Superhero Movies: The Journey from Corny Flicks to Oscar Winners

Origins of the Superhero

The concept of the superhero emerged from where all art emerges: a reaction to social issues. While it may not seem like it, the comic books that began way back in the early 1900s were because of the World War. People were scared, looking for something to believe in, they wanted to feel in power of their own lives again. Superheroes acted as the perfect outlet to channel those feelings and give people the fantasy of being able to singlehandedly save the world.

Early Attempts and Struggles

Comic book movies however were not received as well. From the movies in the 50s with the cheap effects, superhero movies were always limited by the lack of technological means to give that authentic look. The older ones always looked cheap and corny and never found success.

The 80s were a turning point. The Christopher Reeves Superman and Tim Burton’s Batman brought success and popularity to two of the most well known superheroes. But they were the only ones. Marvel had yet to find any success. The failed Howard the Duck movie, Avengers, Captain America and even Fantastic Four. All of these were attempted in the 90s but fell flat.

Even the Batman movies ran into trouble with their biggest failure Batman and Robin. Things looked pretty glum for DC who were the ones who found success and now had to sit in the back seat as 20th Century Fox and Marvel collaborated to make X-men.

The Rise of Modern Superheroes

A movie about mutants that were different from normal people so they were shunned from society. Releasing right before 9/11, this could not have come at a better time. Post 9/11 brought Sam Raimi’s Spider Man which was an incredible film in and of itself and exactly what the world needed at that time. A friendly neighbourhood hero that everyone could count on. It could be anyone. We were all heroes.

Then the Nolan trilogy arrived in 2005 with Batman Begins. This changed how superhero movies could be made. Till now, even the successful movies were all classified as comic book movies, something that only people interested in superheroes would watch. But Nolan began to make them universal. With his limited knowledge on comic books, he brought his own unique perspective and made a trilogy that can never be matched.

2008. The year when a superhero movie won an Oscar for acting and grossed over a billion dollars. The Dark Knight had changed the game again. Not only did we get that but that is the year when the MCU began. Iron Man changed the way superhero movies would be marketed.

Evolution and Expansion

In 2012, we had The Avengers which continued all the good work the MCU had done and solidified the growing popularity of the Anti-hero through Loki. Since 9/11, there was a lot of focus on heroism, honour, nobility and all that but times were changing. People wanted something different now.

Enter the anti-hero. Flawed characters with twisted motivations but a good heart and something that people could empathise with. Fox yet again capitalised on this and made Deadpool and Logan back to back. Two incredible genre challenging films that continued to keep superhero movies fresh just when they began to go stale. Joker in 2019 continued this fashion with Joaquin Phoenix even winning an Oscar for his role.

Wonder Woman gave us a strong female superhero that grossed nearly a billion leading producers to finally believe in female superhero projects. Black Panther brought popularity to black superheroes for the first time since Blade.

Superhero movies have come a long way from being corny, cheap looking black and white films and will have to continue to evolve if they want to find success.

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