Reverse Angle: Problems with DC’s core characters.
What’s wrong with DC heroes?
“Wonder Woman” is the bestreceived DC Extended Universe entry so far. Its 93 score on Rotten Tomatoes makes it the third-highest-rated comic-book movie ever, behind “The Dark Knight” and “Iron Man,” and tied with “Logan” (though by “adjusted score,” it’s second only to “Logan”). But it’s also indicative of what the problems are with DC’s core characters, apart from Batman (spoilers follow).
After establishing the character development, humor and acting that has drawn the highest praise for any DCEU movie, “Wonder’s” climactic battle throws off the film’s rules. She suddenly exhibits Superman-level powers, including invulnerability and flight. Also, it turns out she is an actual god.
Those serendipitous superpowers are true to the comics, so one can’t fully blame the film for them. This is more a problem of the DC ethos: With the exception of the Caped Crusader (and the only recently popular-beyond-the-page Green Arrow), DC’s marquee heroes tend to be godlike.
Superman is, essentially, a god. There should be no terrorism or famine in a world with Superman. The Flash’s powers are time-based, so he should be nigh-unbeatable. Green Lantern can create literally anything he can think of. Let’s hope “Aquaman” (2018, supposedly) has some fish-out-of-water humor; otherwise it could be another dry “so it turns out I’m a god” story.
But apart from her divinity diminishing her origin film’s dramatic stakes, it opens up a supersized can of worms for Wonder Woman, post-movie. We know she can’t return home, having intervened at the end of World War I to save lives. She’s apparently still in today’s world, so where was she during the Nazis? Stalin’s purges? Pol Pot? Boko Haram, al Qaeda, the Islamic State, the Ku Klux Klan, etc.?
This is why Batman is perhaps the most interesting of DC’s top heroes. He’s just a dude (with unlimited finances) who figures his way out of stuff and takes a beating. And who has deeply ingrained psychological issues.
Marvel understood flaws were the way to go long ago. Its Silver Age heroes are pocked with crippling imperfections: Hulk’s angermanagement issues, Thor’s arrogance and limited intellect. Tony Stark is a narcissist and alcoholic. Spider-Man is a teenager who can’t miss his algebra test.
It’s those limitations, those everyday problems, that can make superheroes relatable. As two-time Oscar winner Christoph Waltz once told The Chronicle (paraphrasing architect and designer Charles Eames), “‘If you don’t have a restriction, you’d better go and find one.’ … No restrictions, you end up in arbitrariness.”
Trivia question
What is the highest-grossing film directed or co-directed by a woman?
Not a wrap on Tom 2017
Tom Cruise’s “The Mummy” is getting pummeled by critics (17 percent on Rotten Tomatoes), but the smart money is on Cruise to rise again later this year.
“American Made” (due Sept. 29) is a gun- and drug-running extravaganza directed by Doug Liman (“Edge of Tomorrow”). It looks like Cruise may be turning in his first actual character work in years.
Liman and Cruise look to be reuniting again for an “Edge” sequel: “Live Die Repeat and Repeat” (playing off the first film’s popular tagline/secondary title, “Live. Die. Repeat.”). Liman has been talking it up, though there’s no official green light yet.
By the way, many “Mummy” maulers mangled it for not being what they thought it should be (citing the lack of “campy fun” as in the Brendan Fraser iterations), rather than for what it tries to be (the launch of Universal’s “Dark Universe” action-horror franchise). It’s being described as a bomb, though its $174 million worldwide bow would seem to belie that.
Trivia answer
“Frozen,” co-directed by Jennifer Lee: $1.28 billion.