an annoying one-dimensional joke but a real character. Not be acting overly cool in a forced manner like Chris O’Donnell.
Ideas were tossed around. Maybe they could go an unconventional route with a blond or ginger actor, to make the visual contrast to Bruce/Bats even bigger? There were possible candidates and it could have happened.
However, this was deemed too risky. Fans would rage over the radical change to Robin.

When the news was out that Robin was to be in the film, a lot of young actors tried out. After the success of the previous film, this was a role that many wanted to play. Almost on pair with our real world’s Spider-Man nowadays.
To find the right actor was as difficult as it was to replace Depp.
It has to be someone who can play out every aspect of Dick/Robin: be energetic and fun, mourning and emotional, angry and revengeful. That is for the acting part only.
The actor must be willing to get acrobat/dance training prior to filming, and even take lessons in street parkour in addition to mastering fighting skills. (Both Batman and Robin are physically demanding roles).
They can’t repeat the mistake with getting a 25-year-old this time. Dick Grayson is definitely younger than that. A problem is that there aren’t many actors in the right age group who have what's required for all of the above.
A certain guy around 16/17 was a good natural actor who had the right look but he lacked the bright energy that Robin should have in the beginning. The choice fell on someone who could both be serious and fun-loving

Batman Continues (Warner Brothers, 2007), shot in Chicago and Prague

The title is a double pun, he does actually continue his heroic journey from previous film and the character gets a franchise too
(First they wanted to call it Batman: Triumphant, or Batman: Unchained because the sound of them will suit the film. But they were both scrapped because they are too tied to the possible sequel to Schumacher's B&R which would work against this film)

Directed by Michael Mann
Produced by Tom Cruise, George A Romero,
Written by Michael Mann, Tom Stoppard, Allan Scott, Jeb Stuart, George A Romero, Tom Cruise

Music by Ennio Morricone (incl re-arr of Goldsmith’s theme)

Costume design: Michael Wlkinson, Neal Adams
Set design: James Edward Ferrell, Maggie Gray

Cast
Bruce Wayne/Batman: James Purefoy
Dick Grayson/Robin: Rollo Weeks
King Tut: Philip Seymour Hoffman
Catwoman: Asia Argento
Alfred Pennyworth: John Nettles (suggested by Purefoy)
Com. Gordon: Sam Elliott
Bullock: Michael Madsen
Mayor of Gotham: Michael Biehn
Helen Hunt plays a reporter that Bruce gets interested in

Cameos
John Cusack as the circus director
Ian McKellen as an English lord who visits Gotham/Bruce
Charles Grodin as CEO at Wayne Enterprises
John Philip Law as a board member of Wayne Enterprises
Debra Winger as a financial executive at Gotham City Hall

There are some easter eggs too, hints about heroes from my previous films:
Blue Beetle (Dan Garrett)
Atom (Albert Pratt)

AND these two

Like your Green Lantern cast, excellent !

James Purefoy would make an awesome Batman. He was V in V for Vendetta , but for whatever reason, he didn't do the voice over work. I could see Hoffman as being an eerie, threatening, and intellectual King Tut.

I've never seen Weeks before , but he certainly looks to part . He also very much resembles a young Christian Bale. They make a cool Batman and Robin.

 

[Vaibow]

I had a massive reply churned out, comp crashed and didn't save it, but I will do a quick run down.

MOS wasn't a bad launch pad so well leave it as is, plus I like the cast, aesthetics etc.

MOS - Summer 2013
As is.

Flash - Christmas 2013

Donald Glover as Jay Garrick, the og flash. It's a heist film, where this guy gets powers - doesn't know how to use them, we see him chase cop cars to beat them to it, to save the day, running into fires etc - it's light hearted, we can relate to Jay as he's one of us. Final third is he gets tracked and blackmailed into doing a heist - otherwise a loved one gets 'hurt'. Alas, like all heists, there is a cool plot twist at the end.
Clark Kent cameo's in this, as well as superman - they hit it off and become good friends. (the cameo also shows clark as his DP persona in comparison to him as superman - jay is no fool and it's kinda fun him laughing about it, telling clark to up his game - its a good Segway to a more light hearted superman sequel).

Wonderwoman - summer 2014 (we have it quicker)
As is

Shazam! - Christmas 2014 (again, time line is earlier)
As is.

Aquaman - Summer 2015
As is

MOS 2 - Christmas 2015
Metropolis at Christmas - real story is on clark and Lois, reporting on inter gang, interspersed with fantastic feats and saves - final 3rd is DP being being held hostage, with clark having to seemingly escape and come back as superman to save people, whilst the city and world are watching. Nod to die hard.

6 movies, all family friendly.

Nightwing - Summer 2016
Robin Blake has Gotham under control, he's the masked vigilante in batman's place.. until Tony Zucco rises and aided by The Riddler, taunts Nightwing.
Post credit scene, Bruce Wayne shows up at an airport.
Yes, part two of the Nolan saga.

Wonder woman 2 - Christmas 2016
Jay Garrick uncovers Diana, draws her out in the modern world

Green lantern corp - summer 2017

Worlds finest - summer 2018
Superman, Wonder woman and the mysterious 'batman' team up to defeat a hidden threat.
In this movie, it's never revealed who batman is, due to a modified suit, cowl. It alludes to it being Bale, but the post credit scene see's Bruce in the cave, patching up a young man, he calls Terry.

 

[Airwings]

Very good cast Airwings!

It's pretty epic including the cameos. Cary Elwes would make a great Alan Scott, and it would be fun to see Elwes and O'Connell act off of each other.

This certainly would have been a great , sprawling, Green Lantern epic film.

Thank you
I'm satisfied with it myself. 180 min running time to get everything in.
Ending with John and Kyle getting rings too.

Alan Scott and time-travel was what lead to Green Lantern Corps. That is mind-boggling
It's also bold to turn this into true sci fi, as long as it was possible. Atleast the corps is using technology and science.
The suits being real clothes is for the best.
The designer was experienced: Time Bandits, Brazil, Highlander, The Last Emperor, Little Buddha, Kenneth Branagh's Frankenstein, The Wind in the Willows, The Man in the Iron Mask.

I think of this as a more organic, less artificial, film in the sense there aren't any CGI caracters.
For example, the Kilowog actor (Perlman) was covered in prosthetic make-up.
Only Oa needed to use some blue screen shots because they couldn't build everything.

Cameos are a bonus.
It became a competition for the audience "spot as many cameos as possible".
I wonder what the filming was like with all these known faces on-set. All the cameo actors dropping by to shoot for two or three days.
Then they was all attending the premiere. A big number of celebrities who had been in the film.

 

[Airwings]

Like your Green Lantern cast, excellent !

James Purefoy would make an awesome Batman. He was V in V for Vendetta , but for whatever reason, he didn't do the voice over work. I could see Hoffman as being an eerie, threatening, and intellectual King Tut.

I've never seen Weeks before , but he certainly looks to part . He also very much resembles a young Christian Bale. They make a cool Batman and Robin.

Thank you very much.

This is one of my most time-consuming projects. I will take it easier next time.

The cast is nothing but pure awesomeness. I had to bang my head in the wall a couple of times to come up with the right actors. LOL
Batman and Robin both played by Brits..
Hoffman doing a serious take on the extremely campy King Tut.
Asia (from Romero's Land of the Dead), an Italian actress, as Catwoman. I envision a violent version of the villain. She could also play out some sadistic tendencies in the role.
An Alfred actor who only has played English cops/detectives on TV for decades.
Madsen as the short-tempered Bullock.
Perfect!!!!

I saw Purefoy as the best replacement for Depp. Cudrup was second. Dougray Scott was already Hawkman. I think being British is an advantage for playing Bruce/Bats. It's a feeling I have. It must have someting to do with their mood. Or maybe because they've done much stage work?

Dick Grayson had to be carefully written and cast. I went into it thinking that if Depp had done an oscar-worthy performance as Bruce, why couldn't the sidekick be treated with the same masterful approach? At least written like that. Can you even imagine it, Dick Grayson being handled like the serious type of characters that get oscar nominations?
I looked at a bunch of people to see if their faces would suit Grayson/Robin, in and out of mask. That's were I'm conservative. And that's the reason Farrell did neither suit Bruce or Batman. His performance in Alexander didn't convince me as a real candidate for the hero either. As I said, he needed to mature.
Rollo was about to get a tad old (20) but still appeared young enough. What made me pick him was this 2006 film:


I mentioned that they considered changing the hair color. What would you have thought about that?
If it works in the film, I'm for it. I'm not always conservative.
They could have gone for a younger Dick Grayson too. Here are examples. The two first are from the same film, so pay notice to the change in mood (elegance and anger)

:

It would be quite difficult to have a russian or swedish kid (as two of them are) overseas for playing the role and do all that rigorous physical training prior to filming. I think one aren't allowed to work full days either if younger than 18.
But here I looked at the faces. Maybe these examples could have been a visual re-imagining of Dick Grayson. No need to change the basic origin or the essence of the character. In this film, he's made a happy-going and energetic flashy acrobat dancer at Cirque du Soleil (the only change). It's done to make it modern and to increase the contrast within the dynamic duo.
Then he mourns the loss of his parents. As Robin, he continues to wear a colorful costume. He adopts some of the same darkness and fighting skills as Bruce. He doesn't need dark brown hair for any of the above. Just a stereotype based on the comic books. Every male Robin have dark hair
.
He's also a kid and Bruce can actually be a little bit taller for the sake of the contrast. Being shorter, looking harmless/innocent, wearing that costume - makes it so more impressive that he can still beat down thugs. It will surprise the villains. If he's blond, it will make them even more surprised (another stereotype).
That's what a fully-trained Robin is about. His looks are decieving. He's a fast, agile, skilled fighter with gadgets. You don't want to mess with him unless you have superpowers (or if you are Catwoman)
I really HATED O'Donnell version. He wasn't believeable at all. Neither the actor or the character. Also a performance that mostly sucks.
Ward, despite being too fun sometimes, wasn't as annoying as Chris. He's the best Robin we've had. My traditional Robin candidates are based off his looks. There were a handful of really suitable choices, but I could only pick one.

 

[Airwings]

I’m about halfway in my vision now. Things are starting to speed up for the DC adaptions.

Swish. Barry Allen is back. Paramount went quickly in production for the second film and decided to release the film under their own banner.

The first film was made before Tom Cruise stepped into the role as the overwatcher and decision-maker for all DC adaptions. Now he had the freedom to shape everything as he wants.
A sequel needs to develop the hero and bring him to new heights, to be superior to the previous film. Isn't that right?

The writers were told to think of Frank Capra and Blake Edwards when coming up with the story and how the characters should be, the warmth and the fun. Flash hadn't used inspiration from film history before.
Slapstick was allowed when it is legitimate.
Among the characters, Barry Allen is on paper a little inspired by William Holden and Dudley Moore. Jay Garrick has a bigger role this time and comes off as a Henry Fonda type. The actors do their own thing with that, however. They have already established their versions in the previous film.

In short, the basic main plot is like this:
The two Flash try to track down Reverse-Flash, while Barry has to deal with two villains of his own. Little do the heroes know he’s right under their noses, out of costume. He toys with them before revealing himself as Zoom.

But that wasn't all. Let me explain.
Early on, Zemeckis was wanted. The type of films he did in the 1980s could set the tone for Flash this time. You know, the BTTF trilogy and its fun sci fi tone. And the special effects used when the DeLorean speeds up. All of this SCREAMS Flash.
It would be perfect as a follow up to the previous film directed by Reitman. This time, they should go bigger.
But NO. Not gonna happen!
It's strange how some filmmakers can be so stubborn when they’ve already done something similar when it comes to visuals and overall tone. Are they afraid to fail or what?

This opened for another possibility, another way to go for Flash. A lot of stuff was added.
It started when DiCaprio suggested another director. Flash wears red, so what if the film could give a nod to Red Curtain trilogy? The ideas that were brought up are:
-The hero should go inside speedforce.
-Include a bunch of reality-bending sequences and surreal stuff. Have Flash end up in weird places and situations.
-Use the camera in new ways: zooming, tilting, leaning sideways

All this made the sequel be a more arty SUPER-hero film. It also feels that everything takes place on a giant stage, with the world as the audience. Which was the goal.
The creative team discussed such things; how to solve it practically, what works or doesn’t work etc. Terry Gilliam was consulted. He’s the master of surrealism.
Mel Brooks was also asked to assist with how to increase the fun in some scenes so they can have a parodic feel (think Spaceballs vs Star Wars) but without being an actual superhero parody starring Flash.
External creative ideas can lift the film even higher. It benefits the final film that Zemeckis turned it down. All the strange elements were added later.

The cast enjoyed doing this, to be a part of a lightweight adventure that also has its share of dramatic moments and grand superhero stuff.

Flash: The Scarlet Speedster (Paramount, 2008)
Directed by Baz Lurhmann
Produced by Ivan Reitman, David S Goyer

Final script written by Baz Lurhmann, Charles McKeown, Philip Eisner, Deborah Joy LeVine, Tom Cruise

Music by John Powell (incl re-arr of the main theme by Giorgio Moroder/Jay Gruska)
Costume design: Rebecca Bentjen, Tom Cruise

Cast
Barry Allen/The Flash: Leonardo DiCaprio
Iris West: Alyson Hannigan
Jay Garrick/The Flash: Matthew Modine
Wally West: Joseph Mazzello
Eobard Thawne/Reverse Flash/Zoom: Jeremy Northam
Heat Wave: Christian Slater
King Shark is done cgi
King Shark human form: Henry Thomas
Mayor of Central City: Stephen Tobolowsky

Cameos
Bank clerk: Jonathan Frakes
Upset man: Michael Gambon
Barry’s neighbour: John Cleese
Actors on stage in Barry’s vision: Anna Paquin, Cliff Robertson
Woman inside Speedforce: Nichelle Nichols

There are more speedforce cameos:

Young Russian golden age Flash: Dmitry Martynov
Different silver age Flash: Brad Renfro, in his very last performance.

The film has also some easter eggs:
Stars & S.T.R.I.P.E
Booster Gold
Blue Beetle (Ted Kord)
Captain Marvel a.k.a. Shazam

 

[Airwings]

The success of Wonder Woman made Columbia confident to make the sequel without any involvement from TriStar. There’s a little change in the cast from the first.

The Amazon princess had become a superhero then. Now she completes her journey to be an Amazon warrior. She gets more independent this time around.
The writers borrowed from Kathrine Hepburn and Claudia Cardinale (the latter also starred in previous film).
Films from Howard Hawks inspire the sequel. But also the big Hollywood sword and sandal epics in late 50s/early 60s.

Ancient Greece is glorified here. Its society and culture, even hedonic customs.
These elements are hard to swallow for a Hollywood production. Not everything can be shown, only hinted upon.

There are more fantasy elements too now, taken specifically from high fantasy/heroic fantasy.
We get to see pegasusses at Themiscyra, Diana also rides one of them.
There’s a tribe of centaurs at the Greek mainland, satyrs in the woods and a hidden elven kingdom as well.
This is done more of a “decoration” rather than being a real part of the plot. But atleast the centaurs and elves return for the final battle.
With it being fantasy-like….an older mentor is a must. It’s one of the Olympians. But Diana only gets guidance for a minor part of the film.

The story begins when Diana and Steve are on vacation in Venice. He disappears, she can’t find him.
It turns out that some of gods are still angry for last time. She must go in hiding for a while. She’s safe in India, out of reach.
Of course she has do dress up and do a Bollywood dance with local women, for the sake of the film. Cheesy but fun
Then we head back to Greece, the mainland as well as Crete. Diana travels the wilderness for some time.

Circe, the goddess of magic, is the villain this time. She wants to take over the rule of Greece. Perhaps even more. With her magic, she enchants a lot of men to be her slaves and warriors. Men are weak!
Wonder Woman and the amazons must face Circe and her army at the Battlefield on Crete.
As I hinted above, they get help too.
It ends back on Themiscyra with Diana and Steve getting married by Hippolyta.
Can you guess how expensive this film was to make?
There's an explosion in cameos. That would reveal some of the cost.

Boorman thought this was getting too big for him to handle as a director but he remained in the production as a creative force.
Paramount/Cruise offered Peter Jackson to helm the film, because of the fantasy theme. Can you guess the result?
Answer: Negative!
How come it’s almost ALWAYS so? A majority of the big guns shy away, no matter of successful the genre has become. Each film being better than the one that came out right before, it doesn’t help.
This is because there’s a delay of 1,5 – 2 years that factors in. Jackson was asked about it in 2006. The first WW wasn’t even out yet (but it was completed) and they already wanted to make a sequel.

John Woo was the second to be asked. They thought he would do a repeat of the cool fighting moves in the second Mission Impossible. Those impossible stunts that can’t be done by any normal human, but WW is a demigod after all.
At this point, he was preparing the Asian sword and sandal flic Red Cliff. He had left Hollywood. WW is a big project, he didn’t want to spend that amount of time away from home.
They had to settle for another director. It’s someone who has a style of his own. He tweaked the feel in the film in his personal way. When it came to the action parts, he agreed that they could benefit from some advice from John Woo.
The Asian director could come over as a consultant for some days but not any longer than a week. He looked at the solo fights, and assisted with the battlefield sequence as well.

Wonder Woman 2: The Journey (Columbia Pictures, 2008)
Shot in Venice, Bombay, Thessaloniki, Heraklion and the Greek countryside

Directed by George Miller
Produced by Rick McCallum, John Boorman

Written by John Boorman, Mick Garris, Kurt Wimmer, Tom Cruise, George Miller

Music by John Debney (incl a re-arr of the Wonder Woman theme by Joseph Conlan & Philiph Glass)

Costume design: Laura Jean Shannon, Tom Cruise
Set design: Peter Young, Alex McDowell
Action/stunt consultant: John Woo

Cast
Diana: Lynn Collins
Circe: Holly Hunter
Steve Trevor: David Wenham
Hera: Helen Mirren
Hippolyta: Sigourney Weaver
Antiope: Brooke Shields
Ganymede, the cup-bearer: Elijah Wood
Centaur leader: Walter Koenig
Elven king: Michael York
Elven Queen: Carol Cleveland
Narcissus: Orlando Bloom

Cameos
Zeus: David Warner
Athena: Glenn Close
Hephaestus: Mickey Rourke
Dionysus: Rutger Hauer
Pan: Christopher Lloyd
Adonis: Jesse McCartney

Hotel clerk, Venice: Marina Sirtis
Hotel manager, Venice: James Garner
American tourist in Bombay: Roseanne Barr
Young satyr: Michael Angarano
Satyr leader: Liev Schreiber
Tree nymphs: Keira Knightly, Charisma Carpenter
Centaur: Gary Sinise
Street painter, Thessaloniki: Warwick Davis
Female elf warrior: Julia Stiles
Fisherman, Heraklion: Terry Gilliam

Other DC properties are hinted upon in easter eggs:
Zatanna
Skyman
Mon-El

 

[Airwings]

Highest grossing films of 2007

We're closing in on today. it doesn't feel that long ago. I still remember when Potter ruled the world in the 00s. I was also quite impressed with Golden Compass.

My fantasy B.O. list doesn't look bad. 3 out of 4 in top ten. DC is slowly taking over.
Highest spot so far is Superman Lives at 5th back in 2005.

I'll split it in half so it's easier to read.

1. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
2. Shrek the Third
3. Transformers
4. Ratatouille
5. I Am Legend
6. Batman Continues
7. The Simpsons Movie
8. National Treasure: Book of Secrets
9. Green Lantern
10. Hawkman

11. 300
12. Aquaman
13. The Bourne Ultimatum
14. Live Free or Die Hard
15. The Golden Compass
16. Alvin and the Chipmunks
17. Enchanted
18. Ocean's Thirteen
19. Bee Movie
20. American Gangster

 

[Frodo]

You've got some great casts for Flash and Wonder Woman , and a great in depth history behind the projects..

That must take alot of work and thought to go into not just the casts and the stories, but the motivations of the behind the scenes players ,in addition to picking out specific costume and set designers.

 

[Airwings]

You've got some great casts for Flash and Wonder Woman , and a great in depth history behind the projects..

That must take alot of work and thought to go into not just the casts and the stories, but the motivations of the behind the scenes players ,in addition to picking out specific costume and set designers.

Thank you very much

I hope it wasn't too massive to read.

I have struggled a lot, then a lot more. But haven't you too with all the great visuals for your visions?

All designers for the various films are from 70/80/90s films and TV shows. Mostly sci fi and fantasy but other genres as well.
There's the mission to get the right side characters and villains for the stories too, like choosing specific gods for WW. They must suit the plot.
What plot then? The one I invent, LOL
And then find the actors. You may have noticed I have gone with many from the past rather than all the current superstars. Cheaper talents then.
All the films have one leg in the past and one in current times. There's a retro vibe while still being modern and suited for our times (2000-08).

And then I must come up with cameo actors, and give them good cameos. I create the cameos that would make sense to have. These are the usual common extras in general films. It brings a lot more weight to use known faces. Because of that, these extras are lifted into focus. Getting a line or two as well. It will make the audience go "Oh it's HIM... and HER!"

There's the writers too. Very important.
For Flash, I went with ones behind Brazil, The Adventures of Baron Munchhausen, Lois & Clark and Event Horizon.
For WW, they have previously worked on Batteries Not Included, Critters 2, The Fly 2, Sphere, Equilibrium, Ultraviolet and a couple of Stephen King adaptions. But the film isn't really THAT dark. They're chosen to give the story a special tense energy in the midst of all the mythological fun, that's all.

I went into this HUGE superhero project with the goal to make an equal to MCU. Even surpass it on a creative level. But it's not as commercial attractive as MCU while still doing good. I think each hero is flavored too much in his/her own style for pleasing the general audience all the way to the biggest numbers. That's why Transformers performs better.
It can be hard for some people to digest this DC stuff. It's not generic enough.
But as you can see, my films fare better every year. Their quality increase too (but none of them were ever bad)

I want to make it feel like this happened for real. Which means we have now gotten to the point where a handful of heroes have even got sequels.
I would gladly have the whole MCU erased from existence and replaced by these films. Exactly these films.
I can't speak for your opinion though

Imagine going back to our younger selves in 1999 and everyone of these DC adaptions will await us the coming decade. We won't yet know how many there will be, we will find out along the way.
We can only guess how excited we'll be every time we go to the cinema for a new hero, and every time another upcoming project is announced.
One thing could be sure, it would be our biggest and wettest fanboy dream coming true. We will buy movie magazines and read news/rumours online as well. We'll so overwhelmed that we bounce up and down in pure ecstasy.
Not only is Superman and Batman back at quality level, we also get Green Arrow, The Flash, Wonder Woman, Hawkman, Aquaman, Green Lantern and more DC characters up at the big screen. Every hero (even Robin) is handled just like they should, yet in unique filmatic ways.
Then Cruise, Depp, DiCaprio, Pitt among the lead actors. And some of our childhood directors.
Well, atleast myself would have been thrilled beyond reason!. Maybe not everyone.
These DC adaptions are where the word nerdgasm plays in

We'll get both LOTR and DC during the same decade. Nerds would rule the world!!!!

 

[Frodo]

Thank you very much

I hope it wasn't too massive to read.

I have struggled a lot, then a lot more. But haven't you too with all the great visuals for your visions?

All designers for the various films are from 70/80/90s films and TV shows. Mostly sci fi and fantasy but other genres as well.
There's the mission to get the right side characters and villains for the stories too, like choosing specific gods for WW. They must suit the plot.
What plot then? The one I invent, LOL
And then find the actors. You may have noticed I have gone with many from the past rather than all the current superstars. Cheaper talents then.
All the films have one leg in the past and one in current times. There's a retro vibe while still being modern and suited for our times (2000-08).

And then I must come up with cameo actors, and give them good cameos. I create the cameos that would make sense to have. These are the usual common extras in general films. It brings a lot more weight to use known faces. Because of that, these extras are lifted into focus. Getting a line or two as well. It will make the audience go "Oh it's HIM... and HER!"

There's the writers too. Very important.
For Flash, I went with ones behind Brazil, The Adventures of Baron Munchhausen, Lois & Clark and Event Horizon.
For WW, they have previously worked on Batteries Not Included, Critters 2, The Fly 2, Sphere, Equilibrium, Ultraviolet and a couple of Stephen King adaptions. But the film isn't really THAT dark. They're chosen to give the story a special tense energy in the midst of all the mythological fun, that's all.

I went into this HUGE superhero project with the goal to make an equal to MCU. Even surpass it on a creative level. But it's not as commercial attractive as MCU while still doing good. I think each hero is flavored too much in his/her own style for pleasing the general audience all the way to the biggest numbers. That's why Transformers performs better.
It can be hard for some people to digest this DC stuff. It's not generic enough.
But as you can see, my films fare better every year. Their quality increase too (but none of them were ever bad)

I want to make it feel like this happened for real. Which means we have now gotten to the point where a handful of heroes have even got sequels.
I would gladly have the whole MCU erased from existence and replaced by these films. Exactly these films.
I can't speak for your opinion though

Imagine going back to our younger selves in 1999 and everyone of these DC adaptions will await us the coming decade. We won't yet know how many there will be, we will find out along the way.
We can only guess how excited we'll be every time we go to the cinema for a new hero, and every time another upcoming project is announced.
One thing could be sure, it would be our biggest and wettest fanboy dream coming true. We will buy movie magazines and read news/rumours online as well. We'll so overwhelmed that we bounce up and down in pure ecstasy.
Not only is Superman and Batman back at quality level, we also get Green Arrow, The Flash, Wonder Woman, Hawkman, Aquaman, Green Lantern and more DC characters up at the big screen. Every hero (even Robin) is handled just like they should, yet in unique filmatic ways.
Then Cruise, Depp, DiCaprio, Pitt among the lead actors. And some of our childhood directors.
Well, atleast myself would have been thrilled beyond reason!. Maybe not everyone.
These DC adaptions are where the word nerdgasm plays in

We'll get both LOTR and DC during the same decade. Nerds would rule the world!!!!

Your cinematic and tv universe would have been awesome. . I know I would have been eating them up back then. I remember reading magazines like Hero, Wizard , and Starlog in the early 90s, about potential cbm coming , but they wouldn't being to show up until the early 00's . Even then, it was a snails pace and in dribs and drabs compared to today.

Even though we live in a good time now in terms of Superhero tv and film abundance , it's still a shame it took Hollywood so long to feel confident enough to exploit all of these great properties.

I guess if someone was born in the early 00's , they only know a world where cbm and cbtv are common place.

So for younger people, it's alot harder to appreciate how long Hollywood just sat on these properties .

When you think about, many of these characters were created in the 40s, 50s, and 60s yet it took 40 years for the first Spiderman film to ever get made , and it's taken decades to get a WW and Aquaman film off the ground and into theaters. I remember when there were films like Blank Man, and Tv shows like The Night Man, My Secret Identity, and M.A.N.T.I.S. on the air, while they wouldn't touch Green Arrow, Hawkman, The Atom, and other DC and Marvel heroes.

WB in particular ,had a whole library of DC characters for decades and its only in the last several years they're truly making the push to exploit their vast catalog of characters beyond just Batman and Superman.

Even now, I still can't shake the feeling that WB still may have a bit of that old hesitance and fear from getting out of their past comfort zone , even though they've had success with Wonder Woman , Aquaman, and all their Superhero tv series shows.

 

[Airwings]

Your cinematic and tv universe would have been awesome. . I know I would have been eating them up back then. I remember reading magazines like Hero, Wizard , and Starlog in the early 90s, about potential cbm coming , but they wouldn't being to show up until the early 00's . Even then, it was a snails pace and in dribs and drabs compared to today.

Even though we live in a good time now in terms of Superhero tv and film abundance , it's still a shame it took Hollywood so long to feel confident enough to exploit all of these great properties.

I guess if someone was born in the early 00's , they only know a world where cbm and cbtv are common place.

So for younger people, it's alot harder to appreciate how long Hollywood just sat on these properties .

When you think about, many of these characters were created in the 40s, 50s, and 60s yet it took 40 years for the first Spiderman film to ever get made , and it's taken decades to get a WW and Aquaman film off the ground and into theaters. I remember when there were films like Blank Man, and Tv shows like The Night Man, My Secret Identity, and M.A.N.T.I.S. on the air, while they wouldn't touch Green Arrow, Hawkman, The Atom, and other DC and Marvel heroes.

WB in particular ,had a whole library of DC characters for decades and its only in the last several years they're truly making the push to exploit their vast catalog of characters beyond just Batman and Superman.

Even now, I still can't shake the feeling that WB still may have a bit of that old hesitance and fear from getting out of their past comfort zone , even though they've had success with Wonder Woman , Aquaman, and all their Superhero tv series shows.

We were starved of superheroes back then despite having got Batman films. Where were all the other DC characters?

Magazines like Empire and Total Film still exist, don't they? They are very good, having long articles as well as many photos. I used to buy every issue back during the 00s.
Oh, if they would have covered the ongoing adaptions of MY films then

Young people are spoiled in terms of cinema

Superheroes have always had a bad stigma. Also when counting film popular adaptions (Donner/Burton), it still has taken a long time for CBMs to be accepted.
Decades in fact.
The kids who saw Supes in 78 and Bats in 89 grew up to be the ones that made Raimiverse and MCU possible. Older generations at the studio offices wouldn't even touch such a property with gloves. The bad thing is that some of them are still in power.

There's a new film presented here tomorrow. You'll be surprised.
Wait for it

 

[Airwings]

Tom Cruise’s Superman was the first cinematic adventure of many. But it wasn’t the first new DC project after Schumacher’s disaster.
Already earlier during the fall of 2000, another film saw the light of day. It wasn’t made for the big screen but a TV production. Tom Cruise had nothing to do with it either. It was an adaption that just happened to be made, and the character isn’t the most well-known among DC heroes.
NBC was behind this TV film. They wanted to make a fun crime story for teenagers and adults.
It has a kind of weird B-film esque feel to it. But aren't all superheroes weird?

Dan Garrett is the first Blue Beetle in the comics. Actually, there are two versions of him that existed before Ted Kord was created. This film mash the two Dans together into one.
Dan Garrett's suit is a Phantom rip-off really. They had to tweak it to avoid too many similarities with Billy Zane's look in the 1996s film

Blue Beetle (TV-film, 2000)

shot late 99/early 00, broadcasted at NBC in august

Directed by John Glen
Produced by Roger Corman, Dino de Laurentiis

Written by Gerry Anderson, Tom Holland (not the actor), Jeffrey Boam
Music by: Mark Snow (incl a theme)
Costume design: Jean-Pierre Dorléac, Danilo Donati

Cast
Dan Garrett: Mark Hamill
Mike Mannigan: Adrian Dunbar
Jarvis Kord: Dan Aykroyd
Ted Kord: Ralph Macchio
Sparkington J. Northrup jr/Sparky: David Gallagher

The plot
Dan Garrett is a police detective who's had enough of the justice system. It's not strong enough to deal with all criminals.
Prior to the film, he had donned a bulletproof rubber suit and started fighting crimes already a decade or so ago. When we first see him, he's already a celebrated hero. We'll see him taking up the vigilante way in short flashbacks
At the same time being a masked hero, he continued to work for the police, living two separate lives really.
His partner, the Irish Mike Mannigan, believed Blue Beetle is nothing else than a bandit himself and tries several times to catch him.

It’s said that Jarvis Kord (Dan's old class mate) at Kord Industries was the the designer of the suit.
It's a briliant invention. It's able to fit inside a small bug-like mechanical device, a “beetle”, hence the name.

Ted Kord, the younger brother of Jarvis, is a brilliant scientist, engineer and inventor but always held back by his brother.
When Dan wants some upgrades on the suit. Jarvis hands the assignment over to Ted. He re-designs the suit and makes a completely new and smarter one out of elastic skin tight Kevlar. He also adds some gadgets.
When he tries it on, he realizes how powerful it makes him.
Ted has always been in Jarvis’ shadow. It’s later revealed that he was in fact the creator of the first suit, as a younger tech prodigy. Jarvis just like to take credit for everything.

Now Ted sees a chance to turn the tides on his brother. The suit is changing him. He wants to be praised and enjoy glory.
A new Blue Beetle rises. At first, he’s a hero. The public start talking about Blue Beetle having got a fashionable upgrade.

Ted is slowly becoming a villain. After years of being treated unfair, his needs for getting even takes over his mind.
Make Manning is correct this time when claiming Blue Beetle is a criminal. But that's because he thinks it's the same guy.

Ted kidnaps his brother and takes over KORD Industries. Then he becomes a costumed menace of the city.

Dan has to step in to clear his name and find out who’s this new Blue Beetle is.
When Sparkington J Northrup jr, the son of an English lord, arrives in USA. Dan is afraid the evil Blue Beetle sees this as a chance to kidnap the youngster for ransom. He takes it on himself to protect the kid and act as a bodyguard. The two learn to know each other well. The boy has a love for 70s disco music, leading to Dan addressing the lad as "Sparky"

The two Blue Beetles clash. Dan gets defeated the first time. He had never faced someone that powerful, only street-level crooks. Ted has also learned some martial arts, due to the influence of the suit.

When Dan tries to fight the evil Beetle a second time, he uses some dance moves Sparky taught him. Ted is taken down and ends up in jail.

2004 looked good. The interest in superhero films became noticeable.

NBC held a couple of special cinema screnings for their Blue Beetle (00). Then released it on dvd (along with Wonder Twins).
And more than one film were coming out during the year.

Let's look at one!
The story behind started in 2001, during the filming of Minority Report.
Tom Cruise started thinking: what if someone with future technology visited our own time? What would that person be able to do? How would he or she be percieved by us? What kind of tech would they have in the future?
He was sure this could be an interesting plot for a film and wanted to explore the idea.
No need to create an original character, it did already exist.

There was this superhero called Booster Gold. Disney got the rights from WB some years prior. He approached the studio and told them about his ideas. They realized there is some potential to it.

The story in the film goes

A talented football player from far in the future thinks he doesn’t get enough of praise. Life has started to become too dull for him.
He steals some technology and travels to present day.
With his flashy gadgets and his knowledge of historical events, he stages heroic deeds to be admired by the public.
In the end, some unpredicted happenings force him to raise up as a real hero.

That's not everything. After doing the ordinary hero thing and saving people, he starts to poke his nose into things that's none of his business, like interfering with Task Force X operations and risking to expose them.
And if that wasn't enough, The Linear Men don't want somebody to mess with timelines and send agents back to 2003, to catch Booster. This is making them somewhat "villain esque" in the light of the film.
It's a fun flic. A bit campy, but there are decent action scenes.

Actors from popular TV shows in the past take on supporting characters and cameos. I can mention Richard Dean Anderson, Jason Priestley, Christina Applegate and Corin Nemec as the more recognizable faces.
The main players however, are
Michael Jon Carter/Booster Gold: Kip Pardue
Rip Hunter: Mark-Paul Gosselaar
Amanda Waller: Pam Grier

Disney released the film under the Buena Vista brand.

Booster Gold (2004)
Directed by Steven Lisberger (his first directorial gig in a long time)
Written by Steven Lisberger, Harve Bennett, Tom Schulman, Brent Maddock

Music by Joseph Harnell (incl a theme)

Costume design: Joanna Johnston
she removed Booster's mask because it makes him look too dorky. The hero got a pair of cool high tech glasses instead

In order to make the future world cool, a bunch of people were brought in

Set design ideas: Keith Wilson, Patricia Van Ryker, Jim Mees
Final set designs: James Ira Colburn, Herman Zimmerman, William Stout

These were among the many influences

But do people in the future really dress like this?

This film went further than that and depicted the world of Booster's time really "out there"

Now, what’s this?

An idea had come up at the end of 2005 but was put to rest. It wasn’t brought up again until the first Flash opened in cinemas.
There have been a bunch of cinematic DC adaptions so far. What if we could go back to the first one, that wasn’t Supes, Bats or Arrow? Can Booster Gold come back again? And not being alone this time?
In the comics, he’s teamed up with Blue Beetle. Could that work in live action?

This would take the audience back to a time even before the Tom Cruise Superman.
Blue Beetle was actually the very first in line of all these films, albeit a TV production.

Could Disney be convinced to work with NBC on having their characters meet?
CBS are also involved to some extent here.
It surely helped a lot that Cruise had been assigned the decision-maker of all superhero films. He just had to make the studio and the TV channels willing to put money into the project, that’s all! Every creative input was his to make, and he always hired people to do that for him.
Before approaching Disney/NBC/CBS, he must have a good idea to present. That wasn’t so difficult. It could be a superhero satire.
Since Robert Altman had given some advice for the first Wonder Woman, he had been thinking about to make a superhero adaption that’s Altmanesque.
Altman is a fun and stylized director that also has a serious side. He’s tried CBM stuff himself too (Popeye).
The meetings turned out positive. Disney goes in with their Touchstone banner for this.

This is the first actual superhero team-up. Because both have had solo adventures before.
Imagine the two of them meeting each other!
Imagine Booster entering Dan Garrett and his side characters' world
How can their two distinctive heroes match up? One is more comical, the other a crime fighting vigilante.
It works. They become a superhero duo that have to deal with new threats that rise up.
A lot of stuff is crammed into the film. There’s a global pharmaceutical company with a hidden agenda, and a rouge bad guy too.
Our heroes go to Canada to breaking and entering a warehouse. A bit of a heist there.
But wait, there’s more!
I’ll get back to that later.

The cast is mostly changed. It may feel the film lacks consistency when cutting ties to the old.
Hamill, Aykroyd and Macchio all said they would have loved to do it again, but it didn’t work out. It was going to be a bit different take on everything
But previous actors still show up in one way or another.
A reboot? No, it deals with stuff both heroes had in their own films. The story continues.
Past directors and producers returned to oversee the production. They all wanted to make sure of the consistency, because these guys had brought the characters to life the first time.

Let into look at some things that happen.
It starts in Booster’s own timeline. It’s changed, from a generic high tech society with comical designs, to something called solarpunk. Also with some craziness.
It’s similar to what we’ll see in a few years in Tomorrowland too.
Booster has asked Linear Men for permission to travel back in time again. As they’re in the middle of changing their official work title to Time Masters, they haven’t got time for handling the matter because of all the bureaucracy that would require. They just grant him the wish but with Rip Hunter coming along as a background observer, ready to step in if Booster messes up too much.
They don’t go to Atlanta this time, but to Blue Beetle’s hometown. What a coincidence!

In present day, Task Force X has evolved into Checkmate and expanded the missions to outside of America. They’re also linked to the government, both the military and NASA. A certain space engineer named Ted Knight isn’t amused by this. He thinks NSA and CIA should be perfectly capable of handling global missions on their own.
But Checkmate is more shadowy, they use more brute force and their agents are more immoral. They aren’t fond of superheroes getting in their way and taking care of big threats. Amanda Waller dislikes Booster since their paths crossed last time.
It seems there are non-government investors as well. Business leader Maxwell Lord supports and funds Checkmate missions. He also gets a strange interest in the technology the heroes wield.
Sounds quite serious for a satire.

Jarvis Kord is one of the main villains, perhaps even the main one. He plans to launch an attack on a major u.s. city. With the help of his younger brother, the genius Ted, he’s building robot soldiers that can do the dirty job. But first he had to help him to escape his cell .a.k.a. do a prison break
Ted builds adds wings to his Blue Beetle suit so that he can also fly, in addition to his martial arts and the gadgets.
With all this, Dan should be lucky that Booster shows up.

There can be a scene where Booster Gold fights Ted Kord as the Evil Blue Beetle but barely makes it out.

Dan is still a daytime cop out of costume and has to constantly listen to his partner Mike’s nagging about Blue Beetle being a criminal. He hasn’t yet understood there are two of them.
Dan, as the cop, gets assigned to temporarily be a body guard to the rich Pemberton family’s bratty kid. He doesn’t like it very much.

There’s more too.
One night, a metallic object falls from the sky. It looks like similar to the ones Dan and Ted use to store their suits. It’s shaped like a scarab.
The device crash lands in a garage. It just so happens that where the Reyes family lives. It’s later found by the teenage son Jaime. He doesn’t know what it really is but he finds it intriguing and examine it.
The bug later attaches itself on his back spine and out comes an almost robotic-like suit that cover the whole body.
It’s made out of metal, it’s smart, and it has weapons. The armor can tune in on the wearer’s personality, like Ted’s suit did (that’s why he first went heroic, then villainous). And if that wasn’t enough, the suit can now fly as well. It doesn’t even need wings, like Ted’s.
That’s right, the film introduces a character that just had his debut in the comic books.
Part of the film puts focus on Jaime. His teenage insecurities lead to the suit not working properly but he tries the best he can. We follow his maturing process, how he comes to grip with being a hero, and dealing with teenage problems (and love) at the same time.
At the end, he gets enough confidence to become the third Blue Beetle and do some usual heroics, save some people here and there..
It gets noticed around town that yet another guy wears that blue outfit.
Mike Manning still thinks it’s the same guy. He’s about to lose his mind.

The robot attack is launched. Now we have Booster and two heroic Blue Beetles against one evil, and an army of humanoid robots. It seems they are not enough.
But then they get unexpected help from Spaceman, who wields a gravity staff. A certain superhero kid and his chauffeur join in too. Here, it ties into the anthology film Star Spangled Heroes (2005)
Booster happily points out that a couple of the new guys have stars on their suits, like him.
When Ted Kord finally gets an understanding of right and wrong, he switches side to join the heroes. That’s how they save the city. The former villain redeems himself.

The film ends with Booster Gold, along with Rip Hunter, taking a closer look at Jaime’s scarab. They have never seen technology of that kind despite coming from hundreds of years in the future. Neither of the two Teds, both scientists, know what it is either.
Booster takes the scarab with him to his own time for a deeper analysis, with the promise to return as soon as possible.

Even this film “steals” from older actors.
But who are the influences this time?

For the main players, I think Ted Kord has a Jack Nicholson vibe when evil. When he’s a good guy, more of a restrained version of the same.
Dan Garrett is a Jack Palance type while in suit, a little less so as a cop. Mike Manning is just a hothead.
Jaime Reyes is a teen Dustin Hoffman. But sometimes he acts like a kid Fred Savage. It’s deliberate. You will find out the reason later.
Booster Gold then, who is he? Perhaps like the overconfident Bill Murray?

Roger Donaldson was offered to make the characters valid again after all these other superhero films. He declined because he thinks of himself as too serious for this, but added that he would do Green Arrow or Batman.

Cruise pondered about the director matter. He decided to go with two, not just one. The reason is that the film itself should have two different unique vibes, just like the two main characters. It will make their differences be even more noticeable.
It would prove to be a challenge to find two directors to hire for one single film. Especially considering the fact that they can’t have the same directing style.

Cruise started to think about Peter Jackson, him evolving from splatter flics Braindead and Bad Taste into Lord of the Rings. What a remarkable change!
He thought he could do the same thing and go for a very unorthodox choice here.
There’s one big difference tough. This “weird” director wasn’t the one who got the idea to helm a blockbuster spectacle, he was just hired to do it.
You maybe will slam your head in the wall when I reveal that Cruise brought John Waters onboard for this film.
As you can expect, Waters’ assigned director partner had problems during the filming process. He felt that he had to keep the weirdo in a leash. The whole cast found it difficult to work with “The Baron of Bad Taste” as he’s called. The producers struggled too.
But the joint directors made the film something that’s never been seen before.

As I said earlier, it’s a satire. It’s the comical and the serious together side by side.
It makes a little fun of superheroes, and blockbusters in general.
Just that the end credits are done like the typical 80s TV series opening montage is a proof.
You know, actors looking like they’re in the midst of doing something but quickly turns towards the camera to smile and pose for the viewers.

Booster Gold and the Blue Beetle(s) (Touchstone Pictures/NBC/CBS, 2008)
Shot in Dallas and Vancouver

Directed by John Waters and Joe Johnston
Produced by Kevin Smith, Steven Lisberger, John Glen, Stephen Sommers, Roger Corman, Dino De Laurentiis,

Written by Kevin Smith, Ted Elliot, Chip Miller, Tom Cruise, John Waters

Music by Randy Edelman
incl re-arr of Joseph Harnell’s Booster Gold theme
and Mark Snow’s Blue Beetle theme
and Dennis McCarthy’s themes for Spaceman and Star-Spangled Kid

Costume design: Alexandra Byrne, Anna B Sheppard, Tom Cruise

I'll present the cast in next post and go direct to cameos here

Linear Men/Time Masters representative: Tori Spelling
Debating politicians: Dan Aykroyd, Bridget Fonda
Young woman on inline skates: Lindsay Lohan
Book author on tour: Anthony Stewart Head
Popular actor: George Takei
News anchors: Kirstie Alley, Billy Crystal
Angry car driver at various points during the film: Nick Nolte
Checkmate executives: Mark Hamill, Gates McFadden
Checkmate agents: Izabella Scorupco, Matthew Lillard
NSA agents: Kiefer Sutherland, Stephen Dorff
British MI6 agent: Adrian Dunbar
Rich old woman in limousine: Angela Lansbury
Weather forecaster: Daniel Baldwin
U.S. army private: David Gallagher
U.S. army corporal: Kip Pardue
U.S. army lieutenant: Mark-Paul Gosselaar
U.S. army captain: LeVar Burton
Jaime’s uncle: Ralph Macchio
Teen at Jaime’s school: Rory Culkin
Principal at Jaime’s school: Louis Gossett jr
Jaime’s psychologist: Rosemary Harris
Talk show host: Dick van Dyke

Zatanna and her world of magic expanded the superhero genre.
For that character, she was born with it inside her
But what if more could be explored about the supernatural? There's the kind of magic related to objects, like the totem in Vixen.
Couldn't it also be claimed that there is cosmic magic as well? Would it be above the Earth-based kind? Stronger even?

The ideas were tossed around back in 2002.
DC Comics had several different characters related to one single object, The Cosmic Rod.
Should all of them be adapted? Wouldn't it be too many similarities?
Could two or more of them be mashed into one single character? There were many questions.
When a character named Stargirl was published in late 2003, the plans moved forward quickly.
She was the latest bearer of the rod.

But what about the previous heroes related to the object? Should they be crammed together in an opening montage, similar to how they did for LOTR?
All these various obscure star characters from different eras in comic books belonged at this point to

A fitting symbolism with the cosmic background and the overseeing eye.

CBS did a temporarily joint with a major film studio for this.
Which one?
Universal, of course.

The adaption was going to be an anthology film so that each of the rod bearers would be included. That's for the best.
Stargirl was the one with the most screen time. DC Comics said they need to include her that much so the comics would sell better.

The film turned out a bit massive in format, despite being a collection of shorter stories. It's fast paced, family friendly and fun. The different segments tie into each other in one way or another.

I mentioned that horror directors were interested in Zatanna. They couldn't all be involved on that.
To make up for it, Cruise asked a couple of them if they had interest in taking part in this project and mix the usual typical superhero stuff with another feel. It didn't have to be exactly horror, just something else.

This the first DC adaption of a minor character that cross the border to A-level film (by the 2005 standard). The others always had a B-vibe somewhere.
You might suspect Green Arrow wasn't really A either, but its adaption actually was up there with Supes and Bats. I meant all the other films.

I have to point out that they changed Stargirl's suit from the comics and had it cover the whole upper body. No bare belly here! It wouldn't look good in a major film.
They also changed the word rod, to staff.

For the various roles, most actors were handpicked without an audition.
Dominique Swain showed interested in playing Stargirl but ended up in another role.
Anna Paquin was promoted by Universal but she was unable to dye her hair blond due to other commitments.
Mischa Barton was chosen in the end because she had exactly the right look and charisma for the role. The very american teenage girl kind of thing. She could also tune in to the Melissa Joan Hart vibe because that's who the writers mainly had in mind while adapting the character for the film. But the actress had to fight with Fox to be able to star in this while she was still a regular on O.C.

Star-Spangled Heroes (CBS/Universal, 2005)

Directed by Stephen Sommers
Produced by Sean S Cunningham, Tobe Hooper
Written by Bruce A Evans, David Saperstein, Lawrence Konner
Music by Dennis McCarthy (incl the different themes for each hero)
Costume designs: Marlene Stewart, Michael Kaplan
Set designs: Roger Christian

Segment 1 - "The Earthly Staff"
Ted Knight: Stephen Dorff
Brainwave: Rick Moranis
Here we see a golden age-esque heroic suit, and the how the the gravity belt and the energy staff were created by a space engineer, who later starts a heroic path.
The name Starman is replaced by Spaceman here because they wanted to save it for another segment

Segment 2 - "Star-Spangled Kid"
Young Sylvester Pemberton: Rory Culkin
Pat Dugan: Brendan Fraser
Gloria Pemberton: Claudia Wells
John Pemberton: Ilan Mitchell-Smith (CBS talked him into doing this cameo)
Rich boy obsessed with comic books fights crime in a superhero costume with his family's chauffeur

 

[Airwings]

The cast, part 1 of 2

Michael Jon Carter/Booster Gold: Heath Ledger

Rip Hunter: Colin Farrell


Dan Garrett/Blue Beetle: Billy Campbell


Mike Manning: Tim Roth

Sparkington J. Northrup jr/Sparky: Alexander Ludwig


Ted Kord/Blue Beetle II/Evil Blue Beetle: Jason Flemyng


Jarvis Kord: William Hurt


Jaime Reyes/Blue Beetle III: Ezra Miller


Alberto Reyes: Fred Savage


Praying Mantis Man: Doug Jones


Dr Klaus Cornelius: Michael Palin


Catalyst: Ray Park

 

[Airwings]

The cast, part 2 of 2

Amanda Waller: Pam Grier


Maxwell Lord: Rob Lowe

Ted Knight/Spaceman: Hugo Weaving

Sylvester Pemberton/Star-Spangled Kid: Matthew Knight


Pat Dugan/Stripesy: Brendan Fraser

 

[Frodo]

View attachment 44158


View attachment 44159


Now, what’s this?

An idea had come up at the end of 2005 but was put to rest. It wasn’t brought up again until the first Flash opened in cinemas.
There have been a bunch of cinematic DC adaptions so far. What if we could go back to the first one, that wasn’t Supes, Bats or Arrow? Can Booster Gold come back again? And not being alone this time?
In the comics, he’s teamed up with Blue Beetle. Could that work in live action?

This would take the audience back to a time even before the Tom Cruise Superman.
Blue Beetle was actually the very first in line of all these films, albeit a TV production.

Could Disney be convinced to work with NBC on having their characters meet?
It surely helped a lot that Cruise had been assigned the decision-maker of all superhero films. He just had to make the studio and the TV channel willing to put money into the project, that’s all! Every creative input was his to make, and he always hired people to do that for him.
Before approaching Disney/NBC, he must have a good idea to present. That wasn’t so difficult. It could be a superhero satire.
Since Robert Altman had given some advice for the first Wonder Woman, he had been thinking about to make a superhero adaption that’s Altmanesque.
Altman is a fun and stylized director that also has a serious side. He’s tried CBM stuff himself too (Popeye).
The meetings turned out positive. Disney goes in with their Touchstone banner for this.

This is the first actual superhero team-up. Because both have had solo adventures before.
Imagine the two of them meeting each other!
Imagine Booster entering Dan Garrett and his side characters' world
How can their two distinctive heroes match up? One is more comical, the other a crime fighting vigilante.
It works. They become a superhero duo that have to deal with new threats that rise up.
A lot of stuff is crammed into the film. There’s a global pharmaceutical company with a hidden agenda, and a rouge bad guy too.
Our heroes go to Canada to breaking and entering a warehouse. A bit of a heist there.
But wait, there’s more!
I’ll get back to that later.

The cast is mostly changed. It may feel the film lacks consistency when cutting ties to the old.
Hamill, Aykroyd and Macchio all said they would have loved to do it again, but it didn’t work out. It was going to be a bit different take on everything
But previous actors still show up in one way or another.
A reboot? No, it deals with stuff both heroes had in their own films. The story continues.
Past directors and producers returned to oversee the production. They all wanted to make sure of the consistency, because these guys had brought the characters to life the first time.

Let into look at some things that happen.
It starts in Booster’s own timeline. It’s changed, from a generic high tech society with comical designs, to something called solarpunk. Also with some craziness.
It’s similar to what we’ll see in a few years in Tomorrowland too.
Booster has asked Linear Men for permission to travel back in time again. As they’re in the middle of changing their official work title to Time Masters, they haven’t got time for handling the matter because of all the bureaucracy that would require. They just grant him the wish but with Rip Hunter coming along as a background observer, ready to step in if Booster messes up too much.
They don’t go to Atlanta this time, but to Blue Beetle’s hometown. What a coincidence!

In present day, Task Force X has evolved into Checkmate and expanded the missions to outside of America. They’re also linked to the government, both the military and NASA. A certain space engineer named Ted Knight isn’t amused by this. He thinks NSA and CIA should be perfectly capable of handling global missions on their own.
But Checkmate is more shadowy, they use more brute force and their agents are more immoral. They aren’t fond of superheroes getting in their way and taking care of big threats. Amanda Waller dislikes Booster since their paths crossed last time.
It seems there are non-government investors as well. Business leader Maxwell Lord supports and funds Checkmate missions. He also gets a strange interest in the technology the heroes wield.
Sounds quite serious for a satire.

Jarvis Kord is one of the main villains, perhaps even the main one. He plans to launch an attack on a major u.s. city. With the help of his younger brother, the genius Ted, he’s building robot soldiers that can do the dirty job. But first he had to help him to escape his cell .a.k.a. do a prison break
Ted builds adds wings to his Blue Beetle suit so that he can also fly, in addition to his martial arts and the gadgets.
With all this, Dan should be lucky that Booster shows up.

There can be a scene where Booster Gold fights Ted Kord as the Evil Blue Beetle but barely makes it out.

Dan is still a daytime cop out of costume and has to constantly listen to his partner Mike’s nagging about Blue Beetle being a criminal. He hasn’t yet understood there are two of them.
Dan, as the cop, gets assigned to temporarily be a body guard to the rich Pemberton family’s bratty kid. He doesn’t like it very much.

There’s more too.
One night, a metallic object falls from the sky. It looks like similar to the ones Dan and Ted use to store their suits. It’s shaped like a scarab.
The device crash lands in a garage. It just so happens that where the Reyes family lives. It’s later found by the teenage son Jaime. He doesn’t know what it really is but he finds it intriguing and examine it.
The bug later attaches itself on his back spine and out comes an almost robotic-like suit that cover the whole body.
It’s made out of metal, it’s smart, and it has weapons. The armor can tune in on the wearer’s personality, like Ted’s suit did (that’s why he first went heroic, then villainous). And if that wasn’t enough, the suit can now fly as well. It doesn’t even need wings, like Ted’s.
That’s right, the film introduces a character that just had his debut in the comic books.
Part of the film puts focus on Jaime. His teenage insecurities lead to the suit not working properly but he tries the best he can. We follow his maturing process, how he comes to grip with being a hero, and dealing with teenage problems (and love) at the same time.
At the end, he gets enough confidence to become the third Blue Beetle and do some usual heroics, save some people here and there..
It gets noticed around town that yet another guy wears that blue outfit.
Mike Manning still thinks it’s the same guy. He’s about to lose his mind.

The robot attack is launched. Now we have Booster and two heroic Blue Beetles against one evil, and an army of humanoid robots. It seems they are not enough.
But then they get unexpected help from Spaceman, who wields a gravity staff. A certain superhero kid and his chauffeur join in too. Here, it ties into the anthology film Star Spangled Heroes (2005)
Booster happily points out that a couple of the new guys have stars on their suits, like him.
When Ted Kord finally gets an understanding of right and wrong, he switches side to join the heroes. That’s how they save the city. The former villain redeems himself.

The film ends with Booster Gold, along with Rip Hunter, taking a closer look at Jaime’s scarab. They have never seen technology of that kind despite coming from hundreds of years in the future. Neither of the two Teds, both scientists, know what it is either.
Booster takes the scarab with him to his own time for a deeper analysis, with the promise to return as soon as possible.

Even this film “steals” from older actors.
But who are the influences this time?

For the main players, I think Ted Kord has a Jack Nicholson vibe when evil. When he’s a good guy, more of a restrained version of the same.
Dan Garrett is a Jack Palance type while in suit, a little less so as a cop. Mike Manning is just a hothead.
Jaime Reyes is a teen Dustin Hoffman. But sometimes he acts like a kid Fred Savage. It’s deliberate. You will find out the reason later.
Booster Gold then, who is he? Perhaps like the overconfident Bill Murray?

Roger Donaldson was offered to make the characters valid again after all these other superhero films. He declined because he thinks of himself as too serious for this, but added that he would do Green Arrow or Batman.

Cruise pondered about the director matter. He decided to go with two, not just one. The reason is that the film itself should have two different unique vibes, just like the two main characters. It will make their differences be even more noticeable.
It would prove to be a challenge to find two directors to hire for one single film. Especially considering the fact that they can’t have the same directing style.

Cruise started to think about Peter Jackson, him evolving from splatter flics Braindead and Bad Taste into Lord of the Rings. What a remarkable change!
He thought he could do the same thing and go for a very unorthodox choice here.
There’s one big difference tough. This “weird” director wasn’t the one who got the idea to helm a blockbuster spectacle, he was just hired to do it.
You maybe will slam your head in the wall when I reveal that Cruise brought John Waters onboard for this film.
As you can expect, Waters’ assigned director partner had problems during the filming process. He felt that he had to keep the weirdo in a leash. The whole cast found it difficult to work with “The Baron of Bad Taste” as he’s called. The producers struggled too.
But the joint directors made the film something that’s never been seen before.

As I said earlier, it’s a satire. It’s the comical and the serious together side by side.
It makes a little fun of superheroes, and blockbusters in general.
Just that the end credits are done like the typical 80s TV series opening montage is a proof.
You know, actors looking like they’re in the midst of doing something but quickly turns towards the camera to smile and pose for the viewers.

Booster Gold and the Blue Beetle(s) (Touchstone Pictures/NBC, 2008)
Shot in Dallas and Vancouver

Directed by John Waters and Joe Johnston
Produced by Kevin Smith, Steven Lisberger, John Glen, Stephen Sommers, Roger Corman, Dino De Laurentiis,

Written by Kevin Smith, Ted Elliot, Chip Miller, Tom Cruise, John Waters

Music by Randy Edelman
incl re-arr of Joseph Harnell’s Booster Gold theme
and Mark Snow’s Blue Beetle theme
and Dennis McCarthy’s themes for Spaceman and Star-Spangled Kid

Costume design: Alexandra Byrne, Anna B Sheppard, Tom Cruise

I'll present the cast in next post and go direct to cameos here

Linear Men/Time Masters representative: Tori Spelling
Debating politicians: Dan Aykroyd, Bridget Fonda
Young woman on inline skates: Lindsay Lohan
Book author on tour: Anthony Stewart Head
Popular actor: George Takei
News anchors: Kirstie Alley, Billy Crystal
Angry car driver at various points during the film: Nick Nolte
Checkmate executives: Mark Hamill, Gates McFadden
Checkmate agents: Izabella Scorupco, Matthew Lillard
NSA agents: Kiefer Sutherland, Stephen Dorff
British MI6 agent: Adrian Dunbar
Rich old woman in limousine: Angela Lansbury
Weather forecaster: Daniel Baldwin
U.S. army private: David Gallagher
U.S. army corporal: Kip Pardue
U.S. army lieutenant: Mark-Paul Gosselaar
U.S. army captain: LeVar Burton
Jaime’s uncle: Ralph Macchio
Teen at Jaime’s school: Rory Culkin
Principal at Jaime’s school: Louis Gossett jr
Jaime’s psychologist: Rosemary Harris
Talk show host: Dick van Dyke

The cast, part 2 of 2

Amanda Waller: Pam Grier
View attachment 44171

Maxwell Lord: Rob Lowe

Ted Knight/Spaceman: Hugo Weaving

Sylvester Pemberton/Star-Spangled Kid: Matthew Knight
View attachment 44172

Pat Dugan/Stripesy: Brendan Fraser

The cast, part 1 of 2

Michael Jon Carter/Booster Gold: Heath Ledger

Rip Hunter: Colin Farrell
View attachment 44161

Dan Garrett/Blue Beetle: Billy Campbell
View attachment 44160

Mike Manning: Tim Roth

Sparkington J. Northrup jr/Sparky: Alexander Ludwig
View attachment 44162

Ted Kord/Blue Beetle II/Evil Blue Beetle: Jason Flemyng
View attachment 44163

Jarvis Kord: William Hurt
View attachment 44164

Jaime Reyes/Blue Beetle III: Ezra Miller
View attachment 44165

Alberto Reyes: Fred Savage
View attachment 44166

Praying Mantis Man: Doug Jones
View attachment 44167

Dr Klaus Cornelius: Michael Palin
View attachment 44168

Catalyst: Ray Park
View attachment 44169

Wow, Well done Airwings.
It sounds like another pretty epic project with a big story.
Good all star cast as well!
I can tell you put alot of time into not just the cast, and the backstory of the production, but also the actual story as well.
How long did it take for you to come up with the cast and the story?

 

[Airwings]

Wow, Well done Airwings.
It sounds like another pretty epic project with a big story.
Good all star cast as well!
I can tell you put alot of time into not just the cast, and the backstory of the production, but also the actual story as well.
How long did it take for you to come up with the cast and the story?

Thanks

It's the biggest superhero film so far. Not because of any mythical gods, or space travels. There's no such thing here.
It's for the various different storylines and the sheer number of heroes/villains and other characters showing up. More than it needed to be. Only Booster and two of the Beetles would have been enough. There's enough material for them to work with: Jarvis Kord's robots, Amanda Waller's Checkmate and Maxwell Lord.
I mean, why introduce a third Beetle that barely had a history in the comic books, and give him focus also?
And more villains? And the minor heroes showing up then?
All this makes the scope of the story really big. It involves so many characters and other things to keep track of.
A lot of things happen simultaneously, and are made a part of the bigger picture. So it's fair to call the film Altmanesque. I can confirm it is!
Cramming everything together like this, it's like pouring a whole can of honey over an already sweet and delicious cream cake.
The film is saved by the direction and the highly clever script. Without it, we wouldn't manage to digest it all.

I try to have every film explained so that we get some insight in story and the "behind the scenes". This can make the film seem like an actual film that happened 13 years ago.
I've been working on the whole superhero vision since new year. I also add details up until the moment I post a new one.
Sometimes I fail though. Like forgetting to bring up who had the rights to all these characters. It's not only NBC, but CBS as well. I have to go back and edit the post now

 

[Airwings]

While preparing the Booster Gold/Blue Beetle team-up, and its number of bad guys, Cruise got the idea to make another heroic duo.
He also thought about making a CBM where the usual plot is turned around, and show everything from the villains’ perspective.
These ideas were brought together in a story that would bring a couple of the earliest DC adaptions back at the big screen. It feels like a long time has passed since we saw them but it’s less than five years.
There’s Atom, there’s Elongated Man! And more of the original actors return this time.
Maybe another hero can be included in a minor role too?

The focus is on a group of wannabe villains, including a vampire with alcohol problems. They call themselves League of Annoyance. They don’t want anything more than to annoy people. This have failed so far.
Two more villains rise up, the league see them as potential members and recruit them in the blink of an eye.
Finally, they can unleash some really annoying chaos. And chaos is what will happen!!!
If only there weren’t any of these superheroes around. They turn up, put a spoke in the wheel, save the day… EVERY TIME.
By a coincidence, a galactic circus is secretly investigating if they can arrange one of their shows on earth. Humankind doesn’t know about otherworldly civilizations yet and could be taken by real surprise.
Two of their performers, Zan and Jayna, end up in the middle of what’s going on.

The character personalities in League of Annoyance are based on popcultural onscreen versions of actors, in no way any real villain types: Dudley Moore, Gene Wilder, Martin Short, Meg Ryan, Michael J Fox, David Niven, Maggie Smith, Rick Moranis etc etc.
Maybe that’s why they are dangerous? Two of those actors have actually played villains in earlier DC adaptions.

The heroes have less screen time than usual for these films. But still enough to base them on actors too.
Having Dibny and Palmer together is interesting. Just that they are portrayed so differently from each other.
One has a Christopher Walken tone, the other one a Jack Lemmon vibe. It’s a new kind of dynamics.
Wonder Twins are a blend of all the typical 90s poster boy/girl types that are always smiling and looking good. Both the teen actors and the young pop idols, because the alien siblings are performers/stars too.
They are character-wise also the actors that never got to play them back in late 90s, but they really should have.

Natalie Portman (Mars Attacks)

JGL (Third Rock From the Sun)

Just those two youngsters suited really well the vision NBC had for the siblings back in 1997. More specifically the characters they played and their looks. Getting them onboard would have placed Wonder Twins into a late 90s setting. The characters blending in with other young people and the fashion of that time, but also sticking out from the crowd in some sense too. They're aliens after all!.

This was NBC’s dream cast. But plans had to be put on hold when Batman & Robin destroyed the whole superhero genre. Now, things could finally be corrected in a way.
Not completely though, because the actors had become too old and had to be replaced with a couple of younger ones.
So, NBC got approached about having more of their DC characters adapted again. Just mere months after they greenlighted Booster Gold and The Blue Beetle(s).

The whole film is partly moody, with traces of melodrama, while still having many humorous moments of black comedy and tongue in cheek.
The 70s superhero series Wonder Woman, Spider-Man and Hulk are huge influences for this film, as are 90s Lois & Clark, Gerard Christopher's Superboy series, John Wesley Shipp’s Flash, Matt Salinger’s Captain America and Roger Corman’s Fantastic 4.
Can we even imagine the result, all of that brought together?

The film also flirts with John Huston and Billy Wilder at the same time.
Yeah, the latter is known for being fun but he HAS done more serious work too (for example, the masterpiece Sunset Boulevard) and this was also brought in.

Look at one of the writers! It’s shocking and means all the heroic characters are handled with yet another weird approach in addition to what I described above.

League of Annoyance (Amblin/DreamWorks/NBC, 2008)
shot in Philadelpia, Baltimore and Nashville

Directed by James McTeigue & PJ Hogan

Produced by Robert Engelman, Bruce Devan, Renny Harlin, Simon Wincer, Peter Hewitt, Ted Nicolaou, Kenneth Johnson

Written by James Robinson, Kerry Conran, Tom Cruise, Larry Clark

Costume design: Marilyn Vance, Jacqueline West, Kerry Conran, Tom Cruise

Set design: Kirk M. Petruccelli, Carol Spier, Kerry Conran

Music by Stephen Warbeck
incl re-arr of Lalo Schifrin’s Atom theme
and Charles Fox Elongated Man theme
and Shuki Levy’s Wonder Twins theme

League of Annoyance members
The Scrambler: Tom Selleck
The Malingerer: Gary Oldman
Filo Math: Stanley Tucci
Baron Nightblood/Drunkula: Alan Rickman
Cell Phone Sylvia: Rosanna Arquette
Aunt Phetamine: Molly Ringwald

Other cast
Jason Woodrue/Floronic Man: Steve Martin
Bito Wladen/Sonar: Goran Visnjic
Ray Palmer/Atom: Matthew Broderick
Ralph Dibny/Elongated Man: Anthony Michael Hall
Sue Dibny: Kristy Swanson
Wonder Twins: Aaron Johnson, Kristen Stewart
Albert Pratt/Atom Zero: Lou Taylor Pucci

Cameos
Cyclist: Gregory Smith
Photographer: Mila Kunis
Galactic circus acrobat: Erik von Detten
Galactic circus manager: William Baldwin
Gas Station attendant: DJ Qualls
Crying man: David Boreanaz
Mumbling woman: Jennie Garth
Pitchfork driver: Kenny Baker
Prostitutes: Denise Richards, Freddie Prinze jr
Pimp: Mike Myers
Shocked man: Hank Azaria
Old wise man: Leslie Nielsen