matrix: the news and media magazine of the british science fiction association
Issue 187
March 2008
- home
- guest editorial
FEATURES
- best SF movies ever!…1960s
- snatched moments
- year of the gamer - 2007
- i, zombie: a ghoulish icon
- marvel vs dc
- just two men...
- seduction of the innocent 9
- checkpoint
- a 'vision' of the future
REVIEWS
- i am legend
- the golden compass
- cloverfield
- sweeney todd
- southland tales
- in the shadow of the moon
- battlestar galactica - razor
- jumper
NEWS
- arthur c. clarke r.i.p
- world of science
- what controversy?
- reaching number 1
- the air of success
- ttacon 9
- picocon
- one in a million
- fans in orbit
- it's all a question of endings
EVENTS
- eastercon: orbital
- p-con 5
- alt.fiction
- sci-fi london
- fforde ffiesta
- eurocon/roscon
- ...all events
DVD RELEASES
- primeval
- beowulf
- theory of everything
- town called eureka
- the laughing man
- bender's big score
- ...view all
BOOK RELEASES
- myth-understandings
- the reef
- dark blood
- blue war
- deluge
- swiftly
- ...view all
MUSIC RELEASES
- dream theatre
- muse
- omd
- panic at the disco
- the gutter twins
- joy division
- ...view all
ARCHIVE
- more soon...

 

 

FEATURES: MARVEL vs DC
Marvel counts among its characters Spider-Man, X-Men, Wolverine, the Fantastic Four, The Hulk, Captain America, Iron Man, Daredevil, Ghost Rider and more. Most inhabit a single shared world - the Marvel Universe.
DC is one of the world's largest English language publisher of comic books, featuring well-known characters like Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and their teammates in the Justice League.

by Martin McGrath

It seems odd that DC Comics, part of the Warner Bros entertainment conglomerate since 1969 and, as such, with a direct line to the heart of one of the biggest media conglomerates in the world has taken so long to firmly establish its cast of household name comic books into cross platform stars. True DC were first out of the blocks with big screen adaptations of Superman (1978) and Batman (1989) that turned heads and made money but the near identical path taken by the pair of franchises – opening with films of genuine quality made by directors of standing (Donner and Burton, respectively) before falling away with sequels that increasingly played things for laughs to falling critical and commercial returns suggest that Warner Bros never really knew what to do with their superheroes.



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