In the past 48 hours, I have read several reviews and heard several comments about X Men Origins: Wolverine. Things like:
- “They’ve ruined Deadpool!”
- “They didn’t make Gambit’s eyes glow! And where’s his accent?”
- “This is in no way representative of the greatness of every other X-Men movie which we hated then!!”
These are the kinds of things that kept people from making comic movies between Superman: The Movie and X-Men.
Now, this may sound overzealous and like a betrayal of the Nerddom that I champion…But any complaints about a character’s eyes not glowing like they do in the comic book seem to be made by people who have not seen the genetalia of the opposite sex.
What gets me is this idea that fanboys have that, not only should the best parts of a comic be mined for a thematic throughline and cinematic sense, but also their PERSONAL favorite moments. It brings to mind a comment I once read on IMDB about the Producers remake, the musical.
See, in the original movie, made in 1968, one of the characters is a strange Beatnik-Hippie who, at the time, was a very topical and biting satirical look at the teenagers of the time. (Mel Brooks is a genius, I’ve always said so.) In the musical, in keeping with the times, the same character is sort of replaced by a flaming (but lovingly portrayed) homosexual.
The comment from one “fan” on IMDB was “How could you lose the hippie Hitler? He was THE BEST PART of the original.”
Really? The best part? You’ve got Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder, a musical about Hitler, Mel Brooks at his finest, and THE BEST PART was a hippie?
Isn’t it entirely possible that that was your FAVORITE part? But maybe not everyone else’s? Do you see the distinction?
Look, my point is that the X-Men movies, the Spider-Man movies, the Batman movies…none of them were meant to be absolutely faithful, by rote, reproductions of what you see in the comic book. Taking art from one media into another never is. That’s why they are adaptions.
Comic book fans, and comic book movie lovers, need to learn that we give these filmmakers an almost impossible job. “Take this 40 or so years worth of material, that millions of people have grown up on. Now, while keeping every single person’s favorite attributes of every character and story, condense this down into a single film. But don’t make it overly actiony. Make it a good story, too. Also, don’t obviously leave it open for a sequel, I hate that. And keep everything I liked. Spandex may look FUCKING SILLY to everyone beyond the age of 12, but I like it. So keep that.”
You can’t ruin a story. If you liked it as a comic, or as a movie, nothing will change that. The comic will still be as readable as you think it is.
In the meantime, I like comic movies because they give us another interpretation of our favorite characters. I like how all of the Marvel heroes and villains weren’t created by radiation. I like how Bruce Wayne’s parents were killed after the opera as opposed to The Mark of Zorro.
Some people should learn how to like something for what it is, not hate it for what it isn’t. Isn’t that how we should like each other, too?
good post. I agree with you. All of these complainers kinda forget how cool it JUST IS to even have these movies made.