100 Comic Book Movies

With a little time to kill this afternoon, I decided to make one of those “Movie List Challenges” over on Facebook. Being the sort of nerd I am, I whipped up a list of 100 movies based on comic books, graphic novels, and newspaper comic strips. Some of these are kind of indirect — the comic strip was made into a broadway musical, the musical was made into a movie. Some of them will be movies you’ve seen but maybe didn’t know were comic books first. Some of them will be foreign and some of them, especially the movie serials of the 40s and 50s, will be characters you’ve heard of in movies you didn’t know existed. And although I tried to stay with theatrical films, it’s possible a made-for-TV movie or two snuck in while I wasn’t looking. But let’s see how many of ’em you’ve seen. For the sake of fairness, I’ve put an asterisk next to each movie that I’ve personally viewed…

1. The Adventures of Captain Marvel (1941) *
2. Batman (1943)
3. Congo Bill (1948)
4. Batman and Robin (1949)
5. Superman and the Mole Men (1951)
6. Blackhawk: Fearless Champion of Freedom (1952)
7. Lil’ Abner (1959)
8. Batman: The Movie (1966)*
9. A Boy Named Charlie Brown (1969)*
10. Tales From the Crypt (1972)
11. The Vault of Horror (1973)
12. Superman (1978)*
13. Flash Gordon (1980)*
14. I Go Pogo (aka Pogo For President, 1980)*
15. Popeye (1980)*
16. Superman II (1980)*
17. Annie (1982)*
18. Swamp Thing (1982)
19. Superman III (1983)*
20. Supergirl (1984)*
21. Howard the Duck (1986)*
22. Superman IV: The Quest For Peace (1987)*
23. Akira (1988)*
24. Batman (1989)*
25. The Punisher (1989)*
26. Return of Swamp Thing (1989)
27. Dick Tracy (1990)*
28. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990)*
29. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze (1991)*
30. Batman Returns (1992)*
31. Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993)*
32. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III: Turtles in Time (1993)
33. The Crow (1994)*
34. The Mask (1994)*
35. Batman Forever (1995)*
36. Judge Dredd (1995)*
37. Tales From the Crypt: Demon Knight (1995)*
38. Barb Wire (1996)*
39. Tales From the Crypt: Bordello of Blood (1996)*
40. Batman and Robin (1997)*
41. Men in Black (1997)*
42. Spawn (1997)*
43. Steel (1997)
44. Blade (1998)*
45. X-Men (2000)*
46. Ghost World (2001)*
47. Blade II (2002)*
48. Road to Perdition (2002)*
49. Spider-Man (2002)*
50. American Splendor (2003)*
51. Daredevil (2003)*
52. Hulk (2003)*
53. The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003)*
54. X2: X-Men United (2003)*
55. Blade: Trinity (2004)*
56. Catwoman (2004)*
57. Garfield (2004)*
58. Hellboy (2004)*
59. The Punisher (2004)*
60. Spider-Man 2 (2004)*
61. Batman Begins (2005)*
62. Constantine (2005)*
63. Elektra (2005)*
64. Fantastic Four (2005)*
65. A History of Violence (2005)*
66. Man-Thing (2005)*
67. Sin City (2005)*
68. Son of the Mask (2005)*
69. V For Vendetta (2005)*
70. 300 (2006)*
71. Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties (2006)
72. Over the Hedge (2006)*
73. Superman Returns (2006)*
74. X-Men: The Last Stand (2006)*
75. Ghost Rider (2007)*
76. Persepolis (2007)*
77. Spider-Man 3 (2007)*
78. TMNT (2007)*
79. The Dark Knight (2008)*
80. Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008)*
81. Iron Man (2008)*
82. Punisher: War Zone (2008)*
83. Surrogates (2009)*
84. Watchmen (2009)*
85. X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)*
86. Iron Man 2 (2010)*
87. Jonah Hex (2010)*
88. Kick-Ass (2010)*
89. The Losers (2010)*
90. RED (2010)*
91. Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World (2010)*
92. The Adventures of Tintin (2011)*
93. Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)*
94. Cowboys and Aliens (2011)*
95. Dylan Dog: Dead of Night (2011)*
96. Green Lantern (2011)*
97. The Smurfs (2011)
98. Thor (2011)*
99. X-Men: First Class (2011)*
100. The Avengers (2012)

Gimme something new…

As I observed in this week’s Everything But Imaginary column, there haven’t been enough really original comic book characters in the last couple of decades. As I observed elsewhere at CX Pulp, one of the best outlets for new characters isn’t really viable anymore. But sadly, I often feel like there just aren’t enough new ideas anywhere, not just in the comic book pages.

Take a look, if you will, at the list of movies I saw that were released in 2010. There were 39 films on the list. Those that were totally original ideas? (By which I mean they weren’t remakes, sequels, “reimaginings” or based on a story from another medium like comics, books, video games, or TV shows…) No more than seven. (Inception, Hot Tub Time Machine, Easy A, Buried, Despicable Me, Due Date, Repo Men, and Splice. And it’s easy to argue that Easy A is loosely based on The Scarlet Letter and that Repo Men was a blatant ripoff of Repo: The Genetic Opera.)

This is not to say that there’s anything wrong with a great movie based on a novel, or a sequel to a film that was a lot of fun the first time around. But it seems like Hollywood is relying far too heavily on those tropes. And what about TV? The #1 new show of the season? Hawaii 5-O. NBC has just bought a pilot for a new Wonder Woman series for the 2011-2012 season. And TNT has announced they’re going to remake Dallas for a new generation.

Come on, guys.

Come up with some new ideas. Or at the very least, turn to some books or other properties that maybe haven’t been adapted before, instead of doing the 10,831st version of A Christmas Carol, or allowing Will Smith to remake Annie as a vehicle for his daughter (because The Karate Kid wasn’t enough of an assault of the memories of children of the 80s). Find something new.

Blake and Erin and the Summer on Stage

I go back to work tomorrow, after a summer that feels like it just started. I’m noticing an interesting phenomenon here — last summer, when I didn’t have a play to do, I was going a bit stir crazy just around the time that school was ready to start again. This time around, I was out three to five nights a week working on the show, and as a result, I feel like I haven’t gotten any time to relax at all. I’ve got to find a balance next summer.

But with school about to kick off, I’m going to end my summer by taking you guys on a short tour of Erin’s recent visit down here to New Orleans. She came down specifically to see the Thibodaux Playhouse production of Annie I was in, having never actually seen me perform on stage before. I was, I’m not ashamed to tell you, more than a little excited that she was finally going to see me. She came down Friday, giving which meant she was going to catch the last three performances of the play, as well as get to join me for the cast party.

Let's play "Where's Waldo" -- I'm definitely in there.

This was, by necessity, a little different than our visits usually are. We spent pretty much the first half in dealings with the play, but we managed to have fun regardless. On the Friday night, my group of friends managed to join us after the show at our usual post-pay pizza hangout. It gave Erin a chance to see them again, even Kenny, who I believe arranged the false threat of a tropical storm just so he could come in and hang out with us. On Saturday, she got there just in time for a family reunion. The Robert clan — my grandmother on my father’s side — got together for a potluck lunch, where Erin spent most of the time playing with my cousin Jonathan’s new son Jordan. They both enjoyed it quite a bit.

He wanted to eat her fingernails. They looked like candy.

From left: Erin, me, my father Kerry, mother Debbie, sister Heather, her husband Will, sister-in-law Kayla and brother Kerry Jr.

Sunday was the last night of the show, and after the strike, Erin joined me and my friends at the cast party. It was a good show, a show that sold out every performance, which I’ve never seen happen before at the Thibodaux Playhouse, and it was made even the more special because Erin was there.

With the play over, the last few days of her visit were a bit more normal for us. On Monday, we went to my school where Erin helped me move from my old classroom to the new one I’ll be occupying this year. (I’m teaching 11th grade instead of 9th, so I had to switch hallways). It was nice to have the help in general, as I had a lot of books and papers to move, but it was even nicer to have Erin there. She’s always wanted to see my classroom, and now she got to see them both, even if it was brief. After the move was over, we went out and met Jason and Andrea to see Inception, which by the way, was awesome.

Erin recovers from lunch outside the Joint.

On Tuesday we had our most typical tourist-y day, going down to New Orleans for lunch at a barbecue place Erin found called The Joint. It’s small, out of the way, very difficult to find, and had some of the best barbecue we’ve ever tasted. We also spent a little time walking around the city, hitting a used bookstore and a few other locales of note (Southern Candymakers, naturally), before coming home and meeting up with my family for dinner at a local Italian eatery, Fat Greg’s.

This is the lunch we had to recover from. The big plate in the foreground? That's HERS.

Wednesday, as always, is my geek day, and Erin was good enough to indulge me on my weekly trip to the comic shop. We also took in Toy Story 3, which she hadn’t seen yet. The second time made me cry pretty much as hard as the first. And on Thursday… sad, sad Thursday, we had lunch at Jaeger’s Seafood and Beer Garden, and Erin went home.

So eat your heart out.

This was, as I said, an atypical trip for us. With so much of our time dictated by the play and family obligations, we didn’t have nearly as much time to ourselves as we usually do. And we didn’t even take as many pictures as we usually do, which prompted my idea of hiring a mute photographer to just follow us around, which Erin wasn’t wild about, but we’ll talk through it. Even if we didn’t have as much “us-time,” that’s okay, because it was time together. I don’t care if it was just the two of us or if she had to share me with 200 paying audience members (which I know doesn’t sound quite right, but bear with me here). I was with her, and that’s all that matters.

Everything But Imaginary #293: Comic Strips Scrolling Across the Screen (GMR7)

It’s time once again for The Great Movie Ride, my Everything But Imaginary column-within-a-column in which I attempt the absurd task of watching and discussing every comic movie ever made. This week, I look into six films based not on comic book, but on newspaper comic strips. Then, you lucky people get to pick which movies I’ll be forced to watch for the next installment!

Everything But Imaginary #293: Comic Strips Scrolling Across the Screen (GMR7)
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