By: Peter Lewis
Every summer,
Hollywood releases an endless stream of films every week to meet the demand of
entertainment during that season. Since Star
Wars premiered in May 1977,
and broke box office records worldwide, a new tradition was born in the form of
blockbusters. Blockbusters usually consist of action, Sci-Fi, and visual
effects to entertain the masses. While these films are almost guaranteed
not to win any major awards, such as an Oscar or Golden Globe, they embrace a
classic film element of escapism: encasing mostly unreal situations, but making
them entertaining and allowing audiences to put their sense of disbelief away
for a few hours. It’s true Hollywood has run out of original ideas, but
nevertheless, each year manages to put out films that are memorable and will
leave an impact in some way on the viewer and industry moving forward.
Blockbusters and the summer movie season continue to do this for both critics
and audiences. Though 2013 may have not been the most impressive year (as
compared to 2011 and 2012) and had many flops, such as Lone Ranger, it still posted
record profits yet again. However, only a few will be the most memorable
for a particular year and 2013 was no exception releasing very well done and
entertaining films.
The
genre that has now become a staple of the summer movie season have become the
adaptation of comic books onto the silver screen. Since Superman in 1978, Hollywood
became very interested in this new genre and began work on bringing fan
favorites storylines and characters to theaters worldwide. While it started out well, it had very
rough periods and after Batman and Robin in 1997, many thought that was
the end of superheroes on the bigscreen. In 2000, X-Men brought new life
into the genre and set a new structure that all adaptations have followed since
for the most part. Since
2000, The Dark Knight Trilogy and The Avengers and the films that
built up to it have become extremely successful and the most praised by critics
and audiences. This shows
that the comic book film has become the modern equivalent tales to Greek and
Roman stories about the Gladiators and Spartans. Unlike any other film genre released in
the summer, a movie based on a superhero will easily be much more remembered,
praised or hated, and cause the most debate on the internet. In the summer of 2013, three comic
book adaptations were released to the world. Iron Man 3, the sequel to Iron
Man 2, as well as 2012’s The Avengers; Man of Steel, the
newest reboot of the world’s first superhero and Warner Brothers hope for a DC
cinematic universe; and The Wolverine, the sequel to 2009’s X-Men
Origins: Wolverine. This
article will review all three as well as attempt to declare a winner.
First, Iron Man 3. Taking
place after the events of 2012’s Avengers, Robert Downey Jr. returns to
the main role as Tony Stark/Iron Man, who is in a mental struggle after the
events of The Avengers. Compared
to other Marvel imprints, Iron Man 3, for the most part, takes a more
dark and serious tone, but still keeps the humor that has made the franchise so
successful. The story is
well structured and the problems that made Iron Man 2 hit or miss were
fixed and gave the film a tone like that of 2008’s Iron Man. Downey still shows he is the clear
perfect choice to portray Iron Man and does a great job balancing what he
usually does and the new struggles he has to portray. The rest of the cast does a good job
as well, but can’t compete with Jr. in anyway. The finals positives of the film go to
both writing and direction. The
writing again does the Marvel humor very well, but this time around gives much
more memorable lines and dialogue, same with the direction; Shane Black
took control of the direction and was a surprise in how well he let the film
flow and have great summer blockbuster action.
Now
what was the problem, you might ask? After all the praise above, it
sounds like this film was at the level of the first Iron Man. For the most part, it could have been,
if not for the film’s second act. While act one sets up the story very
well and act three is an epic end to a good movie, the film’s second act makes
some choice that audiences loved or hated. Let me just get it out of the way
and say I hated it a lot. Without
spoiling the film, if you were expecting Ben Kingsley to do great things as the
Mandarin based on the advertisement and trailers, you’ll most likely be
disappointed. Again, the third act saves the film, but the second act is
bound to leave a bad taste in your mouth in some fashion. In the end
though, Iron Man 3 is a success by many standards and if this is the end
of the Iron Man film series, it’s a great finish for all that were
involved.
Second,
Man of Steel. While Iron Man 3 out grossed Man of Steel
in a big way, $1.2 billion compared to almost $650 million, Man of Steel
easily was the most hyped and anticipated film of summer 2013. For good
reason, as well, like: this film is the foundation for a DC cinematic universe
and the starting point for a Justice League film/franchise, Chris Nolan just
coming off his very successful and praised Dark Knight Trilogy
was producing, Zac Snyder, who had done a good job at previous DC
imprints was directing, and to many it looked to be a huge step forward from
2006’s Superman Returns and that the man of steel had new life on the
big screen. At the same time, this film divided both critics and
audiences for the entire month of June and was extremely debated by all who saw
it. For me it was good.
What Man of Steel did right was it
took a better look at the Superman character than previous films had
done. There’s more focus on the destruction of his home world, his
parents’ decision to send him to Earth, his struggle to adapt to the planet, as
well as discover his origins; the film plays these out very well and is highly
memorable and extremely interesting. The film’s story keeps you in the
present, but uses a lot of flashbacks to help develop the Superman
character. The flashback
sequences are very great and so much better than having a twenty minute part of
Superman growing up, as well as giving great moments that are well crafted into
the film with great style. This time, Superman is played by British actor
Henry Cavill, who both looks the part and is great as the man of steel for so
many reasons; it’s way too early to say if he’ll be better than Christopher
Reeves, but he is off to a great start for portraying one of comic’s, as well
as cinema’s, most famous characters. The remaining cast does a good job,
but is very underdeveloped, which is one of the film’s problems for the most
part. Amy Adams takes the role of Lois Lane and does a good job and with
a much more humane portrayal of the character than previous imprints, but there
isn’t too much there to set her apart and she seems to get the lost in the
film. It seems that the filmmakers thought that audiences had knowledge of the
main characters in the Superman world and didn’t put much effort into setting
them apart for the film. Another slight problem was the film’s
dialogue. It’s not bad, but surprisingly below average for what you’d
expect from David Goyer, who just came off working with Nolan on The Dark
Knight Trilogy. Direction wise, Snyder does a pretty fair job, if not
very good; some decisions are questionable, like the lack of character
development, as well as too much CGI in the opening, but he seems to have some
grasp moving forward. For the most part Man of Steel was
everything expected and very well done and probably one of the better comic
book adaptations ever made.
Well, it was in
contention for that title until the second act of the film began at
least. The second act of Man of Steel is where so much criticism
came from and what the viewer’s opinion on the film hinged on. What’s
wrong with the second act? Well pure action overload for over an
hour. Yes, summer blockbusters are acceptable time for action, but action
without a lead in or point is just a waist of CGI and work. Man of Steel is no exception;
once the main conflict begins, the film takes a total 180 and goes from the
equivalent of Batman Begins in a sense to Michael Bay’s fantasy on
steroids. Now, during this
controversial hour, some of the destruction does have a purpose and it does
allow Superman to save the planet in a huge way, and a very well executed
way. The other two moments
of total destruction have no real lead in (as stated before) and are hard to
get behind or really be emotionally invested in. Initially, I though this was all
Snyder’s decision and he deserved the criticism for this; however, after
thinking this, couldn’t have been him. Sure,
his trademark style was shown during this, but Snyder isn’t exactly a guy that
will use Michael Bay’s style of explosions at every corner. In a way, this could have been Warner
Brothers, Man of Steel was still in production during the Avengers
instant success and it’s not hard to believe that they went to the Man of Steel
crew and told them to do what The Avengers did only much, much bigger.
I’ll stop there since I have no proof of this, although for a film that would
decide an entire franchise’s future and make the studio billions upon billions
of dollars, it’s a very reasonable hypothesis.
Even with this in mind, Man of Steel is a
well done film. I can’t
spoil anything, but I will say there are great scenes and memorable moments, as
well as things to completely set this version of Superman apart from
previous versions in a very good way. Though
the film doesn’t have much humor or a heroic Superman it’s an exciting new
start to the character and a bright future ahead if Warner Brothers allows
Snyder and crew to do their own thing. Simply
put, Man of Steel may have gotten off to a very rocky start, but the future for
the series and DC looks to have a good chance of success.
Finally, The
Wolverine. Allow me
just to say it now, I don’t like the X-Men movies. Not hate or dislike, but I just don’t
think they’re as great as they’re made to be. The worst of them all is 2009’s X-Men
Origins: Wolverine. If you haven’t seen it, consider yourself
lucky. Now many were surprised to learn last year that film would be
getting a sequel and from there until Wolverine’s release in July many
went into this with no expectations. However, the biggest surprise out of
all of this was how good Wolverine was, not just good, easily the best X-Men
film released.
What makes Wolverine
so good is that it takes risks no other comic book film would ever dare try and
it goes away from the franchise’s typical formula and tries something new. It
was a huge risk for the filmmakers, but ended up being very successful.
The main reason for the film’s success was the fact it was more story and
character driven than having generic blockbuster action just to meet the
unofficial requirement. Also, it plays with a storyline never really done
in full in a comic book film, taking the hero’s powers away leaving him
vulnerable to the world he once was above. This decision isn’t executed
to the fullest, but plays out very well and the films best asset. The
story has a huge focus put on it, works out very well, gives new detail to the
Wolverine character and showcases a very interesting journey. Hugh
Jackman returns to his role as Wolverine yet again gives it his all and does
very well, but isn’t the best actor in the film. Wolverines best
acting came from actresses Tao Okamoto and Rila Fukushima. The story has
a huge focus on both and each of them give fantastic performances. The real
strange part of the film though is that Wolverine himself isn’t a huge part of
the story; while he plays a major role for sure, the story mostly focused on
the characters portrayed by Okamoto and Fukushima. This isn’t a major
complaint by any means, but noticeable for a film that invokes the name of a
character and doesn’t put a hundred percent focus on him. The only real
problem of the film is its unimpressive main villain, confusion in what side a
character or group is on at times, and a well-executed and unexpected twist
that isn’t as impressive as it could have been.
However, The Wolverine manages to be a
huge surprise, well structured, and focused, making it easily the best film
based on the X-Men franchise and one of the better comic book films to be
released. With a post credit scene showing what’s next, it looks to be
that X-Men has great potential ahead.
So, out of Iron
Man 3, Man of Steel, and Wolverine, which is the best?
The answer is plain and simple: The Wolverine comes out on top. Though
it wasn’t as much of a blockbuster as the other two, have as much hype, or
gross the most, from a standpoint of a film and doing the most interesting
thing with the source material, Wolverine edges out Iron Man 3
and Man of Steel. At the end though, for the second consecutive
year, Hollywood did all major comic book films right. Problems still
exist, of course, but not as bad as it was in the early 2000s, by any
means. This shows that the system may have finally grasped how to make
this popular genre be able to work and will continue. At the end of the
day, Wolverine takes the top spot for 2013’s summer season.
