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Cinematic Universes
Matt
Posts: 4,457
Just finished watching The Mummy, of the Dark Universe. I thought it was okay, but can easily see how it bombed. Tom Cruise was miscast in the movie, for starters.
To be clear, I’m not bashing any of the other cinematic universes, but was wondering how the MCU seems to be the only successful one. Arguable, the Monsters projected to be in the Dark Universe were more well-known then the Phase 1 characters in the MCU. Without question, moreso then Ant-Man & Dr. Strange.
Arguably, DC has more well-known characters. I, Frankenstein was supposed to be in the Underworld universe. The Transformers & GI Joe were to be a Hasbro shared universe.
All of these studios want to make a run at the concept, but only the MCU has proven successful; even 10 years later.
Any theories why?
To be clear, I’m not bashing any of the other cinematic universes, but was wondering how the MCU seems to be the only successful one. Arguable, the Monsters projected to be in the Dark Universe were more well-known then the Phase 1 characters in the MCU. Without question, moreso then Ant-Man & Dr. Strange.
Arguably, DC has more well-known characters. I, Frankenstein was supposed to be in the Underworld universe. The Transformers & GI Joe were to be a Hasbro shared universe.
All of these studios want to make a run at the concept, but only the MCU has proven successful; even 10 years later.
Any theories why?
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But in terms of continued success, you've probably got to say it's Kevin Feige as he's the constant presence throughout.
Could the folly be expectations? Phase One had nothing really to lose by trying this venture. Could it be that other studios want the momentum & success by Phase Two with the initial movie? To quote Gisele Bündchen in episode 1 of Tom vs. Time, “it’s like a relationship; it takes time to build.”
MCEU was huge, at least in part, because of the risks (some of which were by necessity given the way Stan had whored out the rights to all of the higher profile characters) that they took:
Using Iron Man as their starting flagship character.
Casting RDJ - an actor with a history of erratic behavior for a long term role.
Willingness to recognize where things could be improved and being willing to tweak - Kenneth Brannagh was, IMO a great choice for directing Thor based on my reading of Thor - he brought with him that classic Shakespearean tradition really locked onto the early books, but the ability to shift to Hemsworth's humorous chops and infuse the story with so much more comedy was unexpectedly brilliant.
By the way, Underworld put out like 7 movies in their universe... that's a success. Sure, I, Frankenstein bombed but bombs happen. It's not a failure if you miss once and a while.
Marvel has probably been the *most* successful. But someone has to be #1.
* I keep hoping The Fast & The Furious franchise wise up and replace Walker’s former law enforcement Brian O’Connor with former FBI agent Johnny Utah. Now there’s a shared universe that’d kick ass.
Here's another for you, The Conjuring. 2 films under "The Conjuring" label, 2 under Annabelle, and "The Nun" coming out in September with another Conjuring film and another possible spinoff coming in the future...
I haven’t heard of spinoffs & prequels/sequels as examples of a shared universe. They’d be franchises. The “shared universes” as I’ve always ready it are independent franchises operating within the same universe. So, Fraser is apart of the Cheers universe, but it’s shared with Wings. The Profiler universe is shared with the Pretender universe. Friends, Mad About You, & Seinfeld share a universe.
"Independent franchises" feels like a weasel word to me. What makes the Marvel films any more independent than the Conjuring films? All of the Marvel films are owned and created by Marvel Studios. So what exactly is independent about them?
Whereas Annabelle is a prequel to the first Conjuring film. It takes an element of that film and expands upon it. Likewise The Nun is going to do the same for the second. There's not a separate series happening concurrently with the adventures of the Warrens that connects with them in the way Marvel's do.
That's arguably the failing of DC's universe, by dumping the entirety of their universe's heroes into the Batman V. Superman they made Wonder Woman, Cyborg, Flash, Aquaman's films spin-offs of the Man of Steel film series rather than part of something broader.
Star Trek, Star Wars and the Potter-verse are probably the closest to what @Matt is talking about, but even then, there's a very distinct timeline and elements in one are, at least somewhat dependent upon another to build the lore of the shared universe.
The MCU is effectively a series of stand alone sub-universes that have had significant interaction between them in the form of the Avengers movies and Civil War. That's pretty different from most everything else on the market.
If we can define it as movies that do not mention others (or build on others) in any way, then that's true of maybe a couple of pre-Avengers film and that's pretty much it.
By your definition Black Panther is a sequel of Captain America: Civil War, and therefore not a separate series that factors into the shared universe.
I’m open to finding another successful shared universe. Everything I read points to the MCU as the model (I presume that’d make it the most successful).
It’s a “weasel word” to say Alien was independent from Predator until AVP? What about Jason Voorhees was independent from Freddy Kruger until Freddy verses Jason?
It sounds like, from your posts, all of the movies from Fox share the same universe. Or any franchise is a shared universe...that it’s sharing with itself. That’d probably put the Bond movies the most successful.
Here’s what I found, though the second article mentions Conjuring, but a spin-off is still apart of the initial franchise. GotG, Antman, & Doctor Strange didn’t spin out of IM, IH, Thor, or First Avenger.
https://movieweb.com/amp/secret-cinematic-universe-fox-22-movies/
https://screenrant.com/shared-universe-movie-franchises-future-dying-marvel-dc/amp/
https://amp.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2017/sep/05/hollywood-cinematic-universe-marvel-superhero-movies-warner-bros
Here’s volume 1 of a book by Win Scott Eckert where he illustrates a shared universe among fiticious characters for centuries.
Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World (Volume 1) https://www.amazon.com/dp/1935558102/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_qUcjBbF0X833Z
Black Panther made his first appearance on Civil War, but Black Panther could have just as easily been made a stand alone without it.
The real crux, in my mind: Is one movie or series dependent upon another for world building:
Had Iron Man 2 bombed, would that have precluded the release of Thor or Captain America? Now, compare that to some of the others:
Had Chamber of Secrets bombed, would Forgotten Beasts have happened?
Had Fast and the Furious 2 bombed, would Fast and the Furiouser happened?
Had Wrath of Khan bombed, would that have precluded Next Generation?
Had Empire bombed, would that have precluded Force Awakens?
Whereas DC never really had one clear voice or purpose. And that led to some disjointed behind the scenes drama.
Which is another way of saying that, if Black Panther was your first one, sure, you might get excited enough about the character to go back and see Civil War. But you didn't have to have seen it.
I also think they have let these movies be very different from each other in tone and style. The first Iron Man, Cap, and Thor movies feel very different from each other, they look different, and they all have strong authorship behind them when it comes to the direction and cinematography. That reminds me of what Marvel Comics are like in the best of times. That is what makes it feel like a universe rather than a franchise. And I think it gives audiences, including ones that might have come to it in the early days skeptical about superhero stuff or comic book stuff, a lot of ways to enter in. They could pick their flavor to try.
As much as I enjoyed Infinity War, I do hope that, when it is time for Captain Marvel, or other 'issue 1' movies of characters to come, that things continue to be distinctive. To judge from the Ant Man & Wasp trailer, it looks like things will continue to stand on their own. I wouldn't want all the movies to just continue to be one, big, endless Avengers sequel with a giant cast of characters. But Civil War into Infinity War felt a little like we might be going in that direction. And that would be fine if there are some "event" movies in the mix. But I would still want those strong and individual "#1"s as well.
EDIT- One last thought: The MCU launched with directors who had done comedy. Not just with people who did big, slick, cool, heavy-CGI movies (sure, Johnston on Cap had done some big CGI movies, but also ones with humor, heart, and comedy, and ones aimed at family audiences). I think that matters. I know some folks criticize the Marvel movies for trying too hard to be funny. I don't agree, but that's subjective. But I think the idea that you had Johnston, Favreau, and Branagh, all of whom had made things that *depended* on humor and human interaction, and on acting, is key.
By contrast, if your whole resume has been directing commercials, music videos, and giant spectacles of slick, cool violence and mass destruction, then it might not be too surprising if you make a superhero film where audiences have trouble connecting to the characters when they are not smashing thing, you know what I mean? Where people are not engaged and compelled by the human side of the film. And even on a huge budget, more screen time is going to be spent on talking than on smashing.
Marvel Studio's movies sort of did the same thing... Iron Man was really just a "one off" movie (featuring a second-string character), with the exception of the literally tacked-on Nick Fury cameo at the end. Each movie stood on its own, until the last scenes of Captain America which led directly into The Avengers. By this time people couldn't wait to see them team up.
The failure of the other "shared universes", in my opinion, is due to the fact that they set out with the intention of creating a universe. DC jumped immediately from MOS to BVS and Justice League... they wanted the benefit of the universe without the hard work of developing the characters and world they live in. Same with Dark Universe.
Also, DC made the bonehead decision of making their big villain Steppenwolf. Yeah, us comics fans know they were "leading up to" Darkseid, but they should have just gone with him. I have been reading comics for 45 years and I couldn't pick Steppenwolf out of a lineup. And, now, if they drop Darkseid on the public, he'll just be a "Thanos rip-off".
Which leaves us really with just Marvel and a fledgling DCU. I do think all the factors everyone has cited here are reasons why but I think it primarily comes down to just a few people like Kevin Feige's tastes matching the public's. I know DCU had its own people like Zack Snyder, but he - and even Nolan as exec producer - was absolutely the wrong person for it IMO. The Man of Steel made little sense from the start. They wanted to experiment by imagining what Superman would really be like if he existed in the "real world" (because of Nolan's success with Bats), but ignored that they'd then have to reach a point where Superman becomes this selfless hero of the people and symbol of hope even though the entire origin they gave him was the opposite of that. They created an origin for a character who is not the Superman we know, but they just pretended that wasn't the case. Either come up with a dark hero universe or avoid the whole "realism" angle.
This led to Superman V Batman, which as one critic noted (and I'm paraphrasing): "instead of having the day versus night battle that the characters are meant to represent, we get a late afternoon versus evening."
I don't want to sound mean-spirited but I truly believe that leaving Zack Snyder on for as long as they did just insured that the DCU snatched mediocrity from the jaws of victory. How they are going to make Aquaman work given what we saw in Justice League is beyond me. The Adventures of Rad Surfer Dude? It could be fun but how does it work I wonder? Atlantis is real but they all talk inside bubbles??
In order to do what MCU has done you need to be incredibly lucky and have enough home runs so that people sort of just gloss over all the so-so stuff.
For a long time just having good visual effects was enough to pull in a good (enough) box office. But eventually audience came to expect visual effects and story. This was the death of Snyder films.
It might have been better for DC if Man of Steel had bombed. It probably would have meant no Superman movies for a while (like what has happened to GL), but it would have also meant getting rid of Snyder, and Wonder Woman would have still happened.
Better late than never, though. If DC can have some success with Aquaman and WW2 it might accelerate a rebound.
If they make Aquaman work (given what we've seen so far), they deserve an award.
By the way regarding the fledgling Star Wars shared universe: one of the things that put me off the most about Last Jedi was that Kathleen Kennedy - given what she allowed Johnson to do - seemed to only be thinking short term and not really thinking that much about extending the franchise. This is admirable I suppose, but at the same time where do they go from there? To be fair, they could do more if Fisher hadn't passed, but I get the vibe they were going to get rid of her in the 3rd film too. Why get rid of these beloved characters? You had to get rid of Solo because Ford didn't want to stick around but the others?
Snyder’s Ultimate Cut of Watchmen is one of my favorite CBM. I think it worked because it’s based on 1 specific story that confined Snyder. I think his vision of the DCEU was more Watchmen based then what Nolan did. Although I liked Watchmen, I don’t think it works outside of its confined, specific world.
People get on Snyder’s case for his vision. Granted, casting Affleck and this version of Batman has kept me out of the DCEU. Aside from Diana and this version of Kent, I’m not interested in this shared universe. I was hoping to at least like Lex, but again, I can’t get into it. Having said that, has Snyder really done something different then what Burton & Schumacher did? Both had a movie in their series that killed their vision moving forward.
Note that the 92% one at the top there he didn't direct.
Let's go threw these scores.
Dawn of the Dead 75% - This was his first movie, it was pretty good! Honestly! I haven't seen it since it came out so I won't speak to how it holds up.
300 60% - Was visually stunning at the time, but anyone who has rewatched it can attest to the writing being laugable and the acting stiff.
Watchmen 64% - Pretty good. Snyder's dark style matched the source material's dark cynicism well. Since he pretty much stuck to the book panel-for-panel his bad writing didn't affect the script.
Legends of the Guardians 50% - One of the biggest bombs of the decade. Terrible.
Sucker Punch 23% - Unwatchable.
Man of Steel 55% - Bad. Cynical. Disaster porn. A bad movie.
Batman v Superman 27% - A really bad film. Built on the premise that Batman would come around to liking Superman because their mother's have the same name. A really bad film that almost stopped the DC universe dead in its tracks.
Justice League 40% - A movie that had to be rewritten a couple of times because Snyder's original script was so bad. Turned out to be better than the score indicates but Snyder has nothing to do with any of that.
So that's 5 films in a row that have been rotten. That's not a coincidence. He wouldn't have redeemed himself had he been able to create his vision. He has no vision, as his previous films all show.
I stick to my theory up thread, Snyder had some initial success because he was ahead of the curve with visual effects. Once others caught up audiences expected more of a story, and he's utterly incapable of that.
I’m not using Watchmen as a way to validate Snyder. Aside from Watchmen, the only other movie of his I enjoyed was MoS, and I think it’s good because he had Goyer & Nolan.
Objectively, I noted Snyder did the same as Burton & Schumacher. Perhaps if Batman (1989) came out in this social media era, Burton would be getting shredded too. Truth is, looking back at them, I’ve a lot of issues with his interpretation of the character too.
Side bar: reportedly, it was a Terrio script doctored by Geoff Johns what was the unwatchable JL version.
Agree that Sucker Punch is lacking, but some of the visuals - particularly the battle with the clockwork zombie nazis and the giant samurai robot were pretty stunning.