Joke's On You DC - Captain America: Civil War Was Inspired By Batman V Superman
Whoops.
In case you hadn't realised yet,Captain America:Civil War is going to be rather similar to Batman VSuperman - beyond the base concept, there's a myriad of oddly specific parallels between the rival superhero fight flicks. And, as is often the case with "Twin Movies"(Antz was a targeted attempt by Jeffery Katzenberg to beat out Disney/Pixar), this isn'tan accident.
The Russos have been out promoting the latest MarvelCinematicUniverseextravaganza and, in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, elaborated on the development of Captain America 3 from Steve/Bucky bromanceinto massive Avengers showdown; they wanted to break free of the rigid and now very repetitive Marvel formula(something that was definitely showing its flaws withlast year's outings, Avengers:Age OfUltron and Ant-Man) by adapting Mark Millar's landmark crossover event, but master producerKevin Feige wasn't too keen. In fact, he only agreed to it when DCmoved forward with Batman VSuperman.
What?!
So DC's punt to get in the cinematic universe game wound up inspiring one of the best reviewed films in the MCU. That'spossibly the funniest thing this side of Sad Affleck.
It's kinda obvious when you think about it.Batman VSuperman was announced in July 2013, Civil War in October 2014, and whileit had been rumoured to feature Iron Man for quite a few months before, that's still a wide margin. When you put it like that, it almost seems reactive, although Marvel did also have an impact on Dawn Of Justice - that film released in March because Civil War took up the proposed May 6th spot.
There's some fitting irony here, given how many of Marvel's icons were obvious attempts to ape DC's late-50ssuccess - the Fantastic Four was Marvel returning to superheroes, The Avengers isJustice League and the general ethos of real people behind the masks was a direct reaction to their rivals. Heck, movie big bad Thanos is just Darkseid with a slight redesign.
Of course, this "copying success" approach is not why Feige will have signed off on the concept, but it showed there was an appetite for the tricky super-on-super movie.
Captain America: Civil War is in UKcinemas from29th April and UScinemas from 6th May.