Today's News: two powerhouses join forces for marvelous consequences

Quite the news flash was posted on MovieScene the other day, thanks to me:

http://www.moviescene.nl/p/151502/marvel_en_netflix_bundelen_krachten

So basically, what Marvel did on the big screen is being redone on the small screen. Though the originality has worn off, giving several TV shows the same treatment, simultaneously setting up a larger universe that leads to a new (mini)series is quite a novelty, not to matter risky business. But hey, the same thigng was said about Netflix itself, so it comes as no surprise that particular "network" opted to engage in this joint venture. At the same time, Marvel is still cooperating with a regular television network (ABC) on the currently running Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and a new show which has still to be revealed (but is probably that Agent Carter show which was suggested earlier these past few months). So Marvel is branching out on all platforms, being visibly active in theaters, on home cinemas and online. It's gonna be hard to miss the company it seems.

But will these TV shows be compelling enough for audiences? I foresee a few potential obstacles. First, there is name recognition. Daredevil people may be aware of, most likely through the 2003 Ben Affleck movie, which isn't a good thing since it wasn't a very good movie. But how many people outside the world of comic book readers are familiar with Iron Fist, Jessica Jones and Luke Cage? Getting people to embrace these could prove quite a challenge, so hopefully that Marvel brand alone is enough to pull in an audience for their shows. Secondly, there's the background of the characters, which in all four cases is rather similar. All four series will take place in the New York neighbourhood of Hell's Kitchen, so instead of battling outlandish super villains these heroes will fight more basic everyday evil, like drugs, corruption, organized crime and such. What's more, in terms of powers these characters aren't all that different either. Though there are some noticeable unique abilities, they mostly feature superhuman strength, speed and reflexes. At least their origins are rather different, but otherwise four shows dealing with the same subject matter seems somewhat redundant. Of course, the final Defenders climax could herald the end of one or more of these shows to balance things out more neatly, but so far it remains to be seen just how far Marvel and Netflix plan to take these shows. Each character gets 13 episodes, after that we'll have to wait and see where they go from there.

Though story and power diversity may not be as strong, at least the characters are fairly different in make-up, which could appeal to a broader audience. You have your heroine to appeal to a female demographic, a black character and a character dabbling in Asian mysticism (but who's not actually Asian!) to get racial minorities interested and a blind guy to engage disabled folk (okay, that last one may be highly debatable, but you never know). In this regard, The Defenders would be far different from The Avengers, which is basically all white males. True, there's Black Widow as a female role model, but she still hasn't gotten a movie of her own, while Samuel L. Jackson's black Nick Fury is only a supporting character that isn't on the Avengers roster proper but mostly overseeing stuff and letting the white people do all the real work (kind of an reverse Black Pete, for Dutch people). The core members with their own films, Iron Man, Thor, Hulk and Captain America, are all white. Except for the Hulk occasionally, but there's no actual green people to be represented as far as I'm aware. In this light, the four Defenders can make quite a difference, even though they're otherwise not so different. Nice metaphor for humanity me thinks.

And if it doesn't work, Marvel can simply change the Defenders' roster and introduce new characters as they like. After all, the team went through quite a few iterations over the years, just like the Avengers did. As you can see on the picture above, none of the four Defenders you'll see on Netflix appeared in the original first issue. However, the Hulk did, so there's you first potential Defenders/Avengers crossover (even though using the Hulk as a character would probably be too expensive in terms of FX). And then there's the Sub-Mariner and Doctor Strange, both of which have been rumoured to get their own movies. Introducing them in these shows could be explained as testing the waters for a potential movie, or yet another TV series or miniseries. So many characters, so many possibilities and opportunities. One thing's for sure: whether on TV, in theaters or online, the future is gonna be marvelous.