Well, it looks like Hollywood keeps it continual pot of revenue filled with, guess what, comic book heroes. Batman Begins and The Fantastic Four are about to duke it out on Hollywood and Vine. An age-old comic book company rivalry is yet renewing heat this year. I guess all of us comic book aficionados always wonder who would win battle between such and such superheroes. Well at least in next few months one way to keep score is to watch revenues generated between recently released “Batman Begins” and soon to be released “Fantastic Four”, which were both childhood fascinations of mine. Not only are there superhero “what ifs” going on here, but which comic book company will stand to gain most economic substantiation? Batman punches daily time clock at DC Comics and Fantastic Four was brainchild of Stan Lee and crew at Marvel Comics.
And don’t tell me there is a small comic book hero market. Batman Begins claimed number one spot in gross revenue on its opening weekend. It is going to be very interesting to see what Fantastic Four does. Hollywood is definitely increasing thickness of its silver lining these days with comic book hero movies. Batman took in almost $49 million it’s opening weekend. How many mint condition old comic books would you have to sell to make that kind of dough? Are we in wrong end of comic book world (ha ha)?
The rivalry between Marvel and DC used to be a major dividing line amongst tight knit group of comic book collectors. When comic book interest started to decline in 1970s, this issue became largely irrelevant. But now as video games, online role-playing games and major motion picture productions are spreading across globe, classic Marvel-DC conflict is springing back to life.
Superman is coming back to life on big screen as well as Wonder Woman. Marvel has been riding high off their major successes with X-men and Spiderman. They are now digging deep into their catalog of characters and are working on screen adaptations of Iron Man, Submariner, Thor and Silver Surfer, among others. Have we entered a new comic book age that will have to be defined around major motion pictures? Maybe it could be call “Greenback Age”. Do you have another definition?