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Mind Your Surroundings: Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow and Other Superhero Universes


ArctisTor
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8 minutes ago, LeighAn said:

What world do we live in when $96 million dollars is considered bad? 

Like the others have said, a budget of $300 million and the fact that Justice League is WB/DCs heaver hitters. Antman who was unknown to the audience had a similar outing. 

I'm pretty sure that this is going to get some higher execs at WB fired.

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4 minutes ago, Primal Slayer said:

Like the others have said, a budget of $300 million and the fact that Justice League is WB/DCs heaver hitters.

Yeah.  This was supposed to be DC's equivalent of the Avengers.  Which made $207 million its opening weekend. Not even being able to get over $100 million is not good, compared to what was spent and what was expected.

Edited by Starfish35
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29 minutes ago, LeighAn said:

What world do we live in when $96 million dollars is considered bad? 

If it cheers you up, Lionsgate is thrilled that Wonder brought in about $9.65 million on Friday, with a possible $25-$27 million for the weekend.

Difference is, that film cost only $20 million to make.

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39 minutes ago, LeighAn said:

What world do we live in when $96 million dollars is considered bad? 

A world where WB desperately needs a Billion Dollar movie and hasn't been able to crack that figure with any of their movies. I have no idea what JL cost (rumor is 300 million) but, considering the extensive reshoots that Wheden supposedly did and the shit ton of money they spent marketing this movie, making only 90+ million opening weekend is devastating for this movie. 

Look at the comparisons, the Avengers made 1.5 Billion dollars 600+ million US. Age of Ultron fell just shy of the first movie, at 1.4 Billion and Civil War (technically not an Avengers movie) made 1.1 Billion.

This was WB/DC's answer to Marvel's Avengers movies, this is their big tentpole that was supposed to catapult the rest of the DCEU. 

This is bad for WB.

Edited by Morrigan2575
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1 hour ago, Starfish35 said:

This event movie at a reported estimated production cost of $300M was ten years in the making, and was intended to be the pinnacle for the Warner Bros./DC universe introducing new characters such as The Flash, Cyborg and Aquaman who could hold their own franchise weight with their own solo outings down the road. But an opening that’s 44% lower than

What utter bullshit. 10 years ago was just two years after the success of Batman Begins, and the flop that was Superman Returns a year later. They weren’t planning shit because neither Nolan’s Batman or Singer’s Superman, were in the same universe. Not to mention that horrid Green Lantern that followed.

Marvel was smart and carefully, creatively, created a successful franchise. DC/WB instead did a slap dash, cutting corners, in trying to catch up and beat Marvel. 

The ONLY success they’ve had is with Wonder Woman.

I’ve already stated in the movie thread what a piece of garbage Batamn v Superman was, (as @BkWurm1 can attest) from the miscasting of AssFleck, Eisenberg, and the plot. It was a FUCKING INSULT and they SHAT UPON Superman.

So I’m in the minority (and don’t care) that I’m glad  “Justice League” is tanking. It does my cold unfeeling heart so good and I’m chortling with glee.????????

I already have my Justice League in Bruce Timm’s DCAU and all the straight to home movies.

Edited by GHScorpiosRule
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WB needs to start being a little tighter with their money. Avengers was made on $220 budget whereas Justice League...with $300 still looked fairly cheap.

2 minutes ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

What utter bullshit. 10 years ago was just two years after the success of Batman Begins, and the flop that was Supermsn Returns a year later. They weren’t planning shit because neither Nolan’s Batman or Singer’s Superman, were in the same universe. Not to mention that horrid Green Lantern that followed.

Justice League Mortal was in development around 2009, close enough. And Green Lantern was suppose to start the DCEU so they've been wanting to get to JL for awhile.

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27 minutes ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

I’ve already stated in the movie thread what a piece of garbage Batamn v Superman was, (as @BkWurm1 can attest) from the miscasting of AssFleck, Eisenberg, and the plot. It was a FUCKING INSULT and they SHAT UPON Superman.

I'd been avoiding BvS, but after riding the high of seeing the new Thor, I jumped on HBO to give it a shot. That movie made me soooo angry at how miscast Bats and Lex were combined with the mischaracterization and the gawdawful dream sequences, I'm still mad. And that's after watching an hour and a half before ff'd through the rest. Grrr!

Maybe the twist with Barry on Earth X is that he's a good guy and hero since Earth 1's Barry sucks so much and is usually the villain of his own story. 

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56 minutes ago, Primal Slayer said:

JL flopping is really surprising. Im not used to the audience taking these kinds of stands with their money tbh when it comes to giant blockbuster movies but I guess I shouldnt be that surprised since Transformers flopped in the US even though it always did well in the past. I hope that WB learns a lesson from this. They have no body to blame except for themselves, should've got rid of Snyder before production started on JL and get a new script.

I pretty much expect the people that planned on going still will, me included, but I just don't feel any urgency.  I'll see it at some point. 

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WB was talking about/accepting pitches for a Justice League movie back in 1998, and then again in 2000, before sorta starting the project up again in 2002, and then again in 2007.  So yeah, the concept has been around for awhile, even if the execution was delayed. 

I was surprised to find that I didn't mind Affleck as Batman. But the rest of that film was a mess, and despite liking Wonder Woman and Jason Momoa and wanting to see a Barry Allen that I can like again, I haven't really rushed to see Justice League. 

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11 minutes ago, quarks said:

I was surprised to find that I didn't mind Affleck as Batman. But the rest of that film was a mess, and despite liking Wonder Woman and Jason Momoa and wanting to see a Barry Allen that I can like again, I haven't really rushed to see Justice League. 

Yeah, I feel the casting of Affleck was the least of BvS's problems.  It was the story and the editing above everything.

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I haven't seen the movie yet, but so far I thought this video reviewer's explanation was really insightful. It says the movie looks like it was shot in the same grimdark style as BvS and then artificially made lighter and brighter colored in post production. Except a ton of the scene composition and the costumes were made with the more gloomy tone in mind and without it the costumes for example look really gawdy. Because they were never meant to look like that. 

Edited by tofutan
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4 hours ago, Primal Slayer said:

Like the others have said, a budget of $300 million and the fact that Justice League is WB/DCs heaver hitters. ...
I'm pretty sure that this is going to get some higher execs at WB fired.

All I want is Wonder Woman 2 and a Flash movie! Ezra Miller is so good; and all the creative and business-side troubles are screwing over him and one of DC's A-list characters.

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I think you'll see future DC movies copying more from the Marvel movies. They've already tried to inject more humor/jokes into their movies and added post-closing credits to tease future stories. However, I suspect Justice League was just too far along by the time Wonder Woman exploded at the box office. I haven't seen Justice League, but from what I've read, part of the problem may be that it's a film that's only halfway transformed. As one reviewer put it, it looks like a Zack Snyder film but sounds like a Joss Whedon film.  So you've got news articles about how the WB/DC execs are going to let future films be more of the individual director's vision and how they're going to loosen up the inter-connectedness of the universe. That's what Marvel does - they have a lot of variety in their movies that's directly influenced by the individual superhero and individual director. Yet they also manage to put all of the superheroes together in the same movies as well.

Edited by tv echo
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35 minutes ago, tv echo said:

I think you'll see future DC movies copying more from the Marvel movies. They've already tried to inject more humor/jokes into their movies and added post-closing credits to tease future stories. However, I suspect Justice League was just too far along by the time Wonder Woman exploded at the box office. I haven't seen Justice League, but from what I've read, part of the problem may be that it's a film that's only halfway transformed. As one reviewer put it, it looks like a Zack Snyder film but sounds like a Joss Whedon film.  So you've got news articles about how the WB/DC execs are going to let future films be more of the individual director's vision and how they're going to loosen up the inter-connectedness of the universe. That's what Marvel does - they have a lot of variety in their movies that's directly influenced by the individual superhero and individual director. Yet they also manage to put all of the superheroes together in the same movies as well.

That's actually the exact opposite of what Marvel and WB have done (historically). Marvel developed a massive reputation for tightly controlling the directors to keep each movie as part of a unified Universe. In fact that's supposedly why Edgar Wright left Ant-Man and most(?) of his script was rewritten.

It wasn't until recently that they started giving the directors more slack, mostly because the MCU had already been established and, even then you can still claim a certain level of controlled universe building as Thor Ragnorok (a Marvel space movie) fits right in with GotG' universe (coloring, humor, etc).

WB has been the exact opposite of Marvel, they've pretty much always allowed the directors free reign over their movies (sometimes multiple directors/writers involved with each movie). This is precisely why each movie feels disconnected from the others. Why even when they try to tie everything together by having cameo it doesn't work. Hell, WB is even shooting their own attempt at a unified Cinematic Universe in the foot by introducing multiple Jokers (Leto and another Joker for a standalone movie...if rumors are true).

Basically WB is screwing up big time. They desperately want a unified cinematic universe like Marvel and to a lesser extent FOX has with the X-Men franchise but, keep screwing up by throwing everything at the board hoping something sticks. There is no unified vision, hell they won't even let their movie universe talk to their DC animation writers/directors which is stupid because their DC animation people know these characters and have created some of the best DC TV/Movies.

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You can listen to music snippets from the Justice League soundtrack here...

Listen: ‘Justice League’ Movie Soundtrack Now Available to Stream Online
BY DAVE TRUMBORE      NOVEMBER 10, 2017
http://collider.com/justice-league-soundtrack-stream-online/

In Track 15 (Spark of The Flash), you can hear a segment that sounds like the TV Flash's theme music. 

In Track 20 (The Final Battle), you can also hear similarities to the LoT theme music.

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I was relying on this Vulture article, but my recollection may have been faulty in some respects...

DC Rethinks Its Universe
By Abraham Riesman   September 29, 2017
http://www.vulture.com/2017/09/dc-wonder-woman-movie-strategy-universe.html

Quote

None of that seems to worry Nelson, and that’s partly because DC and Warner have adopted a new strategy: Let’s rethink that whole universe thing. They’re not giving up on the idea of continuity, but they want to deemphasize the idea that all of these flicks are occupying the same space. “Our intention, certainly, moving forward is using the continuity to help make sure nothing is diverging in a way that doesn’t make sense, but there’s no insistence upon an overall story line or interconnectivity in that universe,” says Nelson, drawing nods from the top brass around her.

... As Nelson puts it, “Moving forward, you’ll see the DC movie universe being a universe, but one that comes from the heart of the filmmaker who’s creating them.”

One of the centerpieces of this new, decentralized strategy is an as-yet-unnamed side label of occasional movies that are completely separate from everything else, set entirely outside the cinematic universe. Total stand-alones based on good ideas from big-name filmmakers. Movies that are just movies, not components of a larger piece of clockwork. The first one they’re talking about is a solo outing about supervillain the Joker, set to be directed and co-written by The Hangover and War Dogs alumnus Todd Phillips. Johns says they’ll be announcing the name of of this side label “soon-ish.”
*  *  *
However, there’s still a spandex-clad elephant in the room: this November’s Justice League. Its optics haven’t been great. Right after BvS’s backlash hit, the fact that Snyder would also be in charge of Justice League cast a pall over the latter effort among the movie commentariat. There were internal discussions about how to revamp parts of the movie. Johns and Berg mulled the idea of having someone other than Snyder write new scenes for the film. By coincidence, the writer-director of Marvel’s The Avengers, Joss Whedon, met with Johns and Berg to discuss creating a movie with them. The pair were game for that (they eventually chose one about Batman ally Batgirl), but later realized they could accomplish another goal: “Everyone was excited about Joss being a part of DC, and we thought he’d be great to write the [Justice League] scenes, the additional-photography scenes that we wanted to get,” Johns recalls.

Edited by tv echo
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3 hours ago, tv echo said:

I was relying on this Vulture article, but my recollection may have been faulty in some respects...

DC Rethinks Its Universe
By Abraham Riesman   September 29, 2017
http://www.vulture.com/2017/09/dc-wonder-woman-movie-strategy-universe.html

Nelson can say whatever he wants, but @Morrigan2575 is right. Plus, Man of Steel, BvS, Justice League were ALL Snyder’s vision-and glaring proof he has NO IDEA or knowledge of Superman or Batman. Patty Jenkins respected the source material and this why we  got Wonder Woman, the only good movie in this universe. So all the suits who are backpedaling and trying to spin, can just shut it. OWN your crappy decisions and directives, and asinine prohibition that the writers/ whoever couldn’t reach out to the animation division, who could probably have helped to make the DCEU live action a success.

Edited by GHScorpiosRule
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I just saw justice league, and I was honestly pretty pleased with it.   Ezra was fantastic as Barry and I think he pretty much stole the movie.   I don't think the fan service was especially bad,  but then I'm not usually looking for it. 

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From this morning's OTA panel at HVFF-Atlanta...

SA: "Two truths and one lie about the crossover... Um -" 
EBR: "I'm in it." 
SA: "Okay, you do yours and then I'll do mine. Okay." 
EBR: "I'm in it. I'm not in it. Oliver and Felicity kiss... I'll tell you what the lie is. For a price." 
SA: "Okay, two truths and a lie about the crossover... I hand Felicity a gun. Oliver and Kara share a passionate kiss. (Negative audience reaction)  And we do not spend any time whatsoever in Star City... You don't know. I am so good at this game."
DR: "I'm terrible at this game, but I think I got it. Oliver and Felicity share a passionate kiss. (Positive audience reaction) Oliver and Kara share a passionate kiss. (Audience reaction)  And Oliver and Diggle share a passionate kiss. (Big audience reaction) I think I got this game. I think I know this game very well." 
SA: "He's better at this game than me."

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I saw Justice League last night, for me it was, meh. It was better than BvS, which wasn't a very high bar to pass. It's still a mess editing wise and the CGI on Steppenwolf was awful, it felt like my live action movie switched to a video game whenever he was on screen. The 94 million seems about right to me when DC has only put out one great movie and the rest were mediocre to bad. They lost their mainstream audience's trust and they seem to only want to cater to comic book fans by not making their movie accessible to everyone. When they should know that comic book fans are in the minority all they have to do is look at comic book sales.  

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I thought this was amusing. From Pajiba, Let's Play 'America's Next Top Batfleck'! (Filed under "Seriously Random Lists")

Quote

Hey, remember when we heard Ben Affleck was looking to hang up his Bat-cape and leave the Batcave to someone new? Well rumor has it that Matt Reeves, who replaced Affleck as the director of the upcoming Batman solo film (called The Batman for… reasons), already has a replacement in mind. And it’s Jake Gyllenhaal!

John Campea dropped this revelation on his YouTube show today after teasing his inside knowledge yesterday. You can watch his segment below — it starts at around the 26 minute mark: [see link]

It’s worth mentioning that Campea was ALSO the person who first reported that Affleck was looking to leave the role (in the February 13th edition of Collider Movie Talk). And at the moment nothing is official. Hell, maybe all of this is in Campea’s head! But shit some dude made up in his own mental batcave is as good a premise for an article as any, so let’s take it as gospel that Reeves wants Donnie Darko to don the cowl. 

The question is: Are you ready for Batenhaal?

I’m not opposed to Jake — he’s intense, he works out, he can probably drop his voice a register if need be — but there are other actors I could easily see stepping into the Dark Knight’s Dark Boots. Here’s a short list I’ve put together for consideration:

  1. Idris Elba
  2. Christopher Plummer
  3. Jude Law
  4. Taraji P. Henson
  5. Jensen Ackles
  6. Donnie Yen
  7. Armie Hammer
  8. Pedro Pascal
  9. James Marsden
  10. Blake Shelton
    Quote

    … Wait, who?

     

Edited by Starfish35
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1 hour ago, Starfish35 said:

I thought this was amusing. From Pajiba, Let's Play 'America's Next Top Batfleck'! (Filed under "Seriously Random Lists")

 

1 hour ago, Starfish35 said:

Hey, remember when we heard Ben Affleck was looking to hang up his Bat-cape and leave the Batcave to someone new? Well rumor has it that Matt Reeves, who replaced Affleck as the director of the upcoming Batman solo film (called The Batman for… reasons), already has a replacement in mind. And it’s Jake Gyllenhaal!

 

69DA1AFE-2ABE-40FE-97F8-EC732A5829D6.gif

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I heard an interesting review on "the stoic nonsense" that is Justice League from Eli Glasner who said it's like distinct two movies, one directed by Joss Whedon and the other by Zach Snyder.  Snyder downplays the human aspect of the superheroes and does his usual thing but when he had to step down, they called Whedon in and it became funny and endearing. 

The Amazons ended up in the Snyder movie and ended up in armour clad metal bikinis because that's what you want to do when you're fighting aliens, strike fear into them with your six pack.  The benefits of Wonder Woman, which Glasner likened to the best origin story since Reeves Superman movies, is gone.  He thought Steppenwolf was a villain out of central casting.  Snyder's movie is a slog which is why he gave it just passable.

ETA:  I think Zach Snyder is a bigger problem than DC will acknowledge.  He's so bleak and boring (who thought it was a good idea to let him take the colour out of the Superman movie?) that people who will go to a movie because it's a comic book movie will still go but he's losing people like me who will only go if the movie itself is worth seeing (e.g. Wonder Woman, Thor Ragnarok).

Edited by statsgirl
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From DR's solo panel today...
https://twitter.com/Huchgirl/status/932324402292719624

-- DR: "By the way, I saw the crossover, and Stephen and particularly Melissa are just so - they're so good. From Supergirl. Melissa from Supergirl."

-- On doing crossovers, DR: "It's funny when we have to deal with time loops and Speed Forces. Like, Barry Allen is a problem. Like, he's a real problem. You know, like, isn't he an issue? ... (Audience member yells, "Justice for Baby Sara!") Justice for Baby Sara. (Audience reaction) Thank you, that went over very well. I think you just get into this confusion of, you know, how many Earths there are and what choices have been made to kind of make that Earth that Earth. It kind of gets into this whole thing with Legends and Flash, and they can do all this stuff... When we start reading the script and you look at crossovers and every crossover has to be kinda true to what the storyline of that particular show is, you have to say, okay, why is that happening on Legends? Oh, because that happened on Legends, season 2, episode 5, and you have to go back and remind yourself - so there's that. But the writers are really good with trying to keep everything coherent and keep the story of Arrow Arrow, keeping the story of Flash Flash... It takes a lot of work. Stephen was so burnt that he just needed time after the crossover... He worked more than any other actor, so he's truly our fearless leader."

-- DR: "The crossovers really should be separate and above and beyond the shows. They should be like a two-hour movie. Like, there should be one big two-hour movie. And that's the mix-mash. And it's an event, right? That's it. Spreading it over, in my opinion, um - even though it's great to do that so people can see that during their hourly time with the shows - I think it causes a certain amount of confusion. So to make one big two-hour movie, I think, is some place in the works. I don't know if it's going to happen, but I think they're talking about that. Because otherwise you kinda have to be caught up on all the shows."

Edited by tv echo
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38 minutes ago, statsgirl said:

I heard an interesting review on "the stoic nonsense" that is Justice League from Eli Glasner who said it's like distinct two movies, one directed by Joss Whedon and the other by Zach Snyder.  Snyder downplays the human aspect of the superheroes and does his usual thing but when he had to step down, they called Whedon in and it became funny and endearing. 

I'd agree with that, I was talking to my friend during the film (yes,  I'm that kind of person, don't go to the movies with me) it was very clear which scenes were directed by Joss.  Which despite my current hate for him,  those were the better scenes. 

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1 hour ago, tv echo said:

-- DR: "By the way, I saw the crossover, and Stephen and particularly Melissa are just so - they're so good. From Supergirl. Melissa from Supergirl."

There was dead silence from the audience when he said this.

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59 minutes ago, Morrigan2575 said:

I cannot believe The Punisher just got me to scream 

  Hide contents

KISS ALREADY!

episode 10 was freaking awesome

I screamed too! The reviewers were so iffy on this show, and to me, it's the best one of the bunch. I like that it's so character driven, but I guess if you go into it expecting a comic booky show w/superheroics, you're gonne be disappointed.

Spoiler

That elevator scene was more intense than a kissing scene, never thought I'd react that way to a forehead touch. My god they have so much chemistry! But I loved when Frank was telling David to find Lewis, and asked what if it was Sarah? And David is like she's my wife, my family. And Frank goes nuts and screams: so is she. Ugh. Kastle is up there with Olicity and Richonne for me. 

Edited by JJ928
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I thought Justice League was pretty good. Its biggest flaw is that it didn't have the "oh my God EPIC!" feel of The Avengers. It felt like a collection of several movies, all smooched together into one product. I mean, I give it credit for not actively pissing me off (BvS) or being unbelievably stupid and pointless (Suicide Squad), so I appreciate that much at least. This whole franchise needs a new direction, and fast. There are so many great parts here, but they have yet to really fit together. Wonder Woman was a great movie, and this was solid enough, but it needs more if it wants to be a viable franchise. It has to focus on telling good stories, and not just trying to be all things to all people, and focusing on future installments. 

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The problem with WB and DC is they keep reacting instead of taking the time to think things through. They don't need to be like Marvel, they need to write better stories. They also are never going to make the money Marvel does if they keep only catering to comic book fans. Their Easter Eggs mean nothing to non comic book fans. They have to establish their universe then put in Easter eggs that fit what they set up.  I went with a friend who doesn't read comics and she was asking who the woman was in Atlantis, who the guy in the end credits was, the Darksied mention meant nothing to her and she kept asking me what Aquaman's powers were. She knows Superman and Batman from all their movies, she got to know Wonder Woman in her recent movie and she knows the Flash from the CW series (of which she said she likes that Flash better). The DC movies don't appeal to the mainstream audience the 96 million opening weekend just proved that. While Marvel can go from the bottom of their pile to choose a hero to make a movie about and everyone will go see it knowing they don't have to know anything about that character to enjoy it. 

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That's a good point. My brothers are comics nerds, and I've never had to ask them questions about either Wonder Woman or the Marvel movies. They'll often ask me, "Did you catch this-or-that?", and I'll reply that I saw it but I didn't realize it meant anything, and then they'll explain it to me.

This tells me that they are very, very good at putting in Easter Eggs that will mean something to comics fans but don't interrupt the flow of the plot, characterization or themes for the casual fans like myself. Take the purple-face guy at the end of Avengers - didn't have a sweet clue who he was, but context dictated he was being built up as the Big Bad. That's all I needed to know to understand and appreciate the movie. My brothers asked me later if I got the significance of it and explained it to me, but that was just icing on the cake - the cake tasted just fine on its own.

In contrast, I watched BvsS with them and constantly had to interrupt the movie to ask questions. "Wait a sec, how did we end up here? What's going on? Who's that guy? Why did we switch to that all of a sudden?" They were very patient with me, 'cause they're great guys, but the point is I needed an information-source with me in order to understand anything. Who wants to watch a movie where you feel like you have to bone up on your studies first?

But it doesn't have to be like that. Wonder Woman was completely accessible. Legends drops Easter Eggs all the time, but it never interferes with my understanding of what's going on; I find out about them later on the forums and go, "Huh,  that's cool." 

Edited by Miss Dee
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