Trailer Wars

by J.D. Cook · December 13, 2015

In the last few weeks we’ve seen three trailers released for three separate comic book franchises. First came Captain America: Civil War with emotion, Second, came Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice with a long name and third came X-Men: Apocalypse with spectacle. Which of these trailers turned out to be the best? Well we’ve ranked them Worst to Best below.

3. Batman V. Superman: The Court Case of the Century. The scenes with Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman all look spectacular. After being initially skeptical of Ben Affleck as Batman, I can now say I am totally confident he will act the hell out of the role. The same cannot be said for Jessie Eisenberg as Lex Luthor. The latest trailer demonstrated this in resounding fashion, by illustrating Eisenberg would be playing Luthor as a dweebish tech genius instead of the supremely intelligent, physically imposing bastion of humanity he is in the comics. In a lot of ways Luthor is an evil Bruce Wayne and when you see Luthor, Kent and Wayne together, you don’t really see Luthor as anything of an equal to Wayne and especially not Kent. Also the elimination of Doomsday’s comic origins is a little bit of a bummer since they are awesome. I still don’t have a lot of faith in D.C. because they are building their universe on the shoddy foundation of Man of Steel.

2. X-Men: Apocalypse. This franchise seems to have really righted its ship. Even as Marvel Comics tries to diminish the X-Men in the comic universe (That controversy is explained a bit in this previous article, Marvel Vs DC Round 2) they are managing to shine on the big screen. I don’t really think Apocalypse looks as bad as everyone thinks. I for one am super happy he’s an actor in a suit and makeup versus a totally C.G.I. cartoon. I look forward to Oscar Isaacs’s performance immensely. The only lingering issue I have with the X-Men films are the disdain for their comic costumes. Instead we keep getting bizarre black leather or body armor. GIVE ME SOME YELLOW AND BLUE! (The one thing I actually enjoyed in First Class).

1. Captain America: Civil War. This trailer was one of the most heartbreaking things I’ve seen in ages. Marvel really needed to rebound from the disappointing Avengers: Age of Ultron and Ant-Man, which was not terrible but didn’t show me anything I wasn’t expecting. When we see War Machine down and out and Iron Man getting clobbered by Cap and Bucky, you can’t help but feel sad to see former Avengers coming to blows. My only hope is that in the film version of Civil War, Captain America will win the argument but lose the battle, unlike in the comic version where he won the battle but lost the argument.