Marvel vs DC vs Monsters! The future of cinematic universes

Pay attention; the next ten years of movie viewing has already been planned for you!

Cinematic universes have grown hot in Hollywood. The linking of blockbuster franchises to drive ticket sales easily appeals to studio heads, and why not? In the age of sky high movie budgets anything to boost revenue has to be considered, and if you get a hot universe it works as extra publicity for the next installment. Let’s take a look at all these interlocking franchises you’re now expected to keep track of!

Marvel- Disney

The golden goose that has inspired all these imitators, it was launched perfectly with 2008’s Iron Man. For a cinematic universe to be successful it has to get popular enough for people to be starved for more content. It’s not enough for people to like the actors or characters because, unlike sequels, the next installment might not have those in common with the last.

But Iron Man was perfect. Robert Downey Jr reclaimed and exceeded his old star power, cementing himself a billion dollar box office draw. Iron Man as a franchise was set, but the hook for all his teammates came after the credits. Samuel L Jackson appears before Downey in a dark room and offers him a spot on the Avengers, teasing a super hero mash up that at the time hadn’t been done before on the big screen. Audiences were hooked and hungry for more.

Disney’s cinematic universe experiment has continued successfully for about a decade now, with installments planned far in advance. It’s here you can see the challenges of maintaining such a product. First is managing the rotation of franchises and stars. The original core of RDJ, Chris Evans, and Chris Hemsworth, (Iron Man, Captain America, and Thor) have been doing this for a while and looking like a superhero is not the easiest task. Eventually they’re going to want to step back, and new franchises have to be set up to replace them. A lot of work for that was done in Captain America: Civil War where Spider-Man and Black Panther were both introduced (played by Tom Holland and Chadwick Boseman respectively). Notice that the big star, Downey, was key to the movie and is also promoted as the costar of Spider-Man: Homecoming releasing next week. It’s Disney and Marvel trying to give their new stars the RDJ rub, hoping that they’ll catch fire just as he did. While both characters and actors got very good debuts in Civil War, neither felt like that explosion that RDJ produced all those years ago.

When you look at how a cinematic universe works in the long run, it seems like a battle against the law of diminishing returns. How do you repeatedly keep things fresh and interesting? When you look at how many movies are planned in advance and how expensive they are to make and advertise, you realize that if a cinematic universe cooled off it would result in a string of expensive flops.

DC- Warner Brothers

DC’s cinematic universe was crafted in response to Marvels. It launched in 2013 with Man of Steel with Superman being played by Henry Cavill. The next installment, 2016’s Batman vs Superman, jumped right to the superhero team up, by introducing Batman and Wonder Woman (Ben Affleck and Gal Gadot) as well as giving teaser shots of the other members who will populate the upcoming Justice League movie. Obviously Warner Brothers think the big money is in team ups.

The DC movies and their reception have an interesting dynamic. Both Man of Steel and Batman vs Superman have mixed reactions while Suicide Squad was critically reviled. Nevertheless, all these movies were major blockbusters with Suicide Squad being the biggest.

Then, this year, the poor reception streak was shattered by Gal Gadot and Wonder Woman. The movie also dominated at the box office, far exceeding expectations place on it. More than any of the superhero movies since, and more than the other attempts at launching a cinematic universe, Gadot’s Wonder Woman feels like that explosion from RDJ’s original Iron Man. There’s a big revelation if that turns out to be true. It means that the movie that kicks these cinematic universes into gear doesn’t necessarily have to be the first installment, and that these massive projects can in fact be invigorated or reinvigorated. That’s a good thing, but the fast start is still ideal. No one wants to dig themselves out of a hole, especially with the amount of money on the line for each of these movies.

Dark Universe- Universal Pictures

Speaking of digging out of a hole, that’s what Universal needs to do with their classic movie monster based universe. The Mummy, the Invisible Man, Dracula, Frankenstein and his Bride, the Wolf Man, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and more are all slated to return to cinema in linking movies. But given the Tom Cruise led Mummy started things off, it’s uncertain how many of these will make it out of pre-production.

The Mummy was heavily criticized for having a convoluted story that went too far in trying to set up the cinematic universe that is supposed to spring from it. Consider it as putting the cart before the horse compared to the self-contained Man of Steel or Iron Man’s teaser after the credits.

Even worse, the movie flopped domestically. Critics often hate movies that go on to make big money. The fact this one didn’t with a recognizable franchise and the star power of Cruise shows that this is going to be a hard sell. And it’s going to get harder when less recognizable names, both the monsters and the stars’, are headlining these movies.

Monsterverse- Legendary

Legendary Studios has taken a noticeably different track than the other cinematic universes. Instead of the reoccurring stars being the actors, it’s the giant cgi monsters who are asked to bring moviegoers back to theaters for multiple trips. In fact so far, without going to deep into spoilers, the more famous an actor is makes him more likely to die in this universe. That might actually be a sort of short term benefit, as an actor not willing to sign a multi-year deal to star in other cinematic universes.

Monsterverse kicked off in 2014 with Godzilla’s return to cinema. Big G had taken ten years off, his last movie being his 50^th anniversary celebration in 2004’s Final Wars. Ten years later, on his 60^th, Godzilla proved he still had it by raking in over 500 million. The movie is mostly standalone, with only easter egg style hints at what may be coming next.

This year saw the second installment in the equally successfully Kong: Skull Island. The American Ape is scheduled to go against the King of the Monsters following Godzilla’s second film of the cinematic universe.

It’s incredibly appropriate that Godzilla is the center of a cinematic universe. The original line of Toho movies could be called a cinematic universe. The monsters started off in individual movies like Gojira, Rodan, and Mothra and eventually shared films where they’d fight against and with each other. Godzilla even faced off with King Kong before in a 1962 film. 58 years for a rematch; who else can say that?

The Legacy series so far has stuck to the keep it simple mantra. It has its famous monsters and it lets them wreck stuff. They don’t spend a lot of time setting up the next film because they don’t have to; if people are already seeing both monsters’ movies separately, they’ll see them when their together because they’ll fight and that makes it twice as good.

It’s hard to say what gives the Legacy monsters the public’s attention while Dark Universe’s first attempt got ignored. It might be star power. King Kong is eternal, always in our minds atop the Empire State Building swatting at airplanes. Godzilla is the imported workhorse; more films than anyone and with a wide variety between how grim or silly he can get. Universal monsters are all classics and their names are known, but the fondness they originally created in moviegoers’ hearts may have been forgotten.

Or maybe when it comes to monsters, bigger is better.

The Future

These cinematic universes are like inverted races. You’re supposed to run hard and you want to be ahead of everyone, but the idea is to never finish. An interesting thing to look out for is how these franchises react to each other. If people get bored of the Marvel movies, will they get bored of DC too? If Legacy releases a monster stinker will Universal benefit? Who else will enter the race? And what happens if it’s decided a drastic change is needed? These long, planned out movie release schedules are like giant monsters themselves, they can’t turn on a dime and any course correction you want to make will be slow, plodding, and costly.

The real cost would be if the public decides this is all just a fad and they’ve grown tired of it. There’s a downside in telling your story over a bunch of different movies. If you’re not careful, it becomes harder and harder with each new installment for people to enter the franchise.

If the day ever comes that people are tired of keeping track, look for a whole bunch of movies to be abruptly canceled.