Nikki Finke’s Nightmare Is Becoming Real

Dr. Seuss films
Ben Stiller films
Wayans Brother films
etc etc

There are a lot of great comic adaptations out there, and just because people either don’t appreciate the source or because writers fail to properly adapt the source doesn’t mean the entire genre is crap.

Sturgeon is wrong. 98% of everything is crap.

To discount comics as simply the “fan-boy” market is probably the wrong approach.

Go to your local comic and dig deep, past the spandex and you maybe surprised.

Then again you may not be, but to try and sweep the movies of “History of Violence” and “Fantastic Four” under the same carpet is simply nuts.

Everything today is an adaption - why not adapt comics too?

As long as they are done well - I applaud the jump from the pages of comics to the big screen. See Sin City, many of the Batman films, etc.

When they are spun into something that doesn’t even resemble the book they were based on is when Hollywood misses it mark. Catwoman being a huge example of that. I also hear that Wanted might find itself with the same issue because they took a very gritty comic and twisted everything that made it what it was.

With word that titles like Y the Last Man are being adapted I applaud but also hope for respect for the material. Great material. Written in many cases, as mentioned by another comment, by folks working on some of the most respected shows on TV right now.

Tapping into the Dark Horse stable is a genius move by a studio as long as they respect the material. Well respected adaption of Dark Horse books would mean better films than 75% of the dredge Hollywood released on the big screen last year.

Just to think of a few.

Comics is a medium, not a genre. Just as valid of a source as anything else, and with the same percentage of crap as any other medium, including original screenplays.

They just happen to be big at the moment.
–Brian
“Ninety percent of everything is crap.” Theodore Sturgeon

Someone above put it aptly when he/she stated: “I’m against BAD comic book movies”, which let’s face it, comprises about 95% of the adaptations that hit the screen.

Worse yet, they don’t seem to make a dime.

Here’s hoping Hollywood will STOP catering to the disgracefully overrated geek-boy market and get back to writing original material.

That also goes for video games and graphic novels.

True enough… there have been plenty of awful ones… far more than there have been good. It’s just that I find that equally true of original screenplays or scripts based on books. I just think it’s interesting to note that this site gushed over the vapid psuedo slang fest of Juno, especially when a far more subtle and nuanced film such as Ghost World (based on a comic book) dealt with teen life in a much much more knowing way. The point being, as long as the source material is great, I could care less what a film is based on.

HELLBOY was a terrific movie!

So until producers, writers, as well as the studio get it right, we can continue to expect people to say ugh. And rightly so.

In the meantime, we [comic and graphic novel readers] can continue hoping creative types will actually one day READ the stuff and get a better sense of some of the brilliance waiting to be properly understood and adapted. e.g. That every comic property doesn’t have to be mangled into making a tentpole.

I do have a problem with BAD comic book movies.

Many comics have well written stories and a wonderful visual style that should translate well into cinema.

Problems arise when film directors and producers try to put their own “imagining” or try to make the original story hip, like putting nipples on the bat-suit.

Dark Horse strikes me as a shrewd handler of properties, keeping their original fans in mind, while aiming to win over new fans.

I wish the new deal luck.