I am shocked. Well and truly shocked. But not for the reasons you might expect. Yes, the official announcement of the Star Wars casting is brilliant and something I've been waiting all my life to hear. Yes, having confirmation that the original cast is back, along with ANDY FREAKING SERKIS and MAX VON SYDOW, is glorious. But what shocks me is the picture above. Why? Because I count at least 10 major cast members at this reading, and no one has complained that the film is "overstuffed" with characters. I hear Twitter blew up because Lando Calrissian isn't pictured. That means people are complaining that there aren't ENOUGH characters, when this cast is already pretty stacked.
Why do I say this? Because it seems people have a double standard when it comes to casting for these big blockbuster films. Recently another major nerd casting was announced, to far less excitement. Ray Fisher, a theater actor, was cast as Victor Stone aka Cyborg in the upcoming Batman vs. Superman film, with further confirmation that the film would lead into a Justice League movie. People seem to be rather angry about this. And it's solely because they feel BvS is basically a JL prequel, stuffing numerous characters into its run-time just to service a future story. So what, then, is Star Wars doing?
Last time I checked, both previous Star Wars trilogies had enormous casts, anchored by a trio (yes, that's THREE) lead characters. And guess what? They were all developed. That didn't mean each one had equal screen time, mind you. We so often forget that Han Solo doesn't immediately show up in Episode IV, or Anakin in Episode I. But it worked, and oftentimes in both trilogies, characters and stories existed just for the sake of setting up future films. It's debatable how successful this worked with the prequels, but the best Star Wars film, Empire Strikes Back, introduced a slew of new characters and ended on a massive cliffhanger.
And yet, nowadays people feel that if you stuff a superhero film full of characters, they're shortchanged. The Avengers was an exception because each hero got their own film beforehand. Now I'm not knocking Marvel's formula. Far from it. I've praised Marvel's innovative success enough on this blog as it is. But people are under the impression that each character in an ensemble piece needs equivalent screen time or their own freaking movie just to justify them being there.
Maybe it's just me being a film buff, but where is it written that The Avengers invented the ensemble, and therefore gets to dictate what makes a good one? Star Wars did just fine for six whole films as an ensemble cast. Regardless of the prequels' quality, I don't think people were complaining because it had a lot of characters. What I'm trying to say here, is that just because a huge film casts numerous characters does not automatically mean it'll go horribly wrong.
I sort of get how superhero films get a lot of flak for this. Since they're adapted from comics and often using popular characters, there's pressure to make sure all the included heroes and villains get their due. But like any good film, characters should exist in a way that makes sense for the story. You don't include a character just to please fanboys. That's why Spider-Man 3 and the latter X-Men films failed, and why the Marvel films circumvented this by giving each hero their own film. But often we forget how great X-Men, X2, and First Class were, or the Dark Knight trilogy. Successful films with lots of comic book characters, that didn't need five films of backstory to make us care for them, or make them relevant.
Those films worked because the filmmakers remembered they were making FILMS, and gave each character the screen time necessary to propel the story. Star Wars has done this, as have Star Trek, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and Ocean's Eleven (to name a few). Fans look at superhero movies too much as adaptations, and not as films. True, some filmmakers do this as well, hence the Spider-Man and X-Men failures. And yes, Marvel found success with the shared universe route. But people forget exactly WHY Marvel chose this formula.
It nets them money, sure. Okay, it nets them A LOT of money. But the reality is that the Avengers were B-list superheroes, who no one knew outside of comic books. They weren't Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, or the X-Men, and thus had no guarantee of success. The reason solo films were made was to transform B-list heroes into A-listers, and make people care enough that the Avengers could be a true event film. You don't need that with other, more well-known heroes because their films already are events. The Avengers, and indeed the entire MCU, is a special case because we're dealing with B, C, and D-list properties. A-list movies and characters don't need that kind of build-up.
So when someone like Cyborg, already a popular Teen Titan who's gotten a major marketing push recently as a founding Justice Leaguer, is cast in a movie, people know who that is. People know Wonder Woman, Batman, Superman, Lex Luthor, etc. etc. Most importantly, people know the Justice League. Those heroes need no introduction, since pop culture has kept them in the public eye for decades. When all these heroes show up in Batman vs. Superman and Justice League, people will know who they are because they're already iconic.
The problem is whether they will be written well enough to make the film engaging. Notice, however, that written well doesn't mean "give each hero equal screen time and their own film beforehand." Let me clarify something before I go any further. Disney wants to adapt the Marvel formula to Star Wars, as does WB with DC and Harry Potter. Sony will do it with Spider-Man, and Fox with X-Men. I've written three rants about how a potential Star Wars, Harry Potter, and Middle Earth spinoff series can work. I see the potential for expansive universes. But what I posted beforehand were fun hypotheticals. Not every franchise deserves such rigorous expansion. To paraphrase the great Ian Malcolm, filmmakers are focusing so hard on whether they could do spinoffs that they aren't stopping to wonder if they should.
With WB and DC, they want the money Marvel has, and so want a shared universe. But they're going about it in a different way than Marvel. That doesn't mean "bad" or "destined for failure", just different. Instead of solo films leading to a crossover flick, they're introducing their main players in team-up sequels, with the team-ups getting bigger and bigger. If successful, then solo films can come, but only if the characters test well with audiences. As great as Marvel is, most of their untested properties are risks. This summer's Guardians of the Galaxy is the best example, but it's also ironic that, pass or fail, it's an ensemble piece with characters we've never even seen before. If Guardians does work, isn't that just further proof that not every character needs a solo flick before a team-up film?
With WB, it makes more sense financially to introduce Wonder Woman and Cyborg in a Superman/Batman team-up instead of making solo films which might flop. And since Green Lantern did flop, I can see WB's concern. Unlike Marvel, WB is a large film studio that makes a variety of films, not just superheroes. They can only afford several hero movies at a time. For them, it's not about quantity. So to catch up with Marvel, their best bet is rolling out ensemble films. Complain all you want about the direction DC's taking, but what they're doing here is no different than any other blockbuster doing an ensemble. The key is in the writing. If the writing and story is good, then it doesn't matter how many characters there are, as WB's own Dark Knight trilogy shows.
We shouldn't let the Marvel films spoil us into thinking every fictional character under the sun deserves their own movie. I can theorize about Han Solo and Boba Fett movies all I want, but if we never get them I wouldn't bat an eye. There's more than enough character development for Han over the first trilogy, not to mention the upcoming films, that he doesn't need an "origins" movie. In fact, I think we've had so many origins films now that it's become a cliche.
When Batman was rebooted, he needed an origins story because he'd never had a proper one on film before. But the previous four Batman films didn't have an origin, and neither will the upcoming Batfleck. Even Wolverine and the X-Men didn't get origins films until four or five films in. Sometimes it's just unnecessary. Often, not knowing a character's background makes them more interesting. Cue the complaints about Boba Fett's origins in Episode II ruining his mystique.
The point is, we shouldn't be so quick to deride a film just because it has a bunch of well-known characters. Yes, I admit that the more characters you take on, the harder it is to balance a film. Again, it's all in the writing. It separates your Spider-Man 3's from your Dark Knight's. Hell, for all the flack Zack Snyder's getting for Man of Steel and BvS, he did direct a near perfect superhero ensemble in Watchmen. That didn't need five films of build-up. Why does BvS just because it's heroes are more well-known? I could go even further, since Watchmen got a series of prequel comics that were absolutely terrible. But I think, or at least hope, that I've made my point here.
In a lot of ways, I get why people are being so negative about Batman vs. Superman. But adding a few extra heroes shouldn't be one of those complaints. In the MCU we had Iron Man 2 fail because of all the characters and world-building, but then Captain America 2 proved a solo film could balance multiple heroes and still be great. It has nothing to do with the amount of characters and everything to do with how they're written. Personally, I'm psyched for Batman vs. Superman just as much as I am for Star Wars VII. They both have massive potential, and I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt before deriding them. Both franchises have been through worse, so it can't be that bad.
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