Best and Worst of Superhero films revisited

[Mr.Marion]

Personally I didn't overlook it,just felt I couldn't include it since I've never seen it,just heard of it for all these years. All the films I include on my non-list are movies I have seen.

If you can watch Electra, Howard the Duck or Corman's FF, then Mario Bava's Danger: Diabolik would be like Casablanca by comparison. lol
If you want to see absolute rubbish. Check out George Pal's Doc Savage (1975)

[PNGwynne]

I freaking love Danger: Diabolik. Like The Abominable Dr. Phibes and The 7 Faces of Dr. Lao, it's a film I can pop in at any time and decompress and thoroughly enjoy. Some films are like comfort food.

Barring about two lines of cheesy humor, I think The Shadow is underrated.

[JRT!]

Personally I didn't overlook it,just felt I couldn't include it since I've never seen it,just heard of it for all these years. All the films I include on my non-list are movies I have seen.

[Mr.Marion]

An overlooked film that I didn't see on anybodies list.

It really was the first Comic book movie done right.

[JRT!]

Oh this fun thread is easy for me. I love it all! There are no worst for me,I love especially the worst ones. Howard the Duck,Underdog,Green Lantern,Corman's FF,Supergirl,Condorman,Meteor Man,Turtles,all of it......bring it on! There's always SOMEthing I will find entertaining. And like I've said before,I always seem to end up loving what everyone else thinks is crap,or didn't do well at the box office,etc,etc. Oh I have plenty of movies I don't like,usually big budget,overpaid boring actors,and just plain old boring movies,but none of'em are in the superhero/comics genre. So no list from me I guess,lol.

J-R!

[thunderbolt]

best Superhero...
Hellboy, Batman Begins, Dark Knight, Captain America, Avengers, Flash Gordon Serial, Deadpool, Punisher War Zone, Iron Man, Ant Man, Incredibles, Batman 66 movie, Super Argo, Mexican Bat-Girl, X-Men First Class and DOFP
Comic non Superhero...
Sin City, V for Vendetta
Crap..
All Fantastic 4 movies, Superman 2-4 (2 gets it for the cellophane S trap), Batman forever and B & R, Spider-Man 3 and the two after it, Amazing? GREEN LANTERN!!!!

[Brue]

Updated Feb 2016

I find it amazing that there are 50 superhero movies that are good to great. Only six of these came out before I finished high school. Only 15 before 2000.

Here is my current top 50 Theatrical released comics movies


1. Avengers
2. Avengers Age of Ultron
3. Captain America - The Winter Soldier
4. Dark Knight
5. Iron Man
6. Incredibles
7. Spider-Man
8. Conan the Barbarian (Arnold)
9. Superman II
10. Batman Mask of the Phantasm

11. Captain America
12. Iron Man 2
13. X-Men
14. X-Men Days of Future Past
15. Spider-Man 2
16. X2
17. Guardians of the Galaxy
19. Batman (89)
20. Watchmen

21. Thor
22. Superman The Movie
23. Unbreakable
24. Batman Returns
25. Daredevil
26. Thor The DarkWorld
27. Flash Gordon
28. Batman Begins
29. Ant-Man
30. Incredible Hulk

31. Blade
32. V for Vendetta
33. Sin City
34. The Crow
35. Batman Forever
36. Batman (66)
37. Hellboy
38. X-Men First Class
39. Deadpool
40. Spawn

41. Blade 2
42. Amazing Spider-man
43. Rocketeer
44. Superman and Mole Men
45. Kick ***
46. Phantom
47. X-Men The Last Stand
48. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 1994
49. Superman Returns
50. Ghost Rider

51. Fantastic 4 2015
52. Punisher War Zone
53. Man of Steel
54. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2014
55. Mask of Zorro
56. Underdog
57. Red Sonja
58. The Shadow
59. Howard The Duck
60. The Mask

60. Judge Dredd (1995)
62. The Wolverine
63. Conan the Destroyer
64. Swamp Thing
65. Barb Wire
66. TMNT
67. Hellboy 2
68. Ghost Rider Spirits of Vengeance
69. The Shadow
70. Amazing Spider-man 2

71. Iron man 3
72. Tank Girl
73. Jonah Hex
74. Steel
75. League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
76. Hulk
77. Fantastic four silver surfer
78. Batman and robin
79. Kick *** 2
80. Superman 3

81. The Spirit
82. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2
83. Super girl
84. Crow City of Angels
85. Legend of Zorro
86. Superman 4
87 Dredd
88. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3
89. Return of Swamp Thing
90. Son of the Mask

91. Green Lantern
92. X-Men Origins: Wolverine
93. The Dark Knight Rises
94. Fantastic Four (2005)
95. Elektra
96. Spider-man 3
97. The Punisher (Thomas Jane)
98. Blade: Trinity
99. Constantine
100. Catwoman

101. Big Hero 6

[Brue]

I just looked at box office returns. Some films I had forgotten about that were bad (the Spirit and others).
Some I thought weren't terrible that tanked (Punisher War Zone...)
Some that did really well that were really bad (Spider-man 3 and Iron man 3...)
there are some inexplicably left off the list (Incredibles)
See the list here:
http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/cr...ype/Super-Hero

[Brue]

Great List with great explanations of why.
And yes, Unbreakable - while not rooted in comics- is awesome.

And Blade deserves credit for paving the path for modern comic book movies.

Unbreakable - still the best superhero movie. History of Violence is my favority comic adaptation.

But for superhero comics...

1. Conan -Distilled Howard's work into a perfect movie. Only Excalibur did a better job filtering an array of sources into one film.

2. Blade - Still the best Marvel movie. A D-character turned horror/action that no one associated with the disastrous superhero films of the 90's.

3. The Crow - If the movie was average, Lee's death would have just been sad. But Proyas shot an anti-Burton film and that made his death tragic.

4. Swamp Thing - The superhero movie that nearly all other superhero movie has stolen its premise from; Transformation as a manifestation of the character's psyche.

5. Batman Begins - A movie carried by its lead performance due to the character being fleshed out and not swamped by VFX or the villain.

6. The Dark Knight - Nolan, Goyer and Ledger reinvent the Joker and retool multiple comic ideas

7. Captain America - Arguably perfect casting and the exact right tone.

8. Spider-Man/2 - As close to Silver Age as we're going to see without parody.

9 - Iron Man - Favreau turns Tony Stark into a Vince Vaughn character which adds an early 60's playboy vibe to the character which didn't exist.

Everything else has moments - Zod in Superman 2, Shots of Superman in MOS, Flash Gordon's visuals/score, Asgard in Thor,so on - but big flaws to match.

[hedrap]

^I really like Begins. It has some hacky script elements, such as Thomas Wayne's speech, but like the sequels, the themes work in multiple directions, which I can't say for any Marvel movie.

With TDK, it falls over itself with the Two-Face extension. That was due to Nolan not having a contract for a third and the original trilogy he and Goyer came up with was Two-Face as the closing act, so they wanted to wrap things up as it wasn't sure Nolan was coming back. If they ended with Joker's capture, it's near-perfect.

The first Spidey could have been untouchable if Raimi was given free reign. MJ for Gwen, DaFoe over Malkovich, robot Goblin...all Sony.

[PNGwynne]

^You obviously like Nolan's Batman much more that I do, but I think your comment on Spiderman 2 is very apt.

[hedrap]

Unbreakable - still the best superhero movie. History of Violence is my favority comic adaptation.

But for superhero comics...

1. Conan -Distilled Howard's work into a perfect movie. Only Excalibur did a better job filtering an array of sources into one film.

2. Blade - Still the best Marvel movie. A D-character turned horror/action that no one associated with the disastrous superhero films of the 90's.

3. The Crow - If the movie was average, Lee's death would have just been sad. But Proyas shot an anti-Burton film and that made his death tragic.

4. Swamp Thing - The superhero movie that nearly all other superhero movie has stolen its premise from; Transformation as a manifestation of the character's psyche.

5. Batman Begins - A movie carried by its lead performance due to the character being fleshed out and not swamped by VFX or the villain.

6. The Dark Knight - Nolan, Goyer and Ledger reinvent the Joker and retool multiple comic ideas

7. Captain America - Arguably perfect casting and the exact right tone.

8. Spider-Man/2 - As close to Silver Age as we're going to see without parody.

9 - Iron Man - Favreau turns Tony Stark into a Vince Vaughn character which adds an early 60's playboy vibe to the character which didn't exist.

Everything else has moments - Zod in Superman 2, Shots of Superman in MOS, Flash Gordon's visuals/score, Asgard in Thor,so on - but big flaws to match.

[Mego Milk]

worst...

Superman 3

[Boy_Wonder_1978]

My worst...

Batman & Robin
Batman Forever
Ghost Rider
Daredevil
Fantastic Four (2015)
Superman 4
Hulk

Like...

Batman (89)
Batman Returns
Captain America : The First Avenger
X-Men
X-Men 2
Supergirl
Amazing Spider-Man
Amazing Spider-Man 2
Spider-Man
Spider-Man 2
Superman Returns
Dark Knight Rises
The Avengers
The Avengers : Age of Ultron
Ant-Man

My absolute best...

Man of Steel
Superman The Movie
Superman 2 (The Donner Cut)
Dark Knight
Batman Begins
The Crow
Captain America : The Winter Soldier
Iron Man
Iron Man 2
Incredible Hulk
Guardians of the Galaxy
X-Men : First Class

[Brue]

oh - I forgot about Constantine. It would make my list -but not the best list.