| Archive for Video Masters TV- Discussion Forum From Television, to Video Games, and Movies |
| Erikjust |
New Batman show rears its ugly headhttp://www.batman-on-film.com/bat..._brave-bold-announced_4-3-08.htmlIs it just me or are the cartoons from Marvel and DC geting uglier and uglier by the minuet. It started out fine whit Batman the animated series. Then came The Batman which where okay for most of the part, wasn´t all that happy whit the drawing style but it could have been worse. And now this, it looks like something out of the 60s and not in a good way. How low will this go before the ship sinks to the buttom of the ocean. |
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| John Gibson |
Agh, looks like hell. | ||||
| Erikjust |
A good story MIGHT just MIGHT save the show from being a complete failure.
The Batman as horrible as it was drawn it had a good story, good characters, fine voice acting. It made a HUGE difference and saved the show a lot of times when the drawing style made it crappy as hell. Same whit the new Transformers Animated. Though A LOT of the episodes have been what most would call FILLERS, there have been great stories here and there that have kept the show going at a reasonable standard. So as bad as this show looks a good story excellent voice acting and so forth might just keep the show watcherble if you leave most of your sense of quality at home. |
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| NecroVMX |
God, I tire of aged 25+ people bitching that shows aimed at children don't live up to their lofty standards.
Seriously, you're one step away from being this guy. 
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| Erikjust |
So was Batman the animated series, Batman of the future, Justice league and Justice league unlimited, and i don´t hear any complaining about those shows. And yes i have seen The animated series again since i was a kid and i still like it. Yes it is aimed at children, but the story, the voice acting everything is TOPNOTCH same whit the other shows. Sure i might not like the square style they used in the show, but those are shows where there really seems to have been put energy and effort into it, to make it great. Somewhere i think i wouldn´t complain (as much) if they always kept the same bad style as they do now, because i wouldn´t know any better. But the matter of the fact is they can do better and they have done better, seeing they way this popular character is slowly being grinned into the dirt, is really pitifully to say the least. |
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| NecroVMX |
Something's pitiful, that's for sure. | ||||
| launchpad25 |
'Spectacular Spider-Man' is a perfect example of this. The character designs may seem a bit on the 'kiddy' side, but they work well with the animation. (After all, it's much easier to animate characters that have less detail than with more.) Plus, it has some decent writing, and good character arcs to back it up. Also, this series gets it's inspiration from the early Stan Lee/Steve Ditko years of the comic, but with just enough updates that work while keeping the essence of the Spider-Man mythos intact. My real concern is where this series will go to once The CW pulls the plug on Kids WB this fall. (bastards) |
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| John Gibson |
I seriously think the style of Anime is taking over. Just about everything you see looks like that. I don't have anything personal against that style of animation, but when it's used over and over again, it becomes tired and old. It's those damn execs at the CW or Kids WB, or whatever that think this is what we all want to see, not just the kiddies. | ||||
| John Gibson |
That's why we're here, to bitch. It's our right. So while we're bitching about things, you will most likely bitch at us for bitching about it. Not all forums are going to discuss happy things all the same. You can't expect it to be all sunshine, rainbows and lollipops, and people loving everything (and everyone). It's just not happening. |
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| launchpad25 |
I agree. anime has gotten so popular in the last few years that most of our shows have adopted the anime style to reflect this trend. While i like most anime, it's starting to get overused in current cartoons. Another overused trend in animation is the use of Macromedia Flash as a cheap alternative to traditional animation despite the fact that we have innovative software like Dig-Cel that can cut the production time in half. |
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| Erikjust |
Hopefully that dig-Cel isn´t what is used in making cellshading, because that is one style i am getting pretty tired about that style too. Yes it was okay and stylish the first couple of times, but after you´ve seen the first 10 shows all using the same animation style, it gets boring and tedious and you start to wonder when they are gone move on. |
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| fat_deadite1 |
at least aquaman doesnt have a new tv show, i mean who gives a damn about him anymore | ||||
| NecroVMX |
That so? Must have been why the character had such a huge contribution in "World War 3", why "Aquaman: Sword Of Atlantis" got rave reviews (despite the character being killed off and replaced by a younger version.) and why virtually ever comic blog i've seen is asking for the character back. Obviously no one cares. Next you'll tell me no one cares about Green Lantern. |
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| Black Flag NC |
No one cares about DC, except Superman and Batman. It's like half the comic universe has been banished to Alabama. It's a shame, although I admit my comic collection is 90% Marvel. | ||||
| fat_deadite1 |
Yeah i could care less about DC im with marvel all the way | ||||
| NecroVMX |
Hmm let's look at what some of the highest selling titles in comics are right now. There's one called Green Lantern, you might have heard of that. Oh and Justice League Of America, that seems to be doing rather well (better than it should honestly.) Then there's this one book, I think it's called "Action Comics" that sells like hotcakes every month. Yeah there's that. Then they got this weekly book, "Countdown" right? That's a huge commercial success. And well, commercial success isn't everything right? I mean what about quality? Well there's the Eisner best ongoing series winner, it's some book called "All Star Superman". And then there's other books that consistantly get great reviews such as "Blue Beetle", "Justice Society Of America" "Booster Gold" "Wonder Woman", "52" and I seem to recall hearing about something called "American Virgin" None of those are DC books right? They're all some other company, right? I mean, no one cares about DC, right? I mean Marvel, they can do no wrong. I mean when they had Spider-Man make a deal with satan where he gave up his hot super-model wife to save his octogenerian aunt, that was great. and that was only after some great stories where he died and trasnferred his consciousness into a new body, and wore a purple and gold mechanical suit for a few years. And the hulk, that's still awesome right? I mean he's Red for no apparent reason and now he shoots people with guns. That's so aweome, right? Oh and Captain America. I mean he's still awesome right? The way they built him up as the hero of civil war and then had him surrender and get arrested? Awesome. And then that part where he got shot to death and was replaced by bucky? wonderful. I mean bucky is this guy with long hair and a mechanical arm now, that's really great. Oh and there's fantastic four, they replaced mr. fantastic and invisible woman with storm and black panther. Everybody loves that. And there's Iron Man, the way they've made everybody hate him and yet he appears in every book, fucking BRILLIANT. Ok enough sarcasm. My point is that your assessment that "no one cares about DC" what you mean is that you don't care. And that's fine. In reality though, loads of people care about DC, their books sell quite well and they get decent reviews. Marvel's sales are higher, unless you count the fact that DC also includes Wildstorm, Vertigo and Mad Magazine. You prefer Marvel, there's nothing wrong with that. I myself really loved Incredible Hulk (until they cancelled it, replaced the hulk with hercules and launched a new hulk book that was insanely bad) and dropped 50 bucks on the "Planet Hulk" hardcover book. And they have some other killer books, such as Punisher and Daredevil. But I'm a DC fan through and through. When I was a teenager I was 90% marvel, but now it's more like 95% DC. SO when you said "No one cares about DC" I hope you were being facetious, because it's not something I can imagine someone saying with a straight face. |
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| NecroVMX |
Says the guiy with the Joker icon. |
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| launchpad25 |
The problem is that Superman, and Batman have much greater marketing potential that the rest of the DC characters. Still, other DC characters have found success in outside media before. Wonder Woman, and The Flash both had TV shows, and they, along with Aquaman, and Green Lantern, have been mainstays on both 'Superfriends', and 'Justice League'. It's just that Superman, and Batman have been huge cash cows for Warner Bros. at the box office that they've somehow neglected the other heroes despite the fact that the actually OWN DC Comics! So until someone with talent convinces the higher ups at Warner Bros. to give Green Lantern, Aquaman, and The Flash a fair shot, and they become huge box office hits, then maybe average folks will care about them just as much as they care about Batman, and Superman. |
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| NecroVMX |
Nice to see someone talking some sense on here. I think a lot of those lesser heroes will get their shots. There's a Green Lantern movie planned for 2010 (most likely due to the book selling amazingly well right now.) and a lot of those guys will be in the Justice League movie which I'm sure will be spectacularly, hilariously, awesomely bad. I predict that the justice league movie will become the greatest guilty pleasure movie ever, it's going to be so ridiculous and all the online angry nerds are going to burst blood vessels over it. It's going to be really REALLY funny. |
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| Black Flag NC |
Necro, you're pointing out comics and I'm talking about characters that are more popular with the average joe. I'm sure all that DC stuff is great, but Marvel is MUCH more mainstream and has been since the late 60's.
Example: In the last few years, there've been 2 Batman movies and 1 Superman movie. DC pop culture score= 3 In the last few years, there've been 3 Spiderman movies, 3 X-men Movies, 2 Fantastic Four movies, an Incredible Hulk movie, Ghostrider movie, Punisher movie(ugh), and an Iron Man movie. Marvel pop culture score= 11 Sorry if I forgot any. Mainstream doesn't mean better, of course. I just mean as a brand Marvel dominates DC. I myself read independent comics more than anything else any more. |
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| NecroVMX |
If you're going to count iron man, which hasn't yet been released, then you might as well count...
Wonder Woman Justice League Man Of Steel The Dark Knight Watchmen The Spirit Green Lantern Flash Those are all DC films Also, you forgot... Stardust The Fountain V For Vendetta A History Of Violence Constantine Catwoman (ugh) The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen Road To Perdition Not to mention direct to dvd animated films such as Justice League New Fronteir Superman vs Doomsday Teen Titans: Trouble In Tokyo Superman: Braniac Attacks The Batman vs Dracula Justice League: Worlds Collide Batman: Mystery Of The Batwoman and the television shows Birds Of Prey Smallville Legion Of Super-Heroes In The 31st Century Krypto The Superdog The Batman Justice League Unlimited Justice League Static Shock The Zeta Project Batman Beyond Brave And The Bold My point was "no one cares about DC" is an ignorant statement, no matter how you try and cover it up |
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| Black Flag NC |
I'm ignorant, then. DC is more popular than Marvel. Green Arrow is more popular than Wolverine. Hawkman is more recognized than Ghostrider. What was I thinking? | ||||
| NecroVMX |
Now you're being silly. there's a difference between being not as well known and "no one caring" about them.
Your loaded statement is pure idiocy, I could compare Superman to The Sentry in popularity. I could ask who's more well known, The Flash or Quicksilver? And you know what? Those are actually characters that are more comparable to each other. If you wanted to compare Green Arrow to a marvel character, why not Hawkeye? Who is the average person on the street more apt to know? What you said is the equivalent of me saying DC is more popular because more people know who Green Lantern is than Toro However I'm not trying to say DC is more popular, or well known. I'm saying your statement that no one cares about DC is false. |
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| Black Flag NC |
It was a generalization and I was wrong to do so. Let me rephrase: The average American aged 7-87 recognizes more Marvel than DC.
As for my character comparisons; dude, it's awful hard to find a DC character other than Superman or Batman whose on the same level as Spiderman, the Punisher, Captain America, Ghostrider, Daredevil, Wolverine, or the Hulk. I guess we just disagree, which is what these discussions are all about, my friend. |
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| NecroVMX |
Well we'll have to agree to disagree that there aren't other characters on that level. Honestly I think more people are apt to know green lantern, wonder woman and the flash then say, the punisher, daredevil or most of the x-men characters.
I even agree with you that marvel has gotten some really good mainstream exposure in the past decade, not only with their superheroes but with other properties such as blade or men in black. The issue I took was with "no one cares about DC" You're not saying "marvel characters are more recognizable to the average joe" there because maybe the average joe can pick out spider-man quicker than aquaman in a lineup, but do they know that one is marvel and one is dc? when you make a statement like "no one cares about DC" you're insinuating that people who KNOW these characters don't give a shit. But I think you underestimate the mainstream success DC *has* had. I mean I've known lots of cases where people have picked up a green lantern comic and were surprised the character was a white guy. the average person, who hasn't been in a comic shop either in a long time, or ever, knows green lantern as "that black guy" that's cuz of JLU. Hell, my friend Hugh, who is a HUGE marvel fan, and hasn't read a non-batman DC book since...ever. He can name all the teen titans, because of the cartoon. I personally probably couldn't tell you the names of half the x-men lineup, becuase the characters i gave a crap about when i was a kid are either gone, turned bad, dead or unrecognizable. I also think that marvel shoots themselves in the foot a *lot* with the icon stuff. I mean everybody knows what spider-man looks like right? But until just 2 months ago, this was spider-man 
This is the hulk, as of 3 months ago 
And the character that's now captain america? 
Now say you just saw a spider-man movie, you decide to try out the books and you go into a comic shop and you get a purple and gold guy with mechanical arms sticking out of his back (not shown in that pic) bone protrusions coming out of his wrists, a mystical origin and he apparently works for iron man and his identity is publicly known. Then beloved aunt may gets shot in the stomach, he suddenly decides to wear an all black costume and goes around threatening to kill people. then there's a bunch of magical out of body experiences stuff and some time travel, then satan shows up and the last 20 years of story are rendered null. Let's say you see the hulk movie and you go and pick up a hulk comic. You see that the hulk is a big red guy who shoots people and is rarely actually seen in the comic book. Then okay, they gotta get something right, right? Let's try fantastic four, you just saw that movie and you're sure that's the book to try. I mean it's not a hard concept to keep. stretchy guy, invisible chick, flaming dude and a big rocky guy. 
Well, they're halfway there. So yes, the average joe on the street knows who spider-man, the hulk, wolverine, captain america are. But do they care about these characters? Is spider-man the troubled lonely youth struggling with life and super-villains that you saw in 3 movies or is he the whack-job from the books? I know i'm rambling here, and you can probably tell I have issues with the directions marvel has taken in the past 10 years or so. I enjoy their movies (mostly...) but that's about it. But you could easily find people who could tell you 10 different things about superman, but they haven't ever read one of his books. You're also talking about a modern culture that will recognize ronald mcdonald faster than they'll recognize george washington. And you see washington every time you use a dollar bill or quarter. but if you asked someone who they care about more, washington or the clown, how do you think they'd answer? I mean hell I'm sorry for going off on you but this forum frustrates me a great deal as it is and then when i see "no one cares about DC" from you and then another guy who has a friggin' JOKER icon, i'm like well wtf, I care, am I nobody? |
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| Black Flag NC |
No problem, man. Yeah, I picked up on the fact that I struck a nerve. Sorry, bud. And you totally nailed my fat deadite friend. Instant hypocracy. LOL! |
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| launchpad25 |
The sad fact is that average folks don't read comics. They're too busy with their complicated, stress filled lives to keep up with comics. Heck, when people think of Spider-Man, X-Men, The Hulk, and The Fantastic Four, they automatically think 'Marvel' because of how aggressive they are at keeping their characters in the public eye, yet when people think of Batman, or Superman, they don't think 'DC', they think 'Warner Bros'. (To be fair, they're technically right since Time Warner owns Warners, and DC.) Heck, i'll bet you anything that average people think Howard The Duck was a George Lucas creation when in fact, he was created by the late Steve Gerber. And people don't think of Ninja Turtles as a 'comic property', They think of them as a 'toy fad' from the 80's that's been resurrected in recent years simply because they've never bothered to learn about their comic book roots.
What you usually get are alot of disappointed folks who are shocked, and outraged by the changes made to their beloved icons. I have a friend who grew up watching the 60's 'Batman' show, and to him, that's the definitive 'Batman', and he doesn't like any incarnation of Batman since 1989. This is because he's never read a 'Batman' comic, and hasn't kept up with the changes that have been made to the character since the 70's. Which explains why he couldn't accept a dark, serious Batman. When DC published the story where The Joker kills Robin, alot of non comic readers were outraged because they had such an emotional attachment to the 60's show, and they couldn't believe how DC could kill off Batman's faithful sidekick. What they also don't know is that the 'Robin' character that Joker killed was really Jason Todd, who many fans didn't like. People don't read comics, but they only know about these characters through television, and movies. That's why they react in such shock when they see the slightest change that's been made to these characters because they don't keep up with comics, but they'll keep up with the daily shenanigans of Britney, Paris, and Lindsay. Ironically, most comic fans don't like change, either. |
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