Warner Bros. Wants More Darkest Night
According to Hero Complex, Warner Bros. executives still want to make a Green Lantern sequel, even if the first movie’s box office hasn’t reached expectations yet. Developing movies based on characters from DC Comics remains a priority for the studio, and executives there think that they know how to fix the problem. Less brightest day and more darkest night.
“We had a decent opening so we learned there is an audience,” said Warner Bros. film group President Jeff Robinov, pointing to the film’s box office debut of $53 million. “To go forward we need to make it a little edgier and darker with more emphasis on action…. And we have to find a way to balance the time the movie spends in space versus on Earth.”
$53 isn’t a bad opening, but that represents nearly half of it’s total box office draw, so the movie quickly went down the tubes after it’s first weekend. And even with overseas sales so far, the movie is still far from making a profit, or even braking even. And just throwing darker and edgier at the movie isn’t going to make a better movie. This sounds like Warners has people developing the movies who don’t really understand the comic books or characters. It’s probably a big reason why the first movie wasn’t very good, and with this type of thinking, the next one isn’t likely to be any better.
But Warner Bros. is going forward with a sequel, and they already have an outline for a sequel written by Greg Berlanti, Michael Green, and Marc Guggenheim, who all worked on the script for the original. However, people familiar with the executives in charge think that they will make significant changes to the outline, if not start over from scratch in developing a sequel. That statement doesn’t give me any confidence for the future of Green Lantern in movies.
That leaves some uncertainty about the landscape of future DC comic book movies. The Dark Knight Rises, the final installment of director Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy, comes out next summer, and that leaves questions about what will come next for Batman. And how long will it take before we see him on the screen again. Zack Snyder’s Superman reboot, Man of Steel, is scheduled for a June 2013 release, but after that everything is up in the air.
2013 or 2014 could see a Green Lantern sequel, or another possibility is a movie for the Flash. Robinov said the studio has “a solid script” for the Scarlet Speedster. The executive also remains interested in bringing DC heroes together for a Justice League movie. While Christopher Nolan has been hitting home runs with Batman, other DC properties have had lackluster movies. So at this point I don’t feel strongly about a Justice League movie. I don’t want to see the League in a poor movie, and right now I’m not confident in Warner Bros. delivering something big.
Comments are closed.