Totally pointless Green Arrow movie announced.

Apr 9, 2007 at 12:11 PM
5 comments

Wizard Entertainment (don't blame me, I got there through the Beat), announces that David Goyer will be helming a new movie set in the DC Universe. In it, Green Arrow is arrested for a crime that he didn't commit. He is sentenced to life in a prison meant for superpowered criminals. Goyer describes it thusly:

“He’s Green Arrow for the first 10 minutes of the movie, and then he’s arrested and his secret identity is revealed,” says Goyer, who also has plans to do a graphic novel or miniseries that would tie in to the possible film. “They shave his goatee and they take his costume and send him to prison for life, and he has to escape. It’s like ‘Alcatraz,’ and he has to team up with, in some cases, some of the very same villains he is responsible for incarcerating in order to get out and clear his name. Of course, tons of people try to kill him while he’s in there. We’ve populated the prison with all sorts of B and C villains from the DC Universe. For the fans, there will be all sorts of characters the hardcore comic book junkies will know, but they’re all going to be there under their human names and no one is wearing a costume, but there will be a lot of characters with powers and things like that."

The movie will burdened with the exceedingly goofy name of "Supermax"

I can only hope that this is some kind of April-fools joke gone awry. Why is this pointless? Because A) the lead character could be anybody. Even a completely new character. It does not need to be Green Arrow. And B) this completely kills any chance of a regular Green Arrow movie being made. Sure, if it's successful, maybe we'll get a Green Arrow solo flick. But odds are, if there is a sequel (assuming this even gets made) it will be a continuation of this story. Finally. C) the concept, outside of the tacked on addition of the characters being superheroes and villains, isn't terribly original. This is just a innocent man sentenced to prison, has to clear his name movie. If you have to steal the plot from a Tom Selleck starring vehicle, you're in trouble.

Sidebar: I hope they explain why Ollie has to shave his goatee when he goes to jail. Facial hair, no matter how goofy, doesn't seem to be an issue in any other, real world correctional facility.

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Comments

I first heard this idea, and my reaction was, 'oh, that's cool'. But it's not cool. For all the reasons you cite and maybe twenty others on top of that. Do this with a Batman movie and I'm with you, but I don't know that you've got the connection to GA that you need to have to pull this movie off. And I'm not saying that you need an origin story. Because nobody needs that.

I'm mixed on this. I like the idea that they'll be putting a new character on the screen without the boilerplate origin story. At least it shows that some in H'wood are thinking about moving away from that direction.

Yeah, I agree that we really don't need an origin story. But we need more than just 10 minutes as Green Arrow to garner some emotional investment in the character. I need some reason why this HAS to be a Green Arrow story. And from the article, I gather that it DOESN'T HAVE TO BE a Green Arrow story. It appears that they are using GA because he has a little heat coming off of Smallville and he's been having a resurgence in the comic books. But if you replace him with say, Nightwing, and have no major difference with the plot (except for the goatee shaving scene), you don't have much of a movie.

And the fact is that no 'hero unjustly thrown in prison' movie can top Riki-Oh.

This is from Goyer's blog, by way of CBR:

"The basic concept actually came about through Justin Marks, a terrific young writer my wife Jessika (a producer) had previously worked with. They thought the idea of a prison-break story set in a jail designed exclusively for super-villains was a cool one. And I heartily agreed. After some discussion, we decided it would be fun to frame a super-hero and toss him into the meta-human mix. From that point, it seemed like the next logical step was to set the film in either the Marvel or DC Universe. That way, we could populate the movie with all sorts of cool B and C-character Easter Eggs. We eventually landed at DC. Green Arrow, given his hard-hitting, moralistic tendencies, seemed like the most interesting hero to put through the institutional wringer."

When the actual main character comes fourth in the decision process, you know the movie will be bad.

Look at me! I'm a real blogger now! Saying bad things about a movie that's just in the development stage!