With Suicide Squad, the latest comic-book-inspired property set to rule the weekend, about to be released, it’s a good time to reflect on the actual numbers involved in the big business of superhero films. With the varying successes (and escalating budgets) of films like Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice and Captain America: Civil War, it’s important to note how audiences got here, just how many films are derived from comic book properties, and where the genre may be heading. Luckily, Wired released a video that details all of the monetary elements of the superhero movie game and shows just how much of a financial behemoth the spandex set has become. Oh, and it’s all done using paper-craft stop-motion animation, which makes it a bit easier to take in all the data points.
As the video states, comic book property films now make up almost a quarter of the films put out by major studios every year. That’s a pretty staggering number, but the support that the films have received at the box office seem to back up the output. At least for now. As the video indicates, Steven Spielberg and others have spoken at length about how the genre is similar to Westerns, and those eventually hit their peak as well and went from a large share of studio output to just a dwindling amount of revisionist takes on the genre. But with more comic book properties (not just Marvel and DC) entering the fray, and with audiences still turning out to see the latest transition from panels to celluloid (or digital prints), the end of days for comic book movies may be further in the future than most think.
