JLA movie in the works
 

Justice League, the movie? Warner chief sets sights on team-up film and ‘reinventing’ Batman

Jeff Robinov is already thinking about DC Comics movies for 2013 and beyond, and he’s got “Justice League” and a reinvented Batman on his mind.

The president of the Warner Bros. motion picture group, who recently sat down for an extensive interview with The Times, discussed his long-term strategy for DC beyond movies already in the works, such as June’s “Green Lantern” and next year’s “The Dark Knight Rises” and Superman movie.

The first priority for the man with the ultimate say on what films get made at Warner Bros.: Finally getting the Justice League, DC’s team featuring all its top characters, on the big screen in 2013. The picture had been very close to production in late 2007 and early 2008, but was killed by the Writers Guild of America strike, tax credit issues in Australia, and concerns by some at Warner about presenting a competing (and conflicting) version of Batman while director Christopher Nolan’s films were breaking box office records.

But Robinov said a new Justice League script is in the works. Also being written for Warner are scripts featuring the Flash and Wonder Woman, who could be spun off into their own movies after Justice League. Though Wonder Woman is also in the works as a television pilot for NBC produced by Warner, Robinov dismissed that as a sticking point. “Wonder Woman could be a film as well, the same way that ‘Superman Returns’ came out while ‘Smallville’ was on,” he said, referring to the 2006 film that put Brandon Routh in the cape and the television show starring Tom Welling that is now in its 10th and final season.

Robinov knows that the most bankable part of his superhero empire has been Nolan and his Gotham City films – the studio has yet to deliver a 21st century superhero blockbuster hit without Nolan in the director’s seat. Batman will continue to be a centerpiece property beyond next year’s “The Dark Knight Rises” and Nolan’s departure from the franchise. “We have the third Batman, but then we’ll have to reinvent Batman…Chris Nolan and [producing partner and wife] Emma Thomas will be producing it, so it will be a conversation with them about what the next phase is.”

Sorry, I do not see any way this movie would not be dog shit.. Same way no way Avengers will not be worth a damn.. Too many big characters, actors ego's and not enough time to tell a story to do it justice..

The only way, which I have said before would have to be full CGI or Avatar level work.. But still I think that many characters would get in the way of themselves and ruin the movie..

Reinventing Batman? Seriously? Enough with Batman already.

besides, you can't "really" reinvent batman.

i guess nolan "sort of" did. but not really.

that's what makes him batman.

and don't say bat-nipples. ever.

It works if you get Bald, Cavill, Reynolds, and whoever ends up playing Flash, Wonder woman and Aquaman (DiCaprio woud be awesome, but they'll probably saddle us with Vincent Chase:p)

The problem is they might do something stupid and recast all the characters, in which case it's not even worth doing. This is Warner bros, so you never know. They've been hit and miss in their handling of superhero franchises these days.

There is no way that this is going to work by 2013, what gives the Avengers a glimmer of hope is that the backgrounds to each character will have already been established before the movie, allowing the movie's plot to develop without being entangled in character development. However, seeing that the JLA is going to use a new Batman, Spiderman, and a hoard of other new characters whose backgrounds have not been established, I am rather confident that this film will be two and a half hours of drivel.

Well I guess if the Justice League can nab Spiderman it will be decent.. wut??

lololol, whoops, I met Superman, my bad.

'Justice League' aims for summer 2015 after Superman victory

By Ben Fritz

11:18 AM PDT, October 18, 2012

DC Comics' superheroes can finally team up on the big screen following yesterday's legal victory for Warner Bros. in its long-running fight over the rights to Superman.

The studio is expected to accelerate development of a planned "Justice League" movie that would join Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman and other characters, according to a knowledgeable person not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

Warner hopes to shoot the film next year and release it in the summer of 2015. The studio already has a "Justice League" script in the works. Next it needs to attach a director and then cast the lead roles.

Had Warner lost its case against the heirs of Superman co-creator Joe Shuster, it would not have been able to make "Justice League" or any other movies, television shows or comics featuring key elements of the Man of Steel's mythos after 2013 unless it reached a new agreement with the estates of Shuster and co-creator Jerry Siegel.

That uncertainty made it difficult for Warner to move ahead with "Justice League," which the studio's motion pictures group president, Jeff Robinov, has long wanted to make as a pillar of its big-screen superhero strategy.

Robinov previously tried unsuccessfully to convince "The Dark Knight" director Christopher Nolan to produce "Justice League." Nolan is producing next year's Superman movie "Man of Steel." Wednesday's court victory also makes it possible for Warner to make sequels to "Man of Steel" if the picture is successful.

With "Green Lantern" flopping and other movies featuring the Flash and Wonder Woman lingering in development, Warner has lagged behind Walt Disney Co.'s Marvel Studios in profiting from cinematic superheroes. Only Nolan's blockbuster Batman movie trilogy has succeeded for the Burbank studio.

The studio's plan is to spin out other superheroes into their own movies following "Justice League." That's contrary to Marvel's successful strategy of teaming up Iron Man, Thor, Hulk and Captain America in "Avengers" (which became a global blockbuster) after each character had his own film.

Gonna be bad

I didn't think that The Green Lantern "flopped". It just wasn't a huge hit. After making its rounds on cable and DVD, I'm guessing a sequel would do far better, especially with a better script.

I finally watched "The Avengers" on blu ray last night and was extremely disappointed. Maybe I was in the wrong mood but IMO, it was inferior to all of the stand alone movies, save Captain America, which was difficult for me to get through (actually took a few nights).

A JLA movie might sound "bad" but I wouldn't and won't discount a Chris Nolan effort until he disappoints.

Agreed with the many opinions that a JLA movie may end up being bad. I think that the DC characters are in many ways are "unknowns" to the casual viewer, that the JLA itself would have to be unexpectedly different in order to be successful.

The JL & JLU animated series was great. The current Young Justice series is rich with character development, political intrigue, and personal conflicts. The question is, how can you have what makes those cartoons successful, condensed into a two-hour movie while introducing new (to casual viewer) characters? I don't think it can be successfully done.

Yes, they WILL have to reboot Nolan's Batman. Nolan's Batman series IMO is the best interpretation of a comic hero to hit the big screen. And his Batman is so fresh in everyone's minds. Unfortunately, Nolan's Batman doesn't fit in the JLA universe. Batman will have to be rebooted because the current viewer will have to be convinced that Nolan's Batman universe can have flying aliens with invincible super powers, and some dude with a ring that can construct anything he can think of. And a hot Amazon chick that has super strength as well... A Martian shape shifter... etc. None of these realistically fit in Nolan's Batman universe.

IMO, in order for a JLA movie to work, WB has to go the Marvel route by introducing the individual characters first. And reboot Batman in a movie which does suggest that his world can have supernatural/extraterrestrial stuff going on.

That movie flopped. It was panned by critics and only made $19 million more, worldwide, than it cost to make.
I can't think of one single film in that genre over the past 5 years worse than GL.

I disagree. The casual fan is much more aware of Superman and Batman than they were with any of the Avengers characters before those lead-up films were made.

I've said this before, I'll say it again.
"X-Men: First Class" didn't require any lead-ups. That film, itself, was a reboot. I thought it was very well done and think the same can happen with the JL film.

I'm sorry, that doesn't make it a "flop".

A "flop" is Battleship or John Carter of Mars. Actually earning a profit while enjoying decent DVD sales doesn't make it failure.

I guess it depends on how you define the word "flop" then.
If "flop" only defines a film that doesn't recoup costs, you're right.

But sometimes a film can have net losses and not be a flop.
I also think a film can recoup and still be considered a flop.

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Good god. Are there really that many comic book fans to continue to feed this?

I always find it funny when people say shit like that.

These days, with all the video games, cartoons, TV shows, and movies, you don't even have to be a comic book nerd to like superheroes. They're not some fad that's going to go away.

The Avengers and Dark Knight are in the top 5 all-time USA box office, Dark Knight Rises in the top 10, all three of the Spider-Mans in the top 25, Iron Man & Iron Man 2 in the top 35...

They'll pass over the money without even thinking about it: for it is money they have and peace they lack. And they'll walk to their seats; sit in shirtsleeves on a perfect afternoon. And they'll watch the movie and it'll be as if they dipped themselves in magic waters. The memories will be so thick they'll have to brush them away from their faces. People will come jspchief. The one constant through all the years, jspchief, has been super heros. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But super heros has marked the time. It reminds of us of all that once was good and it could be again. Oh... people will come jspchief. People will most definitely come.

These films are being done in such a way that they don't need a large fanboy contingent. You don't need to be all that familiar with the source material anymore. I wasn't much of a comic book reader as a kid. I'm hooked on the genre though. Like everything else though, it'll ebb at some point. Just like the wave of martial arts films died out. They all have their moments within the "Action" umbrella.