Howard The Duck (1986)

Howard the Duck paved the way on how late 20th century Hollywood gaged comic book adapted movies. Its not the first adapted film to hit the big screen, but from a creative stance it makes all the difference in the world.

 During the early 1990's when Marvel Comics was in financial turmoil, they were willing to sell all there  film distribution rights of all there characters to Sony Pictures for 25 Million dollars. At that time Sony believed the only character worth any film value to be shown theatrically was Spiderman and purchased the film rights for only 10 Million Dollars.  In hindsight that deal was horrible for both sides, overtime to inject a cash flow, Marvel granted distribution rights to varied characters to different companies, like Fox owning the X-men and The Fantastic-4, Paramount owning the Hulk,  Sony Pictures having Spiderman and all the Spider-verse characters. For it's deal Sony Pictures made back 10 times the purchase cost of the first Spiderman movie, which still saw a massive profit after the film's budget of $7 million dollars , and the cost for marketing and payment to the National Assoc. of Theatre Owners (NATO), Sony made $114 Million on its opening day weekend which at that time was the highest box office gross for any film in history. and gave an instant profit of $50+ million after expenses were paid out. Spiderman (2002) made just over $403 Million Domestically and more than double that worldwide. So of course the sequel would be in the works and possible a trilogy, if lightning in the bottle would catch twice the company would jump on that without a second thought.

Go back 16 years before the release of Spiderman, which was 3 years after the release of Return of the Jedi. George Lucas and his company Lucas films purchased the film rights to Howard the Duck, a Marvel Comic intellectual property and made it into a feature length theatrical motion picture .  And Marvel's first film ever to hit the big screen.  In short, the film was a commercial failure for a film with a budget of $30 Million ($76 million today with inflation) only made back $38 Million Worldwide, meaning after all expenses, the film never made a profit, it was in the red, George Lucas was was still the process of building Skywalker ranch and had to sell off parts of his company to payback the banks. The most notable sale was a small animation company he sold to Steve Jobs the CEO of Apple. that company would go on to becoming the multiple award winning animation company Pixar films. 

For nearly 30 years Howard the Duck was remembered as disaster of a movie Critics and audiences did not connect with this film , on a revisit - Rotten tomatoes scored this film 15%.  This in turn made investor uneasy to invest large sums of money into a comic book genre film,  A decade later Blade received mixed critical reviews but connected with the audience and in the 2000's  investors saw value in telling these character stories with the debut of X-men,  Batman, Spiderman these films had a more modest/ limited budget in the beginning and saw great commercial success, Daredevil, Elektra, Ghost Rider, Sin City saw a split of public and critical opinion but proved this was a fertile ground to harvest.

Howard the Duck ridiculed notoriety did not taint it's cast.  Tim Robbins, is all but forgotten that this was his breakthrough role, Jeffrey Jones later that year was distinctly remembered for his role playing principal Ed Rooney in Ferris Buller and would go onto be a character actor in about 70 film.  The leading star Lea Thompson, was a household name with the release of Back to the Future, and continues with developing a list of films under her belt,  as both an Actor and Television Director, but never reached that  commanding leading lady role in Hollywood.  As for the actor Ed Gale the man in the Howard the Duck suit, he continued to work as a stunt man for another decade, and would appear in over over 100 Television shows and commercials. 

Howard the Duck would make his return to the big screen 28 years later in a small cameo appearance in the post credit scene of Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) movie. The character and his movie has slowly built a cult following and Disney's Marvel Studios of  today has future plans for this character who in his 1986 theatrical release gave us the first notion of a multi-verse.  

What If (2021) series

The Incredibles (2004)

 

The Incredibles' are Pixar's sixth animated feature length movie and the 3rd film to garner the company an Oscar win. In total the animated studio has collected 10 academy awards for feature length movies, Finding Nemo was their first. This film received 4 nominations and took home 2, best animated feature film, and best sound editing.   Pixar was originally owned by Lucas Films but sold off to Steve Jobs (Apple CEO) to cover the massive loss Lucas films endured with Howard the Duck (1986), while investing heavily and amassing debt to create his Skywalker ranch. Ironically enough 20 years later Pixar  would slowly return home in 2006, for a deal believed to be a 7.4 billion dollar purchase.  As Disney purchased the company and shortly thereafter its founder Lucas films in 2012 for an estimated 4 billion dollars.  

The Incredibles was the first superhero themed animated movie to win an Oscar, the genre would not be recognized for a full decade until Big Hero 6, and again  4 years later with Spiderman: into the spider-verse winning the Oscar gold in 2019.  These films captures the imagination with visual effects and and unprecedented imagination  and it  took almost as long to make as to win.  Jason Lee who was the voice the for Buddy/Syndrome spent only 4 days in a sound booth .  While Craig T. Nelson who was the voice of Bob/ Mr. Incredible took nearly 2 years to complete.  It seems that the approach with Pixar  is that the story is more important than the animation, but being an multiple academy award wining and leading animation studio in the entire world, animation is what they are the very best at. 

The film's story is the bedlam of the animation. Usually delving deep, telling an emotional story of the family dynamic with the dilemma of a family coping in suburban life. Running the risk of being uprooted from witness relocation as their past lives calls back hauntingly. Inside Out  and UP  also gave a real life emotional story to connect with its audience, as the Incredibles gave you the everyday husband and wife / nuclear family going through  past regret and family struggles as their kids go through their own coming of age moments.

The Incredibles is many regards is an awakening for each character beyond it being a superhero film, but when it becomes just a superhero film the movie goes full out to tell an amazing story with an orchestrated explosive score to accompany the action.  An example to best illustrate this remark was when the son Dash discovers he can run on water and with unbridled passion. Its race through a wild jungle and a discovery of levels of excitement.

Venom

Venom on a beach with Spiderman's masked skull in hand uttering "Spiderman alas I killed him well".

From Amazing Spiderman 347, re-iterating an infamous misquoted Hamlet line. The issue takes place after the full completed story arc of the first time Spiderman and Venom had ever fought where the only way to get rid of Eddie Brock and the Symbiote from Peter Parker's life was to make them think they had won.  With Spiderman dead leaving the lethal protector contented with life left on a tropical beach away from New York and the rest of the civilized world. That was until the first emergence of Carnage and Spiderman's desperate need of this lethal enemy who would know how to stop him. Using the logic of my enemy's enemy is my friend. 

That issue was released way back in 1991.  Fast forward to 2021 a deleted scene of Venom Let there be carnage has Eddie and Venom happy on a beach, with the defeat of their latest enemy Carnage.  The difference now being the enemy to bring them back into civilization is the emergence of Spiderman.

As much as the MCU, and their Marvel adapted properties forge ahead with great success; Their designed remains cyclical, Marvel comics has a treasure trove of stories and crossovers spanning well over 50 years that can provide a blueprint to keep historic readers happy and engage the newest fan onto the big screen. The post credit scene of this recent  Venom  movie offers an example of that cross-section.  While setting up what will be Spiderman's No way home, a continuing expanding endeavor of Marvel Studios, in partnership with Sony pictures.  The recent No Way Home trailer can also show how the chaos can possible lead into the multiverse of madness.

Venom,  the Sony pictures' theatrical release, had its debut on the big screen in the fall of 2018, offering  the world the emergence of  Eddie Brock a failed reported and an Alien Symbiote known as Venom, in a world without Spiderman.  Venom Let there Be Carnage offers us the same world without a Spiderman, as Venom's greatest adversary Carnage emerges, An offspring who's host was as deadly and unpredictable as it's alien counterpart. Like any good story, the villain, be it Eddie Brock or Cletus Kasady (aka Carnage), the villain rarely sees themselves as a villain, they are in fact the hero of their own story.  Cletus was denied the love of his life, a Romeo and Juliet story with both characters  sentenced to death to be forever apart.  

Let there be Carnage keeps some of it's comic book origin. Cletus was in prison and bonded with Venom's offspring.  The screenwriters just shuffled the how and why Brock/Venom would be in prison next to Cletus in order for this to happen. Characters like Anne Weying, Riot, Shriek, Carlton Drake, She-Venom were all characters that existed in the comic book lore.  As Sony picture's sandbox of legally owned  characters are tied only to the spider-verse.  In truth they possess only a finite set of characters in which to tell these stories without Spiderman. , As Sony's number one Marvel export  is given a opportunity to be shared within the greater Marvel Cinematic Universe. while quietly offering  a world where his friendly neighborhood league of characters like Morbius and Vulture can exist, but told in pocket corners of the world.

A question remains. What is Venom now with the emergence of Spiderman? We were given an anti-hero without a Spiderman,  As we have no origin or connection to the webslinger, what does the future hold? Can Venom play nice and work with Spiderman,  as Eddie continues to try to control the ethical dilemma of eating brains of alleged bad guys.