How comic book movies kill the deep, mythic history of comic book characters

My own son will see every superhero movie with me, but no matter how I strategically litter the house with comics, he won’t pick one up.

I didn’t read the article but it’s probably good. The headline provoked a response that I hadn’t thought of before, maybe gave a face to the barb that bugged me about the superhero movies.

Many of the comic books I’ve read, the characters in them, their personalities developed over a long period of time. Their histories were revealed in issues here and there and they grew and broke through story arcs.

The movies shovel everything they think you need to know in your face in two hours or less. That’s probably true of any book to movie, though and there are some phenomenal film characters out there.

(If I wasn’t tired and felt more inclined, I would rewrite the above paragraph to not be so finger wagging judgemental from the get-go.)

But I enjoy TV shows more if only because the characters get substantial depth over the course of a season or series. And personally I’m more interested in those characters and how they face their life-trials overall as opposed to that one plot.

Don Draper, Ron Swanson, Number Six, Jessie Pinkman, Kenny Powers. There are others but these came off the top of my head.

Regardless of how I feel about movies and TV, I don’t strategically place anything for Maggie to pickup anymore. She doesn’t need to discover things the same way I did. I’m just happy that she’ll watch the X-Men movies with me. That’s good enough.

#comics #movies