What do you consider the first "modern" superhero movie?
 

The way I see it, there were 4 turning points for what gave us the modern superhero movie:

- Batman 1989. Tim Burton's Batman reinvented Batman for the general public who remembered him from the campy 60's show. It also introduced Batman and Joker to a whole new younger generation of kids from the 80's and 90's (like myself). The series also spawned B:TAS.

- X-men 2000. The first X-men film from 16 years ago, of a movie franchise that's still going today. After Batman and Robin killed superhero movies in 1997....it was only 3 years later that X-men revived it. Its also rather obvious the success of X-men eventually paved the way for Spiderman and the Marvel universe

- Nolan's Batman. The films brought Batman back once again in a brilliant reboot and were critically acclaimed (at least the first two), and paved the way for Batman to be a success in theaters again after Batman and Robin

- Iron Man...the start of the Marvel Universe. Says enough in itself, this paved the way for all Marvel movies that came after it.


What do you consider the first modern superhero movie?

Schindler's List.
Come at me.

And this is why most people don't like you.

"Most people"
B*tch please, I'm fabulous.

Well that was fast. 3 posts in and this thread is already ruined. Amazing.

You usually ruin other threads so you better shut your goddamn mouth.

Not this early!

I changed my mind, to get this back on track.
The movie Chef. I f*cking love the movie Chef.

You did pretty much cover the entire spectrum with your first post. I personally have to credit Batman '89, or whichever Superman movie preceded it. I honestly don't know or care when any of the old Superman films came out.

For me, the breakout mainstream comic book movies are Iron Man and The Dark Knight. Other gamechanger modern movies happened, but they were not as widely promoted or enjoyed.

I guess it depends what you mean with "modern superhero" movies. Blade made superheroes pop back on the list of being marketable after washing away the stank of Pyun's Captain America, Judge Dredd, Spawn, Steel and of course Batman & Robin.

But Blade isn't a costumed superhero per se, so there's Singer's X-Men from 2000 and Sam Raimi's Spider-Man from 2002, especially Spider-man being a hit modern superhero movie with a flashy costume.

There's always 1978 Superman which did great things for superhero movies, and 1989 Batman which showed that Mr. Mom could play a serious superhero.

Most superhero comic book movies are either failed pilots (1978 Doctor Strange), obscure TV movies like Reb Brown's Captain America or not considered actual superheroes or even known that they originated from superhero comic books like 1989 The Punisher is basically Punisher in-name only.

So my final answer is Casabla... Barb Wire, wait... no.

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Wtf man.

For me it's the 1989 Batman movie, and then that movie was followed the next year by the first TMNT movie. However, that's just the way that I look at it. This is something that's just going to vary from person to person.

The funniest part of it all is the 1989 Batman movie is like 26 years old. I wonder how old something can still be to consider it "modern."

The young kids of today who grew up in the late 90's and 2000's would probably scoff at some "80's movie" being modern. The kids of today turn their nose up at older stuff.

Superman: The Movie from 1978. Though it is campy by today's standards, it adapted a comic book character into what at the time was a very realistic setting. And those flying effects look better (imo) than the ones in Man of Steel.

It, along with its first sequel, really changed the way superheroes appeared on film.

I may be one of those so called 90s kids, but I still really appreciate it.

I think I'd choose the first X-Men movie, because I don't consider Burton's Batman and its sequels modern.

Fixed that for you.

I love how some people are legitimately trying to have a conversation here after the thread's already been derailed. In fact, this very reply pointing out is hypocritical as all hell. F*ck me.

So lemme balance it out. I honestly consider The Avengers a turning point in superhero movies, as most people saw them as standalone flicks before. When Avengers came out, however, the ability to make an entire series out of multiple superheroes was no longer just a nerd's wet dream, and superhero movies pretty much became its own "genre", if you will, because of The Avengers and the movies after The Avengers.

I feel like this thread is a trap. Tell Cubed your opinion so he can tell you why you are wrong. :lol:

Anyways for me it's Spiderman (2002). This was the first huge box office success and mainstream comic book movie of this era. It propelled us into a plethora of movies base on comic books and had we not had that time of some of those sub par comic book movies we wouldn't be getting the amazing ones we are today. I think that movie really opened studios eyes and Marvel hit the oh crap button.

Howard the Duck. Supes did movies first, but Howard was the first to use a non-"human" comic character and is STILL the most obscure charcater to get a movie of his own. In a way, he paved the way for many other little-known heroes to get movies. "If they could do it with Howard...."

I win.....

Not to take away from what X-Men did in 2000 but I feel like 2008 when Iron Man and The Dark Knight were released is what set us on the superhero movie path we're currently on.

Skip to 1:20 to hear Richard Donner talk about superhero films today and his legacy.



Spawn is especially awful when you compare it to that fantastic animated series based on the same character that was airing on HBO at around the same time.

I'd agree with that. There were different waves, if you will.

I would say the first Raimi Spiderman and the early X-Men movies really seemed to kick the whole "comic book movie" fad in to high gear. The first Batman from Burton was wildly successful but the avalanche of superhero movies really seemed to get kicked off at Spiderman or the X-Men movies.

Spidey or X-Men for sure

I don't even remember Iron Man 1. I didn't see it in theater and I first saw it on DVD/blu ray and even then I don't remember.

I actually didn't watch any Marvel films until Avengers came out in 2012. Leading up to that movie I figured I might as well watch all the movies the heroes originally appeared in so that movie would make sense.

Am I the only one who got into the Marvel universe late? Its weird because I watched all the X-men and Spiderman movies in theaters when they came out, but I didn't do the same for the Avengers movies. Maybe because I barely knew them.

I'm gonna go with either Spider-Man (2002) or X-Men (2000)

Superman The Movie (1978 ). 'Nuff said!

I think that's a little too old to be modern.

I think Captain America: The First Avenger deserves some kind of special mention due to how it did a historical '40s setting but never felt forced, kitschy, or campy. I hope whatever Wonder Woman film DC does is at least half as good.

Also, I don't know if this counts as a movie, but has anybody seen the pilot to the 1970s Hulk TV show? On paper that series should have looked awful and been written terribly, but they managed to adapt that character in a way that appealed to a very large demographic of people.

http://i.picpar.com/d0d181ebd221530b...b677903e0f.gif

I feel like Batman, Spider-Man, Batman Begins and Iron Man were all important in shaping the modern superhero movie. I'd also give credit to The Avengers for paving the way for large scale superhero team up films.

The David Banner series is fantastic, the movies are great too although The Incredible Hulk Returns with Thor is a little corny, or... Thor is a little corny. :lol:

It's a shame The Trial of the Incredible Hulk didn't start a Daredevil series, cause he was pretty solid.

And they might be the first superhero movies that had a team-up that wasn't hero & sidekick

This goes back to what I said earlier in the thread about this topic being different for each person. If you were a teenager when the old Superman movie came out in 1978, then you'd likely consider it to be the first "modern" superhero movie.

The OP is missing Superman 1978 and Spider-Man 2002. Sure Superman is very old but it still has what made "modern superhero movies" become that, it was the first step of making a "realistic" movie. And for those that don't remember it was Spider-Man that created the new Boom for superhero movies, I still remember the news saying that "after the success of Spider-Man, _____ has been greenlit.". It started the wave of modern SH movies. Those two examples are far more relevant than Batman Begins or X-Men. I'd also argue Blade and X-Men have far more in common with 90s superhero movies than modern. If I really have to choose I think I'd say Spider-Man with Superman a close second it just depends how you want to define "modern".

For what it's worth when I was a kid Batman 1989 was only a few years old and I always considered it "old". That way film looks in 80s movies is very distinct and as a kid I could easily recognize it and know it was an "old" movie.

It's definitely modern enough that many of my High School friends thought Batman Begins was a prequel to Batman '89 when that movie came out.

Spawn was a great film for its time and only looks silly when compared to modern superhero movies. You can only argue that it was "neutered" to be PG-13 but whatever. Sure the HBO show was fantastic but how many people actually watched it? I didn't until the DVDs came out and found out about its existence; You can also argue that Batman: The Animated Series is fantastic and when compared to the Batman movies they are not as good as the cartoon.

Iron Man is easily the best Marvel movie to date and possibly the best superhero movie in general. It just worked out and had everything perfect which every post-Iron Man Superhero movie sans the Nolan trilogy has followed. I mean while comic fans knew who he was to the average person including me he was a nobody or C-List hero at best and this movie made him an instant A-list hero among Batman and Spider-Man. The movie was able to compete with The Dark Knight and that movies hype was through the roof. This movie was what convinced Disney CEO Bob Iger to buy Marvel and finally this movie also convinced Marvel to go ahead and gamble with their cinematic universe following the same formula this movie set up.

Definitely watch it again, maybe it doesn't feel as special when you watch all the other Marvel movies since they all basically copied it but it should still hold up without a problem. You were definitely late to the Marvel CU but I think most people did too, IIRC Captain America, Thor and The Incredible Hulk all did fine in the Box Office but weren't huge hits like the two Iron Man movies and people were unsure of how Avengers would do because of that since they thought only Iron Man was going to carry the film. Post Avengers all Marvel movies got a huge Box Office bump.

So what's the first modern superhero movie you saw theatrically? How'd you react to the ad campaigns, tie-ins, etc? Did it feel like an "event"?

My dad took me to see Spider-Man twice in '02...I remember seeing the ads on Toonami and those insanely poseable ToyBiz action figures at Wal-Mart.

That's probably worthy of its own thread, at least in movies in general. For me pretty much any big movie marketed at me felt like a huge event, if I saw the ads everywhere and promotions at fast food places and the movie all over the food at the supermarkets I knew it was for a reason.....it was a movie worthy of all that. Little did I know it was all marketing to get me to watch the movie but yeah everything that big seemed like a big event. First superhero movie I watched in theaters was Batman Forever, it probably wasn't as big of an event as other movies but I was definitely excited to watch it.

Funny thing is wasn't Batman dead before Batman '89? I mean the comics were still going of course, but after 60's Batman he was pretty much gone besides the Superfriends cartoon.

Batman '89 completely revitalized the franchise. People often forget B:TAS was actually originally a tie-in cartoon to the movie. The theme song is from the movie, and Penguin's design is from Batman Returns.

The comics had already been going through a renaissance starting with Neal Adams and Dennis O'Neil in the '70s. Factor in Frank Miller's work on Year One and Dark Knight Returns, as well as Alan Moore's Killing Joke, and the stage was set for Batman's live action portrayals to catch up with his evolution in the comics.

It's kind of like the improvements in Superman's characterization after the Donner films (with the Crisis on Infinite Earths saga happening in the mid-80s). A lot of the good things about Man of Steel had their genesis there.

I wonder (no pun intended) what will happen with Wonder Woman. The Lynda Carter series, as iconic as it was, happened pre-Crisis. It'll be interesting to see what they do with a modern retelling of her backstory for the moviegoers who don't watch the cartoons or read comics.

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So true. Superman: the Movie is clearly the first modern superhero film. It set the Bar pretty damned high.
Anyone who doesn't know or care when that film came should show a little respect. It paved the way for all that came after.

^
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