Friday, February 20, 2015

Aqua-Dude Revealed


This is Aquaman from the upcoming Superman vs/ and Batman: Don of Sandwiches by Zack Sny.... zzzzzzzzzz....

I don't care.  I'm not planning to see it.

As I said elsewhere - I'm excited for Jason Momoa, but less excited that the DCU is basically turning the JLA into an early 00's nu-metal band.

But if this take on Aquaman came as any surprise to you after the past ten years of Zack Snyder films, well, start paying attention, my man.  I like Jason Momoa in theory more than practice - he hasn't been in anything I've really liked and I gave up on Game of Thrones when he went away (spoilers!), but he seems like such a cool guy.  I want for him to succeed.

I have no problem with his casting or even, really, this look for Aquaman, as Aquaman is a character whose look and characterization the past 2-3 decades have been more fluid than a spoonful of mercury on a hotplate.  I like Aquaman in theory, but the only Aquaman comics I've liked were in JLA comics and the Sub-Diego storyline in his own, about 10 years ago.  Maybe he'll make for a sellable action figure this way.  What do I know?

But I do not, at all, get why DC thinks that targeting a very specific 18-24 year old is the answer for their IP farm.  Marvel has shown, to the tune of billions of dollars, that adherence to the comic book looks and fidelity to the road-tested comics and cartoon versions of the characters is a winning formula across multiple generations of movie goers and toy buyers.  It seems like getting this specific is potentially extremely limiting to the appeal of the DCU.  I mean, I have not seen one kid who seemed to give a crap about Man of Steel in the 2 years since the film's release.  Not one t-shirt, not one Halloween costume, not one kid clutching an action figure.  That's a problem.

This is not the solution, ya dum dums.

5 comments:

J.S. said...

Weren't they sort of making fun of the whole idea of an Aquaman movie on Entourage a few years back?

The League said...

Yeah, and that was referenced in the "Entourage: The Movie" trailer I saw last weekend. So: synergy.

J.S. said...

James Cameron was shooting Aquaman on Entourage. I think I need to hold out for that version.

The League said...

DC has decided to compete with Marvel by also putting up a massive slate of superhero movies. The only problem is that Marvel did this after putting out about 10 gigantic movies and then put out the next few years, because there was buy-in. DC had one kinda-so-so good opening on "Man of Steel" and had to put Batman in their sequel so people would show up for it, and now they've got a slate of Justice League movies through 2025 or so. If/ when this fails, it will be loud and calamitous.

The League said...

On the other hand, I appreciate their misplaced faith in themselves.