Post by Lord Death Man on Oct 24, 2017 15:38:59 GMT
That is not the OP premise, merh. That being said, if we expand these parameters in your sense, Magneto would indeed be one of the greatest CBM-villains and the only one that is not totally eclipsed by the iconic DC rogue gallery like Joker, Lex Luther, Penguin, Catwoman et al. Note that I am talking about and limiting this to the Fox-Men holocaust-surviving Magneto, not the silly comic book version.
That is not the point of discussion. That aside, from a writing theory angle, the MCU heroes are all very formulaic, beginning with their character ars, namely the all popular "Jerk goes through crisis, learns skills and becomes nice guy superhero" arc. We have seen this with Logan in the excellent X1 movie. And the same arc was reused for Iron Man (several times), Dr Strange, Antman, Thor etc (Cap has no arc except becoming BEEFCAKE).
That formulaic trope writing applies to the villains too btw, like with Magneto in MCU you will often find the popular old-friend-becomes-nemesis trope (IM, Thor etc).
I would hardly call this "feshing out" the heroes, it is just a collection of writing tropes, clichees and popular actors conveying the ilusion of character writing.
And , in their respective origin stories the DC heroes are at least as fleshed out as the MCU ones, think Superman1 (the template for MCU films according to Feige), Batman Begins, Wonder Woman, and MOS.
I have an early Thor where Loki attacks Thor as the son of Odin, Loki's enemy. No brother stuff mentioned.
They were all wish fulfillment. Drink a potion, become Captain America. Shoot a few arrows & become Green Arrow or Hawkeye. They were kid stories like Saturday Morning Cartoons.
All the rest is machinations to make them appeal to an older audience
Steve Rogers was the 98 lb weakling who had sand kicked in his face figuratively until a magic potion made him a hero in an era many now can't comprehend, an era where boys lied about their age to join the army. His spirit was willing, but his body weak until science fixed it.
How the HELL is that not an arc?
I wish it could be unfurled in a single post but, it can't. It goes far beyond the MCU vs. DCEU fanboy wars. The success of comic books and comic book movies is at the root of the problem. This success has increased the amount of “consumers” who seek to identify some intellectual merit in the artform without understanding, acknowledging or accepting its roots.
A popular catchphrase you hear from the fanboy who will argue for his high-minded drama and depth in comic book movies is, that if you disagree, you've probably never read a comic book before. There's a lot of irony in that impotent and lazy attack.
What they really mean to say is, "If you disagree, you've probably never read a graphic novel before." I blame Alan Moore for the fanboy's current state of cognitive dissonance. To make every comic book movie into a graphic novel, you have to deconstruct the wish-fulfillment fantasies that gave rise to the character in the first place. In so doing you create something that bears little resemblance to the source material it is derived from. (Although it may have merits on its own).
The comic book medium does not need to be elevated to the stature of classical literature. Comic books are about close calls, near misses, and bold adventure. They don't need to be held aloft as sacred and inscrutable texts.