taffer

You feel creepy? I just thought of Emma Watson in a The Killing Joke adaptation where Joker shoots her through the spine, then strips her naked, and photographs her.

Solid Snake

Great choice. Beyond the physical, he's got a great voice. Really interested in how they do the big cheese with Batson. That dynamic can be very refreshing and unique.

taffer

Personally, I hope Billy Batson gets very minimal screen time. Nothing ruins a movie more than a punk ass kid sideplot. Iron Man 3 gets a bad rap, but the only thing I truly disliked about the movie was that stupid sideplot with the kid.

Solid Snake

That's why I put that last sentence.

Personally I've never cared much for Batson, the kid. But there are great moments sometimes where the split is really well done. You're going to need a good chunk of Batson no matter what. He's still a kid. I actually liked Batson in his New 52 origins. As the human character, it seemed well done and very true for the modern.

If they can find a great actor in a kid, even better. I'm actually really interested in how child actors, within like the past 15 years, have actually become their own people in the craft. The number of quality kid actors has grown and some are very interesting to see in creating their talent.

For the most part, children in the visual media is a breathing prop at best. So it's great to see somebody like Breslin, the Fannings, Radcliffe, and etc be actual creative members in the craft.

PhantomStranger

They've re-made Billy Batson to be a punk kid with an attitude these days. I'm more interested in what they do with Mary Marvel and Captain Marvel, Jr. as part of the Shazam film.

robin2099

Cant wait for this! I've always loved the Captain Marvel(Shazam) character, and The Rock has Black Adam is perfect casting. Not sure who to get for Cap yet even though the first thought I had was someone like Taylor Kitsch.

fujishig

Don't they have to get someone with at least the same size/muscular build as the Rock? Or is Black Adam going to tower over Captain Marvel?

CM Jr. and Mary should be much easier to cast, if they go that route for the first movie. I really hope we don't see the new 52 entire orphanage of Shazams, though.

majorjoe23

Having the villain be much more intimidating looking than the hero usually isn't a bad thing.

Solid Snake

Kind of depends. From what I've grown up with it always seemed like CM was bigger than Adam. That didn't stop Adam from being an ass kicker of CM. at times they were visually equals in size. Or even Adam bigger.

The Rock's size is fine. It will be interesting who they cast against him.

The Valeyard

Not a fan of the New52 Billy/Shazam characterizations - A jerky kid becomes a jerky superhero. But then, I was never a fan of what DC did to Captain Marvel after the original Crisis either. From the 40s to the 80s, whenever Billy said "Shazam!," Captain Marvel took over and had his own personality. After the Crisis, Captain Marvel just became a kid in a grown-up body. I remember Roy Thomas rationalizing this decision in the "Shazam!: A New Beginning" mini-series in '86. But for me, some of the Captain's magic died that year.

devilshalo

It's too bad Cena is such a stiff when it comes to acting...

Solid Snake

I haven't been a fan of it since like 1999, was 13, but every once in a while I catch it on a treadmill or something. I know Cena is popular but how good of a rassler is he?

I stopped watching it after my father passed. It was our thing but it didn't feel right anymore. Saying that... I still liked it but I enjoyed it more before it got "grittier" or whatnot in like 94 or 95. I dunno.

Is wrestling as popular as it was in the early 1990s as I remember from how much exposure it got into the mainstream?

DthRdrX

Wrestling is at it's lowest point ever in my eyes.

fujishig

C'mon, don't discount the Doink the Clown years.

I thought of suggesting Cena when I first responded about needing someone the Rock's size.

For some reason I had completely forgotten that Captain Marvel had a different personality than Batson, I always though Batson just matured when he got all the powers, which included wisdom among other traits. That makes it even more like Marvel's original Captain Marvel, where Rick Jones basically just traded places with Marvell... was that intentional?

In the original, what was so special about Billy that he was chosen to get the power, if he didn't even have control anyway?

DthRdrX

93-95 WWF was bad, but yea, it's much much worse right now. Evil Doink was pretty entertaining.

PhantomStranger

I think it was a necessary move after Alan Moore took the concept to its logical limits in Miracleman. DC was almost certainly responding to those ideas when they had Billy keep his personality in Marvel's body.

Read this treatment that Alan Moore turned into DC, which heavily involved Captain Marvel for a planned Elseworlds story. They passed on it in the 1980s thinking it was too dark but one can tell many elements were later incorporated into Kingdom Come.

http://fourcolorheroes.home.insightb...lightfree.html

fujishig

This is really off topic now, but his write up of Crisis is spot on, and mirrors what happened to me when they rebooted again in the new 52 (and also an excellent point about the Donner Superman movies):

taffer

Continuity is a tricky subject. Just looking at Batman alone, the main Batman title had over 700 issues before the New 52 reboot. The Detective Comics title had over 800. You're looking at over 1,500 comics just from those two alone. That's not even counting all the other Batman spinoff titles such as Legends of the Dark Knight and Shadow of the Bat. Plus other Batfamily members such as Robin, Nightwing, and Batgirl have their own titles. The entire "Batverse" from 1939 to 2014 is thousands and thousands of comics. And that's just Batman. Not even counting Superman, Wonder Woman, or any other characters here.

There's no way you can keep all of that in continuity. You can't expect readers to read thousands of issues of backstory and be that well versed in Batman history just to read modern comics. (Even though Grant Morrison may have tried with his run on Batman.) So some of it HAS to be cleaned up to be accessible to new readers.

gryffinmaster

Joe Manganiello could reenter the superhero conversation.

stingermck

Brandon Molale has wanted the role for years

The Valeyard

Don't know who that is but....Wow! Not bad.

will travel

Is Benedict Cumberbatch going to play Martial Manhunter or a villain in BvSOJ?

http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Bened...es-67034.html/

taffer

They're not going to have both Martian Manhunter and Cyborg in the Justice League, and Cyborg has already been cast.

I could see Cumberbatch as Brainiac. He plays smart guys well. (Khan in Star Trek and Sherlock Holmes.)

PhantomStranger

I think comic book companies realize it pisses off long-term fans, which is why they switched over as quickly as possible to minimize the damage and outrage.

james2025a

I think the notions put forward by Alan Moore translate very well to what the movie companies are doing with their licenses. Marvel are building a mythology and ensuring that threads between characters link successfully and that this continues throughout their future productions. DC/WB seems to be handling this less well. They are rebooting Batman for the third time in 17 years and Superman for the second time in less than 10 years. I think the more characters are rebooted, repeated or rehashed the less inclined audiences are to embrace them. We see this with a character like Spiderman. I hope DC has a more solid game plan going forward, but i think throwing all their main characters into the boiling pot at the same time is not the best of first steps.