Late Night Reflections On Vigilantism In Popular Culture

Superheroes are big right now. Love them or hate them they are very profitable. They have been so pretty consistently since Batman in 1989 with a dip after Batman and Robin in 1997 and a resurgence after X-Men in 2000. With recent successes like Iron Man 3 and Man of Steel, they will most likely be big for the foreseeable future.

 And I love it. I enjoy superheroes the way that conservatives love Fox News. As in a lot. I haven't had the chance to get into the comics, but I do wish to get around to it. I love them with a preference to Marvel recently but DC in the past. But I still have favorites. As I type this at 12:33 in the morning I thought it would be fun to tally up the films from the two rivals and see which one dominates the sub-genre. 

Lets lay some rules

1. No Television Shows.
2. Has To Have Gotten A Theatrical Release in the United States.
3. After 1978 Superman, because it started this.

Alright. Lets get started.


On the side of DC we have gotten some good stuff: Superman, The Dark Knight, V for Vendetta, Watchmen... Superman II...
That's all the DC movies I can think of that have been genuinely great. A lot shorter than I thought it would be. Unfortunatley when I think of DC movies, I think of real disappointments. Catwoman, Supergirl, Green Lantern, Superman IV: The Quest For Peace, Batman and Robin... and so on and so forth.



And on the side of Marvel we have.... Captain America: The First Avenger, Spider-Man 2, X2 X-Men United, The Avengers, Iron Man 3, X-Men First Class, Thor, and Men in Black, which was originally a comic published by Malibu which was bought out by Marvel for their digital coloring system.  Not that Marvel hasn't gotten some absolute Bargain Bin material: Howard the Duck, DareDevil, The Amazing Spider-Man (yeah, I said it), Elektra, and Ghost Rider.


So yeah, Marvel wins. If I had counted cartoons DC might have won. But I didn't.


Hats off to all. See you next week

    Greg.B