The Science Fiction Horror and Fantasy Film Review
The superhero refers to the protagonist of any work who has enhanced abilities. These can include superior strength (Superman, Hulk), invulnerability to damage (Luke Cage, Deadpool), enhanced agility and speed (The Flash), enhanced sensory abilities (Daredevil, Superman’s x-ray vision), psychic powers (Professor Xavier and many of the X-Men), animal or transformational abilities (Spider-Man, Manimal), size control (Ant-Man, The Atom), elemental control (Orora Munroe, Johnny Storm), enhanced martial ability (Iron Fist) or command over an environment (Aquaman, Swamp Thing), among others, while more than most superheroes have the ability to fly.
Superpowers can be natural (such as due to alien origin like Superman), gifted (received objects like Green Lantern’s ring, Shazam’s powers) or the result of mutation (most Marvel superheroes, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles). Other superheroes such as Batman, The Punisher, The Phantom, Black Widow, Hawkeye and The Green Hornet are mundane in nature and operate using acquired skills or draw their abilities from technology (as do Iron Man, Cyborg and The Six Million Dollar Man).
The calling of most superheroes is fighting crime, saving the innocent from peril and fighting earth-threatening menaces. Most superheroic works have created a vast pantheon of colourful Super-Villains and their frequent world domination schemes for superheroes to fight against. Of more recent, we have seen teams of superheroes (usually those belonging to a comic-book mythos) coming together in teams like The Avengers, Justice League, Teen Titans, The Boys and The Umbrella Academy where each of their varied powers works as part of an ensemble.
Most superheroes wear a distinctive costume. Many also wear a mask of some type and maintain secret identities that allow them to lead normal lives – Superman’s identity as klutzy, bespectacled Clark Kent is a perfect example. The majority of superhero films, with occasional exceptions, have been adapted from Comic Books.
The earliest superhero film adaptations were as serials during the 1940s and then on tv during the 1950s where the menaces fought were mundane crime plots rather than super-villains and the low-budgets rendered them in baggy tights and with impoverished effects. TV’s Batman (1966-8) took a campy approach that emphasised the silliness of heroes in tights. This became a dominant approach for a number of years and saw several superhero comedies and parodies.
Things changed with the Christopher Reeve Superman (1978), which brought respect and convincing effects to the superhero genre. This was followed by a number of other superhero films. The biggest success among these was Batman (1989), which drew on the revisionist Dark Knight influence of graphic novel artists of the mid-1980s to create a Batman that was dark, troubled and took place amid a brooding Gothic landscape. This approach was popular for a number of years.
The ascendency of Marvel Comics started in the late 1990s beginning with Blade (1998) and then the massive successes of X-Men (2000) and Spider-Man (2002), followed by a host of sequels and other adapted properties. The Marvel Cinematic Universe itself did not begin until a decade later with Iron Man (2008) where Marvel began a process of bringing all their comic-book superheroes together in a shared universe continuity and have them make appearances in other films, while building anticipation towards their team-up with The Avengers (2012).
DC Comics had great success with Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy but were slow to adopt the same model as Marvel. They finally did so with Man of Steel (2013), which led into crossover with Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) and others. Other comic-book properties have attempted to ride the bandwagon with differing degrees of success. There have been surprisingly few in the way of original screen superheroes.
The superhero parody has enjoyed much success in the 2000s/10s. This includes a number of comedies about the superhero with no powers.
A twelve-chapter serial based on the comic-book superhero who these days is known as Shazam. Often regarded as one of the best of all serials, this has some decent action scenes and cliffhangers
This is another one of Robert Rodriguez’s home made children’s films that takes off in a wackily gonzo manner. The results are uneven but often cutely appealing
A banal David De Coteau directed kid’s film about two teens who find an arsenal of alien equipment and put the suits on to become superheroes
Another of the DC animated films, based on a work that reinterpreted Superman. This is somewhat bitsy in condensing a 12-issue series to a 73-minute film but holds some moments of great writing
Low-budget superhero film. With a plot that strips the superheroes of their powers and them facing a villain’s deathtraps, we end up with little more than a Saw copy in funny costumes
Sequel to one of the few original (ie. non comic-book) superhero films of the 2010s. this takes the interesting route of telling it as a investigative tv report into someone killing off all the superheroes
Indie superhero comedy that reads a good deal funnier on paper than it ever produces laughs on screen. The production lacks the budget to produce more than a handful of cheap superheroic digital effects
The reasoning behind rebooting the Spider-Man franchise after ten years and only three films is a puzzle. That said, this offers an edgier origin story than Sam Raimi’s take and Andrew Garfield makes for a fine Spider-Man
One of the best among the modern Marvel Comics screen adaptations. All involved are at the absolute peak of their game and the balance of superheroic action, humour and tragedy makes you cheer at how well they get it right
Tired of the bombast of Marvel/DC Comics superheroics overunning screens? This is a superhero film for you – one welcomely brought down to Earth set in working class neighbouhoods and with a focus on real-life problems. The results are surprising and refreshing
While there is little doubt that Edgar Wright would have made a much better film, this emerges with an engaging likeability. Less epic superheroics, this plays out more as a caper comedy where a good ensemble and comedic playing carry the show
Ant-Man was a lightweight but perfectly enjoyable entry in the horde of Marvel Comics adaptations. This sequel has amplified the comedy element, seemingly with the intent of being the joker among the MCU pack
The third of the films devoted to Marvel’s miniature superhero. This ventures into multiverse themes works well when it comes to introducing the MCU’s big new super-villain who ended up never happening
A few years ago Aquaman was regarded as a joke among superheroes. James Wan dispels any notion of Aquaman’s wimpiness in a series of jaw-dropping effects sequences that propel this ahead of anything the MCU is doing at the moment
The sequel to the DCEU’s Aquaman reaches for epic effects spectacle, although the character of Aquaman undergoes a substantial shift and is now given more of a comedy playing
An interestingly odd film where a videographer looking for a story investigates homeless man Joe Manganiello’s claims to being a superhero, which may or may not be true
This animated theatrical remake of the old Astro Boy cartoon series is nicely made, although the film often feels over-simplistic in its scripting and use of cliches
This fifteen chapter serial was the second ever Superman film. It is a vigorously entertaining run through the comic’s basics and features the first screen appearance of Lex Luthor
The US release of several short Japanese films featuring the superhero Starman. Cheap and entertainingly absurd, filled with tatty superheroics and laughable science
The culmination of one of the most ambitious cinematic exercises ever conducted, with Marvel weaving storylines through several films to finally merge here with flawless regard. The characters get far more depth than in all of their previous films
The first Avengers film came with a massive anticipation in seeing the characters come together and the snappiness of their interplay; here this seems more flat, while the rest is overrun by wall-to-wall action
Marvel conclude the cliffhanger they left Avengers: Infinity War on and offer up a bigger-than-big line-up, overspilling with just about every MCU character to ever appear on screen up to that point
Marvel’s third Avengers film, uniting almost every superhero under their roof, resulting in some thirty characters on screen and a plot that becomes a blur of changing locations and superheroic punch-ups
A real oddity among the Batman animated films – one where the basics of the Batman mythos are translated into Aztec culture at the time of the arrival of the Conquistadors
Batman’s first screen appearance in a fifteen-chapter serial. This is a dull, impoverished adaptation, which sees Batman and Robin rewritten in the service of the US government fighting a Japanese invasion force
A film spinoff from the popular 1960s Batman tv show starring Adam West. At half-an-hour twice a week, the series was an enjoyable piece of surrealistic zaniness but its appeals seem stretched at feature-length
Tim Burton borrows from the dark brooding graphic novels of the era and gives us a beautiful, stunningly designed film that digs deep into the psychological recesses of the masks and funny faces
The reboot of the Batman franchise post Zack Snyder returns to the Christopher Nolan conception with Robert Pattinson as an emo Batman who resembles The Cure’s Robert Smith. Not completely successful on all fronts but a promising start
Building on the popularity of the character in Suicide Squad, an animated film that gives to Harley Quinn, and lets loose with a sense of humour far more adult than the other animated Batman films
The second of the animated Batman films, a Mr Freeze story timed to come out at the same time as Joel Schumacher’s Batman & Robin atrocity. This treats the Mr Freeze story with far more respect than that film
Not to be confused with the Joel Schumacher atrocity, this was the second Batman film ever made, a 15-chapter serial. This is mostly worth watching as a novelty in its laughable attempts to approximate the superheroics of the comic-book in comparison to modern counterparts
Possibly the worst film ever made on a big studio budget, Joel Schumacher’s follow-up to Tim Buton’s standout Batman films where he turns everything into an absurd Day Glo realm with a script for two year-olds, campy puns and badly overacting super-villains
Animated film featuring a team-up between the sons of Batman and Superman, which ends up being far more fun than you expect
This is more of a Suicide Squad than a Batman film. Based on the popular Arkham videogames, this a Justice League-type adventure but with super-villains where the emphasis is on dark humor and gleeful mayhem
Another of the DC Universe Original Animated Films. This is less a Batman film than a Batman Family film, a mixed effort that sidelines Batman for much of the show
After Joel Schumacher killed off the cinematic Batman franchise, Christopher Nolan successfully revives it, bringing back the dark, psychologically brooding superhero and telling a Batman origin story
Film spinoff of Batman Beyond, an animated tv series set in the future as a youngster inherits a hi-tech Batsuit from an aging Bruce Wayne. The film resurrects The Joker but fails to do anything interesting with the character
Tim Burton’s superlative duo of Batman films were wrecked after Joel Schumacher took up the director’s chair and turned the films into giant camp fests. Here he allows a madly overacting Jim Carrey and Tommy Lee Jones loose as the villains
Adaptation of a classic graphic novel that imagines Batman back in the late 19th Century as he fights Jack the Ripper. This works rather well – in fact, better than the graphic novel it is based on
Taking a leaf from The Wachowskis with The Animatrix, DC went to Japan and hired a bunch of anime directors to deliver an anthology of six different animated Batman stories
Animated adaptation of the classic Batman comic-book story, this places the Batman/Cat Woman relationship centre stage to give her the most substantial workout of any film
Theatrically released film based on the 1990s animated Batman tv series. This allows the series to stretch its wings and do things it never could on tv, although the creation of a new super-villain never quite comes off
One of the better films spun off from the 1990s animated Batman tv series, introducing the character of Batwoman (although a different one to the comic-book incarnation).
This gets full marks for a WTF set-up, an anime that imagines Batman and most of the villains transplanted back to feudal Japan. There is fun to seeing the familiar characters reinterpreted in terms of Japanese imagery
A sequel to Batman Ninja, which offered an anime treatment of Batman. This gives us a bizarre alternate Yakuza-ruled Japan with versions of the Justice League working for them
Someone figured out Adam West and Burt Ward, Batman and Robin from the 1960s Batman tv series, were still around and put them in this animated film that replicates the look of the show and pays homage to its willful silliness
The second of Tim Burton’s Batman films is even more beautifully dark and glistering than the first, introducing Michelle Pfeiffer as a sizzling Cat Woman and Danny De Vito as a venomous Penguin who respectively own the show
An oddity among the animated Batman films. This seems less another Batman film – Bruce Wayne gets more screen time than Batman, for instance – than it does a homage to the 1970s martial arts film
Film crossover between the 1990s Batman and Superman animated tv series from Bruce Timm. The script does an interesting job in playing the characters, their secret identities and principal villains off against each other
The first of a two-part animated adaptation of the classic graphic novel ever written. The film lacks the same impact because, firstly, it is an incomplete story, and secondly, Frank Miller’s ideas have now become so much part of the modern Batman
The second of the two-part animated adaptation of Frank Miller’s classic graphic novel. The film is staged as a series of epic confrontations between iconic DC characters and written with a dark bite to emerge much more satisfying than the first part
DC Universe Animated film that is adapted from an Elseworlds story that offers up an alternate 1920s version of Batman who is fighting up against H.P. Lovecraft entities
Adaptation of the Alan Moore graphic novel, one of the most famous comic-book titles of all time. The notoriously cranky Moore need have no reason to shun this film version, which recreates his work right down to preserving his dialogue and replicating the set-up of individual panels
The first in a two-part adaptation of a classic Batman story, this shows great promise that lifts the DC Universe Original Animated Movies out of the comfortable middle ground they have been drifting through the last few years
The Long Halloween Part One was one of the best DC animated films in some time, now comes the concluding chapter, which alas fails to fulfill the promise that the first film showed
One of the best of the animated Batman films, telling the story of the overlooked Robin Jason Todd and his resurrection as the villain Red Hood, a film that has an adult tone and comes with immensely exciting action scenes
An animated Batman film that is essentially an extended commercial based on a line of toys wherein Batman fights super-villains that have an animal motif
It took DC Comics the better part of a decade to catch up with the massive success Marvel Comics are having on screen in crossing their characters over. Zack Snyder comes to the party offering up THE biggest headline double-bill in superherodom
A film spinoff from the animated The Batman tv series, this offers a great title match but proves a disappointment. Moreover, it has to twist comic-book canon to make the plot work
Second in the trilogy of animated films dealing with Bruce Wayne’s son Damian who becomes the new Robin – this also adapts the massive Court of Owls crossover event, which provides a fascinating new nemesis for Batman
An animated crossover where you cannot help but think that the two styles of either – a grim loner who lives in a dark milieu vs a team of manic teenagers spouting surfer speak – are only going to end up clashing
Batman: Return of the Caped Crusaders, an animated homage to the 1960s Batman tv series reuniting Adam West and Burt Ward, was a quirky delight. This is a sequel in the same vein, although more a case of a joke that tires in the retelling
Animated adaptation of the classic Frank Miller graphic novel, this is dark, psychologically brooding, far more adult than the children’s niche it is sold to, and with producer Bruce Timm and his team at the top of their game
French-Belgian adult animated film in the gonzo trippy vein of Ralph Bakshi and Bill Plympton – a visually madcap satire of science-fiction tropes and 1980s East-West tensions, full of wackily surreal visuals
Disney animation and Marvel Comics come together; Marvel loses and most of the comic-book is tossed out the window and this becomes a simple story about a boy and his robot story before settling into familiar sueprheroics
A bizarre Japanese about a documentary crew who make a film about a man who becomes a giant-sized superhero to fight off giant rubber monsters
The DC comic-book Birds of Prey is hijacked to become a vehicle for Harley Quinn, the breakout character from Suicide Squad. Margot Robbie gives the impression she has zero interest in making a film for comic-book fans
An entry from the abortive attempt to create a DC Comics shared universe. Dwayne Johnson takes on the role of the DC’s anti-hero in a film that is far more fun than the recent Marvel offerings
A Jet Li vehicle that falls into the masked superhero genre where the show has taken a few leaves from the tv series The Green Hornet. Enjoyable fun with some exhilarating action sequences
Tsui Hark takes over the directorial reins of the sequel, filling it with much more fantastical elements, pitting the hero against a mad scientist and his mutant creations in a series of wild martial arts scenes
The most successful Marvel Comics adaptation of all-time up to that point. Enjoyable if I fall short of calling it the best Marvel film ever and its receiving a nomination for a Best Picture Academy Award
The MCU’s sequel to Black Panther. This offers the peculiarity of a work in which the superhero of the title never actually appears and is instead set around his absence following the death of Chadwick Boseman
Following Michelle Pfeiffer’s turn as Cat Woman in Batman Returns, this was a copycat from Roger Corman in which Joan Severance becomes a black vinyl clad superheroine exacting justice
The second of the low-budget Roger Corman produced films made for cable featuring Joan Severance as a black vinyl-clad masked superheroine
The first MCU film to emerge since the Great Pause of the pandemic, the question is whether one of the least interesting characters in The Avengers can carry a film all by herself
One of the original superheroes with no powers comedies, a not particularly funny variant based on a Saturday Night Live sketch. Written by and starring Damon Wayans.
That starts out seeming a standard mindless action film in which Vin Diesel is resurrected as an augmented super-soldier only for everything we assume to get turned on its head in interesting ways
The DC Comics superhero Blue Beetle, one of the Teen Titans, is given his own film. One of the more quickly forgettable entries among DC Comics’ attempts to compete with the MCU
A low expectation Disney animated film that proves an entirely charming winner centred around a dog tv star who believes it is a superhero. In essence, this is a talking animals variant on the Don Quixote story
The rather interesting idea of Superman retold as a horror movie featuring a character that is Superman in all but name who goes over to the dark side instead of becoming a paragon of truth, justice and the American way
Cheap and fairly terrible adaptation of the Marvel Comics superhero from low-budget director Albert Pyun. The superheroics look impoverished and Matt Salinger makes a dopey-looking Steve Rogers
Another of the mostly disastrous Marvel tv adaptations of the 1970s. Captain America is sidelined for much of the show. This does conduct the coup of casting Christopher Lee as the villain but criminally gives him nothing to do
Captain America’s first screen appearance was this 15 chapter serial, although about the only common element with the comic is the costume. On the plus side, the action and cliffhangers are good, while Lionel Atwill chews scenery in grand style as the villain
Laughably cheap and dull tv pilot version of comic-book superhero, which emerges less the Captain America of Marvel Comics fame than Captain America imagined as Evel Knievel superhero
The fourth Captain America film, where Anthony Mackie now takes over the shield and costume. And you really need to have been following MCU continuity to make sense of much of what is going on
Less Captain America 3 than The Avengers 3 – the entire film has been conceived as a massive superheroic punch-up. The results move with an exhilarating pace, but the Russo Brothers haven’t yet mastered Joss Whedon’s hand with character humour
One of the more disappointing of the Marvel Comics adaptations. Despite all the elements assembled, this never comes to life in director Joe Johnston’s hands and takes forever to get into action
Captain America’s second solo outing feels more like a Mission: Impossible film or an episode of 24 than a superhero film. Lots of Marvel continuity and fanservice and you are taken aback at how political it is prepared to be
The MCU offers up their first superheroine with very unexceptional results. A competent enough effort but DC’s Wonder Woman easily blows everything this tries to do out of the water
Live-action film based on an anime series where the original is built out with a series of of extraordinarily gorgeous over-ornamented visuals set in a strange retro-future world
The long-planned Halle Berry-starring Catwoman movie proved a widely ridiculed bomb. The film throws out the comic-book Catwoman and instead opts for an approach the frequently collapses into the risible
Animated adventure given over to Catwoman that comes with an appealing sense of humour that easily erases all memory of the Halle Berry film
The film adaptation of a popular radio series about a Westerner who has trained in the Eastern mystic arts and uses his powers to create illusions in the fight against crime. One of the first screen superheroes.
Hilarious film in which Carmen Electra gets resurrected as a superheroine via American Indian magic. Filled with hilarious white trash bitcheries
Essentially a Found Footage version of a teen underdog discovers psychic powers film like The Fury or Akira. Nothing original, just a novelty of approach conducted with conviction
One of the few original, non-comic book based superhero films of the 2010s set in a world where those with powers are treated as a minority. This is essentially a heist film but with the addition of super-powers
The Canadian-made Code 8 was one of the few non-comic book adapted superhero films of recent years. This is a sequel where a bigger budget has been afforded to the superheroics
One of the flops from Disney’s live-action heyday with Michael Crawford as a comic-book artist who gets to bring his inventions to life after being thrust into a spy caper
Mario Bava directs a sublimely stylish and tongue-in-cheek adaptation of an Italian comic-book about a masked super-thief who delights in outwitting and taunting the bumbling authorities
One of the early efforts among the surge of Marvel Comics adaptations on the big screen in the early 2000s. A disappointing adaptation that feels more like a series of posed comic-book panels than it ever does a movie