DC vs. Marvel Box Office Battle Video Breaks Down Rivalry

Marvel Studios and Warner Bros. (who owns DC Entertainment) continue to be Hollywood's most [...]

By Matthew Aguilar

Marvel Studios and Warner Bros. (who owns DC Entertainment) continue to be Hollywood's most consistent money makers, and that looks to continue when DC's Suicide Squad releases later this week.

Wired takes a look at the phenomenon and how it started in their newest Data Attack, and the team unearths a few key facts regarding the superhero genre as a whole. That includes the sheer number of superhero films coming from the big two, which totals to 19 films over the course of the next four years.

DC vs Marvel Wired
(Photo: Wired)

While both studios have plans laid out years in advance, Data Attack recounts when DC and Warner Bros. were the frontrunners when it came to film adaptations, centering around their original Superman and Batman projects, and even more recently with Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy. Marvel had to resort to licensing their IP to other studios, but that move is what saved them from bankruptcy, and ultimately led to Marvel opening their own film studio.

The genre has seen its market share increase from 13.7% to 27.6%, and Marvel is certainly in the lead with 13 number one films in a row, including this year's well-received Captain America: Civil War.

That hasn't stopped some from attempting to put the genre in its place, including Steven Spielberg, who compared Superhero movies to the Western genre.

"We were around when the western died and there will be a time when the superhero movie goes the way of the western. There will come a day when the mythological stories are supplanted by some other genre that possibly some young filmmaker is just thining about discovering for all of us."

The Western was incredibly popular from 1910 to 1960, at which point 25% of all films were westerns. After the 1970's, that went down to less than 1%, but I don't see Superhero films going the same route. The hype and constant interest will die down, sure, but this is a genre that has so much source material to draw from that coming up with new takes on established IP should not be an issue for years to come.

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