Superhero Movies On The Rise

The increase of interest in comic book movies that started with Spider-Man in 2002 is still growing exponentially. Ever since the unrivaled success of 2008's The Dark Night (which is not just the highest grossing superhero movie ever made, but the 7th highest grossing movie of all time) superheros have been catnip to the movie industry and have sparked a huge increase in interest. Let's take a little look at what the next year have in store for us:

Release Date: January 14th, 2011

Directed by Michel Gondry and starring Seth Rogan, the film is going to released in 3D next January. So far it does not have a rating, but is expected to be PG 13. There really isn't anything else notable to say. Seeing as this will be Green Hornet's first major role in film, there isn't anything yet to judge it against. Let's hope it's a good one!

Release Date: May 6th, 2011

This movie has been long anticipated by Avengers fans, seeing as it was commissioned to be scripted all the way back in 2006. The film will star Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Tom Hiddleston as Loki, Natalie Portman as Jane Foster, Colm Feore as Ymir, Jaimie Alexander as Sif, Stellan Skarsgard as Professor Andrews, and Anthony Hopkins as Odin. Directed by Kenneth Branagh (a relative unknown most notable for starring as Gilderoy Lockhart in Harry Potter and the Chanber of Secrets), the film has a $150 million budget. I don't see this film becoming a great money-makes, seeing as Thor is hardly "mainstream".

Release Date: June 3rd, 2011

The fifth film in the X-Men series  will be directed by Matthew Vaugh of Kick-Ass. The film will be a prequal to the first three movies, and will take place in the 1960s. However, none of the original X-Men will be in the film apart from Beast. It has also been confirmed that during the movie, the reason why Dr. Xavier needs a wheelchair will be explained (how exciting! Seeing as X-Men Origins: Wolverine 2 is also (maybe)  scheduled for release in 2011, this could be a pretty X-Men intensive year. Let's hope they live up to our expectations more than the first X-Men Origins: Wolverine did. 

Release Date: June 12th, 2011

yes, Earthlings, it has finally happened: one of our very own will be inducted into the Green Lantern Corps in a major motion picture! I'm not going to lie, this is without a doubt the 2011 superhero movie I am looking forward to most. Directed by Martin Campbell and starring Ryan Reynolds, there has already been talk of making a trilogy out of it. This movie is anticipated to be one of the highest-grossing movies of 2011.

Release Date: July 22nd, 2011

Now, this I am fairly excited for. The film stars Chris Evans as Captain America, and Evans is already well versed in playing superheros from his roles in the Fantastic Four movies. The movie is to be set in the early days of the Marvel Universe, before the formation of The Avengers (it is unclear at this point whether or not they will form during the movie). A video game tie-in called Captain America: Super Soldier is going to be released in 2011 for the Xbox 360, Wii, PS3, PSP, and DS.

Mere days after the release of Green Lantern, Transformers 3 hits the theaters. The Transformers franchise is one of the most popular and mainstream, meaning the film is expected a substantial revenue (mainly from the parents of 8 year old boys). The film is directedby Michael Bay and produced by Steven Spielberg himself, and stars Shia LaBeouf (of course). However, Megan Fox will not be featured in the movie, which is a shame because she was probably the main reason most males wen to see the first too. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of the Transformers series, and although I expect it will do vrey well on the money front, I do not expect to be impressed by this one.

There has been talk about Spider-Man 4, and Ant-Man movie, a Dark Knight Sequel, a Deadpool movie, and a new Superman. Unfortunantly, none of these films have yet been confirmed, which is a shame because they're all the ones I would really want to see!