Super-Shorts

As I excitedly bought a Marvel Superheroes McDonalds Happy Meal toy yesterday, on a road trip home from Montreal, I was reminded of an item that I had wanted to post a couple weeks ago...

With the well of popular characters to make films out of beginning to run dry, Marvel Comics’ film studio (Marvel Studios) is rumoured to be exploring an interesting idea to both introduce audiences to less popular, or “B” list characters, and to gauge their potential success if translated into films.

For those who care, it goes without saying that Dr. Strange, Luke Cage, and Black Panther do not have the same draw as Spider-man, X-Men and Iron Man. Therefore, Marvel may produce short films, featuring these characters, that will be roughly 10 minutes in length. These films will appear before upcoming movies featuring their more famous characters (such as Thor – 2011, Captain America – 2011, The Avengers – 2012, and the Spider-man reboot – 2012). In doing this, Marvel expects to get an idea of what characters’ films might fly with audiences, without risking too much financially.

This approach would continue to set Marvel apart from its rival DC and their canon of heroes. Already their film approaches are distinctly different, with Marvel focused on making film adaptations of its stable of popular characters, where as DC (excluding the Batman, Superman and the upcoming Green Lantern film) has tended to focus on its more off-beat characters and graphic novels, such as The Watchmen and Constantine (from Hellblazer).

Of course, the successful testing of a character does not guarantee that its film would be a success, whether critically or financially. Particularly critically, for every Iron Man 1 & 2, Spider-man 2, and X-Men 2, that Marvel has had, there has been a Wolverine, Daredevil and Fantastic Four 1 & 2, and many other lukewarm, at best, films to name.


The lesser known Dr. Strange, Black Panther, and Ant-Man.