Ahoy, True Believers!

It has been an interesting couple of weeks if you’re an avid cape-follower. Superhero movies have been the cash crop of choice for Hollywood for at least the past decade, with “Spider-Man” and “X-men” knocking the door down for our favorite heroes and villains. And for a while, it was good to be a geek! I mean, who didn’t want to be first in line to see “Dark Knight”? I must have seen “Spider-man 2” at least four or five times in theaters. Hell, I was geeking out when I got to see some advanced footage with Bryan Singer in Princeton before the release of “Superman Returns”.

But there comes a point where you have to wonder when it might be time to let the men (and women) in tights take a breather. I am, of course, speaking of the impending Spider-man series reboot. Don’t get me wrong; I can see the studio’s side of things. Tobey Maguire isn’t getting any younger, Kirsten Dunst got a lot of flack for wooden acting (though to be fair, part of that probably comes from the way the character was written, but that’s beside the point). There’s also the venomous (see how I did that?) response to the third installment. In case you forgot:

For a while there, it looked like Raimi and company were ready to begin production, even enlisting John Malkovich for Vulture and courting Anne Hathaway. Of course, the role they were offering her was something called The Vulturess, and the less that is said about that, the better. So maybe it really was time to go separate ways. Raimi wanted to go with older villains, the studio wanted younger villains, the cast is all moving on to other projects. Maybe it was meant to be! And heck, Marc Webb, the new director did “500 Days of Summer”.

But wait a sec. I’m getting horrible visions of the future. The studio want a youth movement. Utilize the Ultimate universe (which isn’t really that bad of an idea if they do go that way). But it’s not the source material that has me scared. They want to tap into that High School Musical/Twilight crowd…

NNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I’m sure I won’t be the only fanboy storming the gates with a Molotov cocktail if this nightmare were to become a reality. Perhaps ItsJustSomeRandomGuy
(http://www.youtube.com/user/ItsJustSomeRandomGuy) put it best.

In all seriousness though, I don’t know which idea is worse. Rebooting a successful franchise less than 10 years after it started…or WATCHMEN 2 (Electric Boogaloo).

Yes, that’s right. According to BleedingCool.com (http://tinyurl.com/yaplw6a) and picked up by sites like aintitcool, joblo and superherohype.

Of course Nikki Finke of Deadline Hollywood (http://tinyurl.com/ycy88kn) immediately did some sleuthing and found out the apparent truth- no movie sequel is planned just yet. But that says nothing about the idea of a comic book prequel, spinoff or any other terrible ideas. Creator Alan Moore didn’t like the idea of a Watchmen movie to begin with and is very critical of tangent views on his projects, so I doubt this is going to be number 1 on his Christmas list- a cash-grabbing bastardization of one of the most influential graphic novels in history.

Have you started to wonder if you’ve woken up in Bizarro World yet?

The coming year will be a make-or-break year for the comic book movie genre. Already there are whispers that the market is oversaturated with superhero movies and audiences may grow tired of the trend. What’s coming out this year?

-Iron Man 2
-Jonah Hex
-KickAss
-The Losers
-The Green Hornet

And in the near future we have Green Lantern, Thor, Captain America, the Spidey reboot, The Avengers, Bryan Singer’s new X-Men First Class project, Edgar Wright’s rumored Ant Man project, reboots on Daredevil and the Fantastic Four, Deadpool, a rumored Hancock sequel, the eventual third Batman movie, a Superman sequel/reboot (that a whole other blog entry) and at some point a JLA movie.

I’m not even counting the never-ending development of a Wonder Woman movie (how can you turn down a JOSS WHEDON SCRIPT?!) and Flash movie (officially putting my vote in for Neil Patrick Harris for Barry now that Ryan Reynolds is Hal).

With DC’s announcement of an announcement of their new direction toward the movies (yes, you read that properly- they are actually proclaiming they will have news to release…I’ll believe it when I see it/read it), one has to wonder what the future holds in store for the masked menaces and courageous cape-wearers of our beloved medium.

Before I take off though, I figure I’d share a quick story. ISSUES was chosen by the Writers Guild of America to be one of the first 11 web shows to be included in its WGA 2.0 Web Initiative back in September. Basically, I was fortunate enough to be chosen for membership. Ever since then, I’ve been deeply involved with meetings and caucuses pertaining to the future of digital media. I’ve met some very cool fellow webheads as a result. This was particularly fun on Monday, February 1st, when the Guild had a meeting/party at the legendary Friars Club in NYC. Noah Rothman (Zeke) and I were able to talk shop with some of the best and brightest in the biz. At one point, I found myself exploring the Ed Sullivan Room with Michael H. Weber, the co-writer of “500 Days of Summer”. Needless to say, pretty damn cool for a kid from suburban south Jersey. Until next time!

Up, up and away…
_>SuperScott*_

These guys have Issues.

WGAE Executive Director Lowell Peterson addresses the crowd as Noah does his GQ impression in the background.

Our friend Anne Flournoy ("The Louise Log") stopped by to say hi. Check out her show in our links page!

Some of our new Web friends! Daryn Strauss of "Downsized" and Julie Ann Emery and Kevin Early of the award winning "Then We Got Help". Visit our links page for their shows!

Zeke knows how to network! Noah chats with WGAE Executive Director Lowell Peterson.