Calling Wonder Woman 1984 the most anticipated movie of 2020 almost feels as though the year isn’t going to be all that big even if comic sequels have been outdoing their predecessors. Scott Campbell of We Got This Covered and many others will likely disagree but at the same time it’s hard to change the tune largely because the comics are hard movies to get into at times largely because there’s so much material that covering it all and appealing to the fans is sometimes rather difficult and in some cases impossible since each director has their own vision that could be completely different from what fans want. Thus far Wonder Woman has not disappointed and it would appear that this next movie is going to be more of the same since people are fully on board and ready to see just what gets released for their viewing pleasure. But still, it feels as though people are trying to put a cap on the year before it ever gets started and in some ways it does feel as though this is bound to be a bad idea since there’s so much more to come.
Why would I say something like this? It’s not about hedging bets since like so many others I know that Wonder Woman has hit the big screen and become a huge phenomenon. I’m not betting against Wonder Woman in any way, but I’m not rooting for her either. While I’m not much of a DC fan I can admit that the first Wonder Woman was a big step forward for DC and created a lot of hope for the studio that Batman vs. Superman and the Justice League movie tore down in a big hurry. The standalone movies are, as Ian Sandwell of Digital Spy indicates, the direction that DC wants to move towards at the moment as they try to gain more ground on the big screen than they’ve been able to in the recent past. Aquaman is another movie that will be getting a sequel and there is still an idea for a standalone Flash movie as The Batman is on its way and interest in Michael B. Jordan as Superman continues to grow. At this time standalone movies are what appear to be the big deal for DC and could very easily be what helps them to gain a stronger foothold in the cinematic universe.
But while making such a claim as being the most anticipated movie of 2020 isn’t all that innovative, it’s still a big and very bold claim that could end up backfiring if this coming Wonder Woman movie doesn’t live up to expectations. Sequels in the comic book movies might do better than their predecessors in the box office, but one thing that very few people are talking about, which is amazing really, is that topping the predecessor isn’t a guarantee. Yes there are going to be more and better effects and yes, there will be more of a story moving forward with hints of the back story to use as support, but that’s never a guarantee to work. People are forgetting, or so it appears, that 2020 is at this moment expected to be a stellar year at the movies and like it or not, Marvel has a history of outperforming DC on the big screen.
Right now their hopes tend to ride on the Wonder Woman movie since The Batman is being talked about sporadically and isn’t nearly as anticipated for various reasons. Ben Sherlock of ScreenRant has something to say about the movie in his own words. In a big way it feels as though this anticipation is being built and hyped in a way that could lead to massive disappointment unless the movie can generate the kind of buzz that the first one did and interest people in coming to see it on opening day and make the weekend one of the hardest of the year to beat in terms of the box office sales. All in all this is a Marvel fan stating that building up too much tension and too much hype over something is not a good idea, but I’m also a movie fan that thinks putting all your hopes on one movie is kind of foolish.
If DC really wants to own the summer or even the year they’d be banking more on releasing more content in different seasons in a balanced manner so as to interest people to keep coming back to the theater if only to see the next DC feature that’s coming out and ignore anything else. That’s not bound to happen obviously but it’s a lofty goal that could manage to pull DC even and possibly ahead of Marvel, which will be building towards its next big and epic moment as the movies continue to build the story that will eventually unfold in another decade if not sooner.
