X-Men was the second successful franchise that Marvel Comics experienced.
Blade was released in 1998 and it was a box office hit. Perhaps the success of Blade at the box office started the hype regarding the vampire genre.
The movie starred Wesley Snipes as Blade.
'... Speaking of Wesley Snipes, the actor tried to audition for the role of Robert McCall, the protagonist of The Equalizer.'
Kazir remembered that fact since The Equalizer was quite hyped and promoted lately. Besides, Wesley Snipes was a famous black actor.
Unfortunately, Kazir Grey wanted to hire Denzel Washington... Kazir also knew that Wesley Snipes had a temper. Working with someone like him could endanger the franchise.
'I remembered that Blade 3 has a lot of problems. Wesley Snipes was always high on drugs whenever he was on the set. Wesley and the director confronted each other and promised to never work with each other again.'
Blade was produced by New Line Cinema, they acquired the adaptation from Marvel Comics, of course. This franchise was the reason why Marvel Comics focused their business on movies lately. They saw hope, they saw how they could survive and possibly become the most famous Superheroes franchise in the industry, beating DC Comics.
The first installment of Blade(1998) grossed $131 million. The budget was $45 million.
The second movie, Blade 2(2002), grossed $155 million. The budget was $54 million.
It might be nothing compared to the box offices that Grey Pictures achieved but it was true that the Blade franchise created profits.
Marvel Comics realized that they could use this method to stay relevant. Blade(1998) gave them a chance.
And then, X-Men was released in 2000 and it slowly changed the trajectory of the company.
The movie adaptation of X-Men was acquired by 20th Century Fox. 20th Century Fox obtained the film rights to X-Men and other related characters in 1994 for $2,600,000.
Honestly, 20th Century Fox was lucky to acquire X-Men because X-Men had a lot of characters that they could use... One of these characters was Deadpool. A crazy mutant who can break the fourth wall.
20th Century Fox took advantage of Marvel Comics' moment of weakness and now they were a time of their lives making money by filming X-Men.
The first movie of X-Men grossed $296 million, with a budget of $75 million.
Marvel Comics was now doing well, but everything changed when Spider-Man was released in 2001!
This movie was the fourth movie that grossed $1 billion at the box office! Sony-Colombia took the importance of this project by hiring someone as talented as Kazir Grey. Perhaps that was the factor why Spider-Man was successful.
No matter how you see it, $1.09 billion was a success. Spider-Man just grossed that amount of money, by the way.
Still, it didn't change that Spider-Man affected Marvel Comics in a good way. Their comics, especially those related to Spiderman, were selling a lot. The merchandise was also selling like hotcakes.
These three movies were the start of Marvel Comics' redemption arc.
Kazir found Stan Lee talking to Hugh Jackman. Even though Wolverine was only one of the characters in X-Men, his character was the most famous.
In fact, Kazir knew that Wolverine would have three standalone movies with Hugh Jackman as the protagonist.
There's only one Wolverine, and that's Hugh Jackman.
'Well, Tom Hardy and Jensen Ackles can also play the role. But that's my opinion though. People are allowed to have their own opinions.'
Hugh Jackman saw Kazir and greeted the director. Nothing wrong with greeting someone as famous as Kazir.
"Good evening, director."
"Good evening too, Hugh."
The two were not that close and Hugh excused himself.
Stan Lee and Kazir had their conversation while the theater was slowly getting filled by people.
"Did you hear the news?"
Stan Lee asked the director.
"Are you talking about Chairman Eisner's resignation?"
"No, not that... I don't even know who you're talking about. It's about Warner Brothers and DC Comics. I heard that they are also trying to start making a Cinematic Universe. What's your opinion about that?"
Kazir nodded.
He also heard about it and he knew that Warner Bros was serious. However, Kazir knew the outcome of their plan.
'Superman Returns and Batman Begins are their starting movies. Too bad because Superman Returns was a lost cause.'
Superman Returns only made $391 million at the box office. For something like Superman, that amount was too low. Especially when the production cost of the movie was more than $200 million.
Warner Bros suffered a lot from Superman Returns.
Fortunately, Batman Begins did well. Grossing $373 million while having a $150 million budget. Clearly it was better than Superman Returns.
Because of this failure, Warner Bros decided to make Batman a trilogy instead, naming it The Dark Knight.
As for their plan for Cinematic Universe, they had to adjust and wait for a few years so that people could forget about the failure of Superman Returns.
Man Of Steel was released in 2013, the starting movie of DCEU. This time, Warner Bros decided to go with a dark theme. Showing how destructive Superman's race truly was. And this plan worked, the movie made $668 million while having a $225 million budget.
'Unless Warner Bros and DC decided to go with a darker plot, their plan of starting a Cinematic Universe will fail this time. Although I have to admit that The Dark Knight Trilogy is a masterpiece. I can't wait to watch it in theaters.'
"Kazir, DC Comics is the most famous Comic publisher in North America. I hate to say it but they defeated Marvel a long time ago." Stan Lee admitted while gritting his teeth.
The two companies had the same products and they were equal a decade ago. But things slowly went downhill for Marvel Comics when Superman and Batman were released in theaters. More people preferred DC Comics because of that.
"Stan, are you afraid of DC Comics?"
He teased the old man and Stan Lee shook his head.