DC and Marvel comics that have been adapted to feature films

DC Comics

Founded in 1934 as National Allied Publications by Malcolm Wheeler- Nicholson Name was changed to DC to represent the popular line of Detective Comics DC launched the Action Comics title in 1938 which featured the first superhero…Superman Due to the popularity of Superman, DC went on to introduce other characters such as Batman in was known as the Golden Age of comics and many superheroes were introduced such as The Flash, Green Lantern, and Wonder Woman Superhero comics lost popularity in the late 1940s and DC began to publish western, mystery, and horror comics Detective Comics and Action Comics continued to be published and sold during this period Previously popular superheroes were reimagined for the Silver Age of comics which began with the appearance of the new Flash character in Showcase #4 Oct 1956 History of DC Comics

The sale of DC’s comic books jumped drastically in the mid-1980s DC sold 3.5 million comics in Sept 2014 DC currently has 61 different titles on the newsstand with more to come in late 2014 early % of readers are women An Action Comics #1 sold for $1,000,000 in Feb 2010 and another for $3,207,852 in was the 75 th Anniversary of Superman’s first appearance in comics In February 2010, A Detective Comics #27 featuring the first appearance of Batman, sold for $1 million at auction 2014 was the 75 th Anniversary of Batman’s first apperance Popularity

DC made the transition to the big screen in 1978 with Superman The movie and its sequels After a period of no big screen superhero presence, Tim Burton revived the genre in 1989 with Batman which led to several sequels The Batman story was rebooted in 2005 with Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins The Nolan trilogy is now considered to be the best Batman films of all time The New Media

Superman The Movie: (Trailer) Superman II: 1980 Superman III: 1983 Superman IV: 1987 Superman Returns: 2006 Man of Steel: 2013 Batman: 1989 Batman Returns: 1992 Batman Forever: 1995 Batman & Robin: 1997 Batman Begins: 2005 The Dark Knight: 2008 The Dark Knight Rises: 2012 Green Lantern: 2011 DC Films

Marvel Comics

Marvel was founded in 1939 by Martin Goodman under the original name Timely Comics Timely’s first publication was Marvel #1 in Oct 1939 and featured the android Human Torch and Namor The Sub-Mariner By the 1950s Timely Comics had become known as Atlas Comics The modern incarnation of the company began in 1961 with the launch of the Fantastic Four title and other hero comics which resulted in the name change from Atlas Comics to Marvel Comics in honor of Marvel #1 Marvel features popular heroes such as Spider-man, Wolverine, Iron-man, and The Hulk History of Marvel Comics

Marvel began to increase it’s popularity in the 1960s when Stan Lee took over as editor-in-chief (Stan Lee Interview) Marvel’s characters are not the typical heroes like the ones in the pages of DC comics because Stan Lee prefers to write about the anti-hero Most Marvel characters are either mutants, outsiders, damaged, or deeply troubled in some way These characters are so popular with readers because they are different and many of the readers can relate 79 different Marvel titles were shipped to comics retailers in Sept 2014 Popularity

Marvel had made previous attempts to get on the big screen There was a poorly done Fantastic Four film by Roger Corman in 1994 that was never released and a Captain America film that went straight to video in 1990 Marvel found success with its films beginning in 2000 with X-Men and 2002 with Sam Raimi’s Spider-man series The new wave hit in 2008 when Iron-Man was released Marvel’s Jump to Film

X-Men X-Men X-Men: The Last Stand – 2006 X-Men Origins: Wolverine – 2009 X-Men: First Class – 2011 The Wolverine – 2013 X-Men: Days of Future Past – 2014 Fantastic Four – 2005 Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer – 2007 Captain America: The First Avenger – 2011 Captain America: The Winter Soldier – 2014 Iron Man – (Clip) Iron Man 2 – 2010 Iron Man 3 – 2013 Marvel Films

The Hulk – 2003 The Incredible Hulk – 2008 after a reboot of the series Spider-Man – 2002 Spider-Man 2 – 2004 Spider-Man 3 – 2007 Amazing Spider-Man – 2012 Amazing Spider-Man 2 – 2014 The Avengers – 2012 Guardians Of The Galaxy Blade – 1998 Blade II – 2002 Blade: Trinity – 2004 The Punisher Cont.

Superhero films are popular because superheroes come in all shapes and sizes – there is something for everyone People look for an escape from their everyday lives With the fear of terrorism, epidemics, and financial instability, superhero movies provide viewers with hope and allow them a few hours to forget what is going on in the real world New technology gives comics fans a chance to see their favorite superheroes in live action in a way they never could before The ongoing “war” between DC and Marvel means only good news for the fans as both companies continue to release film adaptations of their properties The Superhero Genre

The films tend to draw large crowds and a huge box office take The Dark Knight grossed domestically $448,139,099 The 3 Iron Man films grossed $1,039,859,426 Guardians of the Galaxy was based on a little known comic and many didn’t expect the film to do well –Domestic gross is $331,062,044 Based on the success of the previous films, DC and Marvel have released the lineups for each company’s future films The Numbers

The Future of Superhero Films

References