100 Greatest Comic Book Movies Of All Time
28. Batman Returns
You can thank Happy Meals for Tim Burton's Batman Forever not happening. So annoyed were McDonald's at the disparity between their family-friendly message and the dark vision of Batman Returns that they took issue with brand partners Warner Bros, helping pressurise them into going with Joel Schumacher and a more PG vision.
Unfortunately, that meant abandoning the beautifully gothic, deliciously strange vision that Burton had built in Batman and then turned up massively in its sequel. Batman Returns is a circus of freaks, painting the best image of Gotham City as a hive of oddities, where the only way to deal with monsters like Penguin and Catwoman is a monster in a cape and cowl
Michael Keaton is wonderful, but so too are Michelle Pfeiffer, Danny DeVito and Christopher Walken. It's just a shame that Warner Bros weren't brave enough to persist and trust Burton.
[SG]
27. The Dark Knight Rises
Is it as good as The Dark Knight? No, but then what is?
Does it have some plot holes? Sure, but when it’s wrapped up in such impressive scale and spectacle, and provides a fitting conclusion to the greatest comic book trilogy ever made, then it doesn’t really matter.
The Dark Knight Rises is Nolan operating as a master of the blockbuster craft; the action is epic, but what’s just as impressive is how he brings everything started in Batman Begins full circle, with nods to iconic comics moments, a villain who wisely differs completely to the Joker but still feels like a genuine threat, and one last superb performance from Christian Bale.
[JH]
26. Oldboy
Few think of Oldboy as a "comic book movie", but it is indeed based on a manga of the same name by Nobuaki Minegishi and Garon Tsuchiya.
For Park Chan-wook's version, many things changed. The hammer fight is nowhere to be seen, for example, but that cold, resonant and driven story of revenge still remains. It's here where the spirit of the original work comes through, and Chan-wook's additions all elevate Dae-su Oh's mesmerising performance, focusing on the sheer brutality of a man whose trained for years, only to unleashing his skills on all in his way.
Naturally, there's a far darker, twisted realisation at the core of Oldboy, but that's one for spoiler talks and credit roll-realisations. If you've somehow not seen Oldboy, remedy that immediately.
[ST]