Did you know there were tons
of Marvel movies before the Marvel Cinematic Universe?
Yes, that's right.
Because Marvel, back in the mid-90's,
had to sell the rights to a lot
of their characters
to save the company from bankruptcy.
The result is this weird convoluted web of films.
Some of them are great,
some of them are,
well, they're legally movies.
And today,
we're gonna take a walk down memory lane
on today's episode of The Dan Cave
with a look at all the Marvel movies
before the MCU.
Captain America.
Now back before Marvel Comics
was even called Marvel Comics,
Captain America made his debut on the big screen
in serial format.
Dick Purcell played Captain America,
but this guy wasn't Steve Rogers,
the experimental super soldier.
Rather he was District Attorney Grant Gardner
who investigated a series of mysterious suicides.
They were connected to a chemical called,
The Purple Death.
It also involves a villain tryin'
to use a super weapon called the
Dynamic Vibrator,
which,
I'm not even gonna touch in.
You probably shouldn't either.
It's very old.
Howard the Duck.
Now George Lucas is a brilliant storyteller
and a wonderful world builder,
but he owes America an apology
for foisting Howard the Duck upon us.
After struggling to find success
with TV adaptations on CBS,
Marvel changed gears
with their first film in 42 years,
a live-action adaptation
of Steve Gerber's bizarre existential comic
about an ill-tempered duck from outer space.
The result was something that's widely regarded
as one of the worst films ever made.
It was supposed to be animated,
but a contractual obligation meant it had
to be filmed in live action,
which led to grueling shoot
that saw animatronics ducks exploding,
breaking down,
and it necessitated a grand total
of six actors to play Howard.
As for his voice,
well that honor eventually went
to Broadway star, Chip Zien.
But also some seriously notable actors like
John Cusack, Martin Short,
Jason Alexander, and Robin Williams
all auditioned for it.
Please.
Someone show me the multiverse
where those versions exist.
Because I need to hear John Cusack
as Howard the Duck.
The Punisher.
Now long before the Netflix series,
there was a live-action Punisher movie
starring Dolph Lundgren as Frank Castle.
Except you might know about it
because it never made it
to US theaters thanks to its distributor
running out of money.
And the fact that creative differences between
Marvel and the filmmakers
resulted in some weird backstory ret-conning
and a complete lack of the skull iconography.
Most of all, it showed what happens
when you bring a gun to a sword fight.
(guns fire)
(laughs)
Don't do it.
Captain America.
Now it should come as no surprise
that the shlocksters extraordinaire,
Cannon Films were behind this egregiously
bad Captain America movie.
It had been in development since 1984.
And at one point,
it was about the Red Skull stealing the
Statue of Liberty.
What?
Val Kilmer, Dolph Lundgren,
and Arnold Schwarzenegger were all floated
to play Cap,
but the honor went to J.D. Salinger's son,
Matt Salinger.
The movie that resulted was this bonkers story
about Cap tryin' to stop Red Skull,
who got plastic surgery to disguise himself
as the leader of a crime family,
from trying to brainwash the
President of the United States,
to change environmentalist policies
that Red Skull just straight up loathed.
Unlike Steve Rogers,
this movie probably would've been better
off trapped in ice at the bottom of the ocean
never to be seen again.
Doctor Mordrid.
Now we've very nearly had a Doctor Strange movie
some 20 years before Bramblethorp Clamborbout
made his MCU debut.
Unfortunately for producer Charles Band,
he lost the rights before the movie was complete.
So, they just shaved off the mustache
and some creative re-jiggering,
and the result is the magical Doctor Mordrid.
Knockoff of the Mystic Arts.
Good job, Doc.
The Fantastic Four.
Now the sordid saga of this movie
is almost worth an episode unto itself.
But heres the truncated version.
In order to prevent the Fantastic Four's rights
from reverting back to Marvel,
German producer Bernd Eichinger
teamed up with Roger Corman
to make an insanely low budget B-movie
about Marvel's first family
for one million dollars.
In 1994, when the film was completed,
it was revealed that it wouldn't be coming
to theaters after all,
because it was actually just
a transparent ploy to squat on the rights.
Then Marvel exec, Avi Arad
bought the film from Eichinger
for a couple million dollars
in order that it be destroyed.
But thankfully,
a few slipped through the cracks
and this campy low budget delight
is still floating around the internet
to this day.
What kind of a thing have I turned into?
Blade.
Based on a vampire hunter from the pages
of Marvel's Tomb of Dracula series,
Blade is a nearly perfect movie.
It showed that in order to make a successful
comic book movie,
you just needed Wesley Snipes,
killer one-liners and enough fake blood
to drown a horse.
And fun fact:
It was almost a vampire spoof movie
starring LL Cool J.
Thankfully, LL Cooler J heads prevailed
and we got the cult classic
we know and love today.
X-Men.
Arguably the start of the
modern comic book movie boom,
2000's X-Men spurred on by Blade's success,
proved that superhero stories were
viable blockbuster fare once more
because of its blend of pulpy storytelling,
a talented ensemble cast,
and giving the world the gift
that was Hugh Jackman's Wolverine.
My one complaint?
The costumes.
What would you prefer?
Yellow spandex?
Yeah Scott.
I would.
See, this is why they killed you
in the third one.
You ass.
Blade 2.
Now this is the movie
for which Guillermo del Toro
really deserves his Oscars.
At least that's how I remember it.
Does it hold up?
Well, possibly not,
but if you're looking for bloody vampire action
with Wesley Snipes,
a very young Norman Reedus,
Donnie Yen and Ron Perlman,
then you are in luck.
And if not, then.
You obviously
do not know
who you are (bleep) with!
Spider-Man.
The first Marvel movie
to make 100 million dollars
in its opening weekend,
Spider-Man's a perfect example
of what happens of when your faithful
to the source material
and you make a genuinely good movie.
More importantly, it finally confirmed something
I've known my entire life:
Willem Dafoe has restin' Goblin face.
Just look at it.
He's a goblin.
Daredevil.
Now it's difficult to believe
that this isn't the thing
that Ben Affleck would regret most about 2003,
but then again, Gigli came out
several months later.
Honestly, the best part
of this mishmash of an origin story is
Colin Farrell's gleefully unhinged Bullseye
who's basically like
the MacGyver of murdering people
with small household objects.
And for some reason,
if you thought you were missing something,
well, you are.
There's an extended directors' cut
with about 30 minutes of extra footage,
and 100 percent more Coolio.
Can't believe it got cut.
X2.
Widely regarded as the best
of the original trilogy of X-Men movies,
X2 stands the test of time thanks
to its classic tale of mortal enemies
teaming up to take out
an even bigger threat.
Like that episode of G.I. Joe
where they teamed up with Cobra
to fight drugs.
Honestly, it's worthy of accolade
just for that kick-ass sequence
where Nightcrawler is just BAMFing
around the White House.
However, the best piece of trivia I found
out about this movie is on the film's Wiki page,
which states,
"Shaquille O'Neal wanted a role in the film,
"but was ignored by the filmmakers."
To which I say,
it's not to late to put Shaq
in X-Men: Dark Phoenix.
Do it you (bleep) cowards.
Hulk.
You wouldn't like him when he's angry,
and you definitely wouldn't like him
when he's Ang Lee.
It took a long time
for this movie to get made,
13 years to be precise.
With various scripts that pit
Hulk against terrorists,
sharks, his own sex drive,
mutant insect men,
and much more.
The result was an ambitious movie
that made a decent amount of money,
but didn't give audiences what they wanted.
Case in point,
Hulk doesn't appear until like
40 minutes into the movie.
And after all, if you wanna smash hit,
you coulda let Hulk smash.
Not like that teens.
Not like that.
The Punisher.
Once again, Frank Castle has been betrayed
by the people he thought he could trust.
Except this time,
it was a bunch of studio execs
who slashed production budgets in half.
It only gave like 52 shooting days,
leading to some creative compromises
in the part of writer-director,
Jonathan Hensleigh.
The result is a gritty, pulpy story
of the Punisher cutting a bloody swath
through a smuggling operation in Tampa Bay.
Honestly though, the film's biggest crime
wasn't sending Punisher
to a sunny place like Florida.
It was not recreating his most iconic summer look
of all time.
Look at that suit.
How's it stay on?
Spider-Man 2.
Easily one of the best sequels
and superhero movies in the pre-MCU canon.
Spider-Man 2 pit
old web head against one of his
most iconic foes:
Doctor Octopus, who, I still maintain,
should be called Doctopuss.
It's right there Marvel.
Come on.
Idiots.
Doc Ock.
Genius.
While I loved what wound up on the big screen
including the iconic homage
to Spider-Man no more,
I'm deeply intrigued by the Michael Chabon
draft of the script
that put a 10 million dollar bounty
on Spidey's head,
that turned New York into his own
personal version of The Running Man.
As well as a weird love triangle
with a younger Doc Ock, Spidey, and MJ.
And that is to say nothing
of the fact that Spidey lost his powers
or the fact that Doc Ock wanted
to rip out his spine.
Well you know what?
It's hard to argue with perfection.
And that's basically
what Spider-Man 2 was.
Spider chef.
Blade Trinity.
One of the most compelling arguments
against trilogies,
Blade Trinity is largely responsible
for putting a stake in
the heart of this franchise.
And giving us this legendary TV edit.
How about you take a sugar frosted chump
off the end of my hoo-hoo.
Fantastic Four.
Now back in 1961, Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
were asked to create a super team
to rival DC's Justice League.
The result wasn't anything like
what the publishers wanted,
but it was unlike anything else in comics.
It was a family story of people
that gained fantastic powers
that had to contend with genuine emotional crises.
It flew off the shelves
and the Fantastic Four were born.
Flash forward to 2005
and well, you'd have the latest entry
in a long history of no one knowing quite
what to do with Marvel's first family.
Now thank goodness this wasn't
Chris Evan's last time playing
a Marvel character
because otherwise...
(laughs)
Oh no.
To put things in perspective,
this movie came out one month after Batman Begins.
Say it with me now.
Yikes.
Elektra.
A movie so bad it ultimately led
to Fox abandoning its plans
for the Daredevil franchise.
Elektra was a misguided spinoff
centering on everyone's not so favorite
scarlet-clad sai wielding assassin,
Elektra Natchios.
Even the film's star, Jennifer Garner,
knew how bad it was.
She only agreed to do it
to fulfill contractual obligations.
And she only filmed it while on breaks
between shooting seasons of Alias.
What's in her wallet?
Hopefully some fat stacks.
Because she deserves to make bank
for having to put up with starring in
the Catwoman of Marvel movies.
Man-Thing.
What's the best way to squander both your
source material and 30 million dollars?
Two words: Man-Thing,
or one word technically since
it's hyphenated.
The point is that this movie,
based on Steve Gerber's Man-Thing comic,
straight up sucks.
It's a Marvel horror story
that could've been great,
but instead it was shot out of sight,
and out of mind in Australia.
And the results, well,
let's just say there's probably
a reason you haven't seen it.
X-Men: The Last Stand.
When I saw this in 2006,
I thought it was the worst X-Men movie
I would ever see.
It's easily the biggest waste of Cyclops
since Odysseus blinded Polyphemus.
And then I saw X-Men: Apocalypse.
God, movie sucks.
My other biggest disappointment
about this movie?
There was a version of the script
that introduced telepathic villainess Emma Frost,
who was intended to be played
by Sigourney Weaver.
Why?
Why not that one?
Instead, we got whatever the hell this was.
I mean anyway, it's got blue Frasier,
completely unearned Phoenix storyline
and a super timely,
"I'm the Juggernaut bitch" reference.
Remember that,
remember that meme?
Holds up.
Like a Pitbull song in an animated movie
that comes out eight months after
it was released.
Ghost Rider.
Now not to be confused with the
1980 short film about bus safety.
Ghost Rider was Nicolas Cage's chance
to finally live his dream
of playing a comic book character
on the big screen.
He came this close with Superman Lives,
but instead, he became Johnny Blaze.
A stuntman who gets tricked
into making a deal with the devil
that turns him into a demon who hunts down souls
that escape from hell.
And he gets to ride a sweet hog.
Vroom vroom.
The results were
well, they weren't what anyone was expecting.
Even Nicolas Cage was pissed about it.
"Ghost Rider was a movie that always should've
"been an R-Rated movie",
Cage told JoBlo in an interview.
That was a pitch perfect impression.
"David Goyer had a brilliant script,
which I wanted to do with David
"and for whatever reason they just didn't
"let us make the movie."
The real question Nic isn't
why wasn't Ghost Rider R-Rated.
The real question is,
how the hell did you guys convince
Peter Fonda to play Mephisto?
Spider-Man 3.
Now what can I say about Spider-Man 3
that isn't better expressed through the art
of dance.
Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.
As the old saying goes,
if at first you don't succeed,
needlessly complicate the sequel
with cosmic comic book weirdness.
Is that what say?
The coming of Galactus story arc
played well in the comics,
but ultimately fell flat on the big screen.
Maybe, if that Fox/Disney merger deal
ever goes through,
we'll see the Silver Surfer and Galactus
finally get their due.
Until then, it's best to just revisit
the source material,
and pretend this movie never happened
because that's exactly
what Fox did.
They had signed the principle cast
to a three movie contract,
but looked at the box office for both and said,
"You know what?
"Let's make an even more troubled reboot
"eight years from now."
And that's exactly what they did.
And those were the Marvel movies
that came before the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
And that's not even counting
Marvel's countless TV movies.
Some questionable non-MCU movies
still came afterwards,
but at least now we have
18 going on 19 interconnected films
to make the MCU come alive
on the big screen like we always imagined.
But tell me,
which of these is your favorite?
Which haunts your dreams?
Let me know in the comments below,
and give me historically awesome thumbs up
while you're there.
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and use their battle rap skills
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in suburban Detroit in
Ocean's 8 Mile.
Until next time,
keep on diggin'.