Copyright © 2023 Rick and Ruth Coy
DC had many more serials about their heroes than Marvel, but they include companies that have become part of DC over the years. DC has 8 serials to Marvels 1. Now serials are interesting, but by no means are they good. For the era some where considered really good when they come out and we have people today who love these early serials will disagree about how bad they are. Now if you never saw one
One, see one. You can find them all over the net to stream. Now the people who made these early serials in many case had never read one of the comics they were based on, this shows up a lot. Then Heroes like Superman who was also on radio and had several animated shorts made - was harder to screw up. I have seen the complete “Superman” serial and bits and pieces of several others.
1941: Adventures of Captain Marvel - A lot of serial fans say this is a great film. First Billy isn’t a kid, he’s an adult. He on a safari when he runs into Shazam and gets his power. Bad guys attack the safari and he waits until several people get killed before he bothers with saying SHAZAM… didn’t watch much beyond this.
1943: Batman - Seen two chapters of this. I rate his Batman a little better than Adam West, Not bad looking as Bruce for the era. Story sucked.
1947: Vigilante - the cowboy version
1948: Superman - I enjoyed this one. Kirk Alyn as Superman and Noel Neil as Lois Lane.
1948: Congo Bill - This was before he became Congarilla, so it was just a jungle adventure.
1949: Batman and Robin - New actors same bad acting and costumes and script
1950: Atom Man VS Superman - Another Kirk Alyn, Noel Neil starring.
1952: The Miraculous Blackhawk: Freedom’s Champion - This also had Kirk Alyn starring and from people who have seen it, say it is a very good adaption of Blackhawk.
Films of the DC heroes even to this day have no bible. Each director makes his own story. Most try to stay close enough to the hero that we will recognize him, others could care less. Many of them there is no mention of any other heroes. They are the only one on their EARTH. Which brings us to the multi Earth of DC Comics. They had this from the 60 since the FLASH of Two Worlds story - which gave us all the Golden Age heroes on Earth 2 (Since they were first - shouldn’t the Silver Age heroes been Earth 2) Now when most of the films were made - nothing about multi-Earths was though about, but in Crisis on infinate Earths on the CW crossover a few years ago - they used all the old movie and TV versions of their heroes that they could, even one in the some of the current movies. Unlike Marvel they didn’t sell the rights to movie version of their Heroes - they would sell them the rights to make X-amount of them and in many cases someone else could come out with the same Hero in a film shortly after one with him completely different. But this means that DC will not have to buy back right that they sold to other studios. But DC can’t seem to get it together. Like Marvel they need one person to be in charge of the films
1951: Superman and the Mole Men - Had George Reeves as Superman and Phyllis Coates as Lois Lane..this is considered to be the first feature DC superhero film. The film was used as a pilot for the Adventures of Superman TV show - where it was latter shown in two parts.
1966: Batman - Starring Adam West as Batman. Just as hokey as the TV show. I hear people say how great a Batman Adam was - my though on that is that those same people have never, ever, read a Batman comic book. The show was like a Mad Magazine version of Batman. It was a comedy not an adventure series. As a kid watched every episode and complained about every episode (Did I in my teens really think it was going to get better?) Tried watching one online a few weeks ago. It was horrible.
1974: Wonder Woman - Cathy Lee Crosby played this blond costumed superspy that was called Wonder Woman. Wasn’t Wonder Woman. This was on TV only. (And it looks like there is a DVD of it.) Was a pilot for a series that never happened.
1975: The New Original Wonder Woman - Pilot for the tv series starring Lynda Carter. This was not bad for it’s time and No one looks more like Wonder Woman than Lynda Carter. Again watching some of these older shows it is hard not to compare them to the newer ones. No one took Superheroes real seriously then - and the Batman TV show was their model.
1978: Superman the Movie - Christopher Reeve as Superman and Margot Kidder as Lois Lane. No one looks more like Superman than Chris Reeve. Loved the movie when I saw it, but the story sucked and how they treated some of the characters. Gene Hackman played Lex Luthor. Hackaman’s a good actor - why did he play Luthor for laughs - the villains were a joke. Jor-El - another great actor who was so wrong for the role - he was too old and looked made you think Kar-el wasn’t really his son. Would have been much better with Chris Reeve playing Jor-El also, aged a bit. And Krypton - yuck - guys read a few of the comics when making a movie. Fortress - crystal palace - this horrible version of the fortress they keep wanting to keep. But again when it came out it was great, Chris played both Clark and Superman believably and you could understand why people didn’t go to Clark “Oh you are Superman”. Did the same person who directed him, direct the rest of the film.
1980: Superman II - in many ways better than the first. Chris was just as good and the villains were BAD and I’m not talking about their acting. As with the first they wanted to get away from the comic book Superman. A problem that has haunted most of the DC movies. The Donnner cut was better than the one in Theaters.
1982: Swamp Thing- Not bad, liked it at the time it came out. Adrienne Barbeau, Louis Jourdan and Ray Wise
1983: Superman III - Christopher Reeve was great as Superman - Script worse than Superman the movie. Campy. Good effects. Introduced Annette O’Toole as Lana Lang, the other LL err Girl in Superman life.
1984:Supergirl- staring Helen Slater as Girl of steel. This was set in the same universe as the Chris Reeve Superman. The script sucked, Slater made a good Supergirl. And we had the Linda Lee secret ID that Supergirl was using in the comics back then.
1987: Superman IV: The Quest for Peace. Another, we have the best Superman you could ask for, so we will give you the worse scripts we can. A sad last outing for Reeve’s as Superman.
1989: Return of Swamp Thing - Don’t remember a lot about it. Know I saw it.
1989: Batman- Starring Michael Keaton, Jack Nicholson, Kim Basinger. When I heard Michael Keaton was playing Batman - I was more than a little upset - as I was hoping a more serious Batman after suffering Adam West in my teens. Here they were having an actor known for Comedy playing the Dark Knight. But all in all Keaton didn’t do a bad job - like Nicholson’s Joker. Wasn’t a fan of Keaton’s Bruce Wayne - too Clark Kent.
1992: Return of Batman - Starring Michael Keaton, Danny DeVito, Michelle Pfeiffer. Keaton second outing as the Caped Crusader. Again not a bad Batman. DeVito did an alright Penguin and Pfeiffer Catwoman was good.
1995: Batman Forever - Val Kilmer as Batman and Chris O’Donnell as Robin. Not bad, Kilmer wasn’t as good as Keaton - but still much better than Adam West.
1997: Batman and Robin - George Clooney as Batman, Chris O’Donnell as Robin and Arnold Schwarzenegger as Mr. Freeze. Alicia Silverstone as Batgirl, Uma Thurman. The script sucked, still better than any of the TV shows and Clooney was by far the best Bruce Wayne. He had the looks. Fans pan Clooney, who had nothing to do with the crappy script. Which tried it hardest not to have anything to do with the comics. Batgirl was related to Alfred.
1997: Justice League of America - pilot for unproduced series - direct to TV on CBS.
1997: Steel - Since they only had the rights to Steel, it just didn’t fit into the DC universe. Shaquille O’Neal played John Henry Irons/ Steel.
2004: Catwoman - WHY… Halle Berry played Patience Phillips??/Catwoman. Again Why…Nothing to do with the DC universe…not even the same name. Maybe it took place on Earth Y?
2005: Batman Begins - The first of the Nolan Batman movies starring Christian Bale as Batman. This reminded me the lot of the Batman Year one stories by Frank Miller. I enjoyed Bales Batman.
2006: Superman Returns - Starring Brandon Routh as the last son of Krypton. Kate Bosworth as Lois Lane, and Kevin Spacey as Luthor. Routh wasn’t a bad Superman, but the script - sigh - this was a sequel to Superman IV, where Superman so upset of being in such a bad movie left Earth to find himself or for the people to forget the movie. He comes back five year latter and Lois has a fiancé and has a child (who was his) Luthor is played camp. It was decided that this would last of this run of Superman.
2008: The Dark Knight - second of the Nolan Batman movies. Bale as Batman and Heath Ledger as the Joker. Wow - Ledger Joker hit the mark - the make up sucked. With the correct make up he would be hands down the best Joker ever. Seems the writer didn’t get it that it was the accident that made his face white and his hair green also made him insane. Sigh….still like the movie, but one little thing could have made a lot of change. Guys who make future Batman movies - the Joker doesn’t wear clown make-up, that is his face!!!!
2009: Watchmen - This was close to the comic…enjoyed it, Ruth didn’t, but she didn’t like the comic either. Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons comic was great . Moore for some reason wouldn’t allow his name to be associated with the movie - it’s not like the fans would blame him for any changes.
2010: Jonah Hex - didn’t see it, or don’t think I did.
2011: Green Lantern - The script has some problems - wrong villain for origin story. This was the silver age version of Hal Jordan - Ryan Reynolds made a good GL. Loved the idea of a CGI uniform - since in the comics it is the ring that created it. A lot of the things I’ve heard bad about the movie were straight from the Silver Age comics. It wasn’t as good as it could have been, but it wasn’t as bad as people are saying. I’ve been a fan of GL ever since going into the newsstand and seeing Showcase 22. Here was a hero that wasn’t born with power, he got it from a RING!!. Seeing the movie I was that nine year old again…
2012: The Dark Knight Rises - The final Nolan Batman. Anne Hathaway joins the cast as Selina Kyle/Catwoman. A very good Batman.
2013: Man of Steel - Henry Cavill as Superman Amy Adams as Lois Lane. A very different take of Superman. It is a good Sf movie, not a very good Superman movie. Lois knows Clark is Superman before she really meets Clark. This is more realistic that a Investigative Reporter could track down this person who can fly. I enjoyed the movie, but had to man things that were not Superman in it.
2016: Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice - Ben Affleck as Batman, Henry Cavill as Superman, Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman. Batman is an older Hero, Superman is almost Superman, Wonder Woman - Nice. The story isn’t too bad - pulls a lot of things from the comics, but from different eras and it is sort of mismash.
2016: Suicide Squad - Will Smith as Deadshot, Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn. Fun movie. Robbie makes a great Harley Quinn - some viewer didn’t like that she didn’t wear the Costume form the cartoon - instead she wore what she wears in the Harley Quinn comics. Better than Dawn of Justice.
2017: Wonder Woman - Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman, Chris Pine as Steve Trevor. A new take on WW origins, but one that worked the best of the so called DCEU films (DC’s take on the MCU). Enjoyed it a lot.
2017: Justice League - Ben Affleck as Batman, Henry Cavill as Superman, Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman, Ezra Miller as The Flash, Jason Momoa as Aquaman, Ray Fisher as Cybog - we already saw how good a group Superhero movie could be with the Avengers…this showed how bad one could be. Flash Costume sucks as does Aquaman. The movie could have been a lot better.
2018: Aquaman - OK Aquaman has always been B team hero, he was back up stories and minor member of JLA. So wasn’t expecting much with the movie - WOW - Great movie and we end it with the correct Aquaman uniform. So far we have two good DCEU films (2 ½ if Suicide Squad is in same universe) Jason Momoa plays Aquaman.
2019: Shazam! - The only thing that would have made this any better would be if he was Captain Marvel instead of Shazam. Zachary Levi plays Shazam and Asher Angel plays Billy Batson. This was a really fun movie, even with the updating it got whats important with Shazam. Loved it. Had the whole Marvel err Shazam family in it.
2019: Joker - WHY??? Now unlike Catwoman this is a good film, located on Earth NOT. It stars Joaquin Phoenix as the Joker. It gives a new origin to the Joker (Remember what I said “The Joker Does Not Wear Make UP”. Now it has Thomas Wayne in it, so it may be the start of the villain Joker. Good movie, bad Joker movie.
2020: Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn. _ I still like Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn, but the rest of the cast errr are in name only - nothing like their comic versions. This is part of the DCEU, and makes so much not like the MCU. Sad. Liked movie it was fun, didn’t like the fact that it is part of what DC is trying to make cannon for the movies.
2021: Wonder Woman 1984 - Just as good as the first one. The nice thing we see how really old Wonder Woman is.
2021: The Suicide Squad - Don’t forget “THE”. Margot Robbie as Harley and John Cena as Peacemaker. A fun movie which is part of the DCEU.
2021: Zack Snyder’s Justice League - OK this is re-editing of the JL movie with some more scenes added. This was direct to HBOMax and is four hours long. Much better than Justice League, more like a Superhero group movie. (Amazing what a little editing can do - and it had more Superheroes in it that the first one. This is the version that should have been done.
2022: The Batman - Robert Pattinson is Batman. He not that great as Bruce, but then he’s not Bruce that much in it. He made a great Batman. The story isn’t bad…didn’t care for the Riddler costume. Catwoman was good and so was the Penguin - and the hint of the joker. This is not part of the DCEU. (Shame)
The DCEU is dead before it really did anything. It looks like they said we have to catch up with the MCU so we will have the DCEU - but they didn’t try to make the movies true to the comics. They have too many stories that is outside the DCEU. Each director is still doing their own thing. Some of the costumes are so far off, its like they don’t care - well if they don’t care - neither will the fans and not go to see them. They had the chance to put it all together - work it out - let us know the hero and to like them, then give us the Justice League. They are realizing some of the people are not working and are already recasting and rebooting. DC had done such a good job with TV and such a sucky job with the movies. Hopefully they will get better and really do a DCEU - map it out get a bible - have costume designs that look like the ones in the comics. Anything that doesn’t fit the bible would be outside the DCEU. Call them Another Earth Story.
2022: Black Adam
2022: Shazam! Fury of the Gods
2022: Batgirl direct to streaming
2023: Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom
2023: Flash
2023: Blue Beetle
This was written in 2022…
