Justice League ≠ The Avengers

Rumor has it Warner Bros. has reached out to Ben Affleck to direct their Justice League movie. While I always have a place in my heart for our local boy, why would Affleck be their top choice? He has directed a total of 2 films (Gone Baby Gone, The Town) and although they were both awesome, he doesn’t come to mind as someone who can handle a big action movie spectacle like this with all the pressures of fanboys and summer blockbuster status on his shoulders. Needless to say, he’s no Joss Whedon. And he’s not even DC… Daredevil is a Marvel character.

That brings up another point: the Justice League is not the Avengers. Marvel and DC could not be more different in how they write their comics. The Marvel characters were actively intertwined in each other’s tales while the DC characters seemingly lived independently of each other. Hell, Marvel even set up all their movies from Iron Man on to lead into the Avengers film. What has DC done?

In addition to not having any overlap in their universe, DC also hasn’t carried over very well to film. Batman of course has been the tentpole but what after that? They’re rebooting Superman for a second time in 6 years. They tried to make Wonder Woman into a TV series with Adrianne Palicki (it didn’t air a single episode). Green Lantern ended Ryan Reynolds career. Aquaman and the Flash haven’t even seen the light of day. This isn’t exactly a group people care about. Plus, the fact that Christian Bale has hung up his Batsuit is the final nail in the coffin. I don’t see how this movie gets made and I certainly don’t see how it succeeds commercially.

The Avengers

The Avengers was released in the U.S. on May 4. Brig and I saw it yesterday. Yeah, we’re busy people but we’re also lazy people. We were going to go on Mother’s Day (May 13) but were too tired after a day with my family. That snowballed into us forgetting about it (during opportune times) until yesterday when we wrapped up a nice Sunday at about 11:30 am. So to fill the 10 ½ hours until the Mad Men finale we decided to finally Assemble.

The movie was expectedly awesome and actually pulled at the heartstrings a little bit. I think Hulk absolutely stole the show and Captain America really felt like the leader of the crew. Hawkeye and Black Widow didn’t even feel forced in as mere mortals and both held up well without super powers. What really dawned on me was just how jackass-y Tony Stark is. He’s the hero of the Iron Man movies because he’s sarcastic, bombastic, etc. but it plays because we’re rooting for him and solely him. In this movie he was surrounded by other characters we could root for and he came off as a whiny brat. That is until [REDACTED]* died and the responsible, leadership role was thrust on him. He always takes it but only after someone close to him gets hurt/killed/captured. It just especially stood out here when you have the likes of Captain America, Thor and the rest offering their services immediately.

What I thought was really great was how The Avengers didn’t feel like Iron Man 2.5**. It started and ended with Tony, the battle revolved around his new skyscraper and even Pepper Potts was in a couple scenes, but Joss Whedon did a great job of having other characters share the lead. And Whedon gave fans what they wanted to see with a lot of initial in-fighting between the troops and answers to questions such as “Who would win if Thor’s hammer smashed into Captain America’s shield?”

The film was exceptionally well done and let’s just say I can’t wait for The Avengers 2 in 2015.

*No spoilers in case some other slackers haven’t seen it yet either.

**Iron Man 3 is already scheduled for release next May.