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[Lumenskir]

I would prefer to have John Boyega as T'Challa and Chiwetel Ejiofor as T'Chaka.

Yeah, that's my runner-up lineup (and I guess if they keep the Oxford background it'd make even more sense), I just really want everyone who was on The Wire to have a big career. Stupid Marvel using Idris Elba for some bullshit Thor part...

[Magus]

Yeah, Black Panther's origin doesn't really make a lot of sense for a movie, but then again, did Thor's? In fact I think Black Panther will work better as a movie in many ways...

The Justice League thing is silly. It's like they looked at how the Marvel movies worked and said, "Let's do this in reverse." Confusing. As for a villain, I really don't think they'd like to go straight to an alien invasion/Darkseid for the first movie. It's been shown to be a bad idea (Green Lantern's Parallax, anyone?). If I had to make up a trilogy of Justice League movies, I'd save Darkseid for the second or third one. In fact here is an arc that makes the most sense for villains in a Justice League movie (and is in fact basically what Justice League Unlimited did, so there's that):

1. President Luthor/Cadmus and the government (which can bring in characters like Captain Atom who are interesting in their waffling between loyalty to the government and what they feel is right).
2. Legion of Doom.
3. Darkseid.

This is probably what would make the most sense as an "arc" for a trilogy. It's not what I would personally want, though. If it were up to me I'd never include Darkseid in any of these things. Instead I'd have them fight the Justice Lords as an "ultimate threat" in the third one. Or perhaps the Injustice League or whatever the "bad" version of the Justice League was (not just misguided or dystopian like the Justice Lords. Actual criminals, you know, Ultraman and Owlman and so on).

[Lumenskir]

The Justice League thing is silly. It's like they looked at how the Marvel movies worked and said, "Let's do this in reverse." Confusing.

I don't think the basic theory is unsound, especially for the DC Movie Universe. DC's main plan hasn't been as organized as Marvel's, seeing as none of the DC superheroes ever appear to be living in the same universe. Doing the team-up movie first lets you create a blank slate to introduce how the individuals will act later. DC never had Marvel's familiarity problem (i.e., Batman and Superman were always more well known than Iron Man or Thor), but they do have a problem with consistency.

As for a villain, I really don't think they'd like to go straight to an alien invasion/Darkseid for the first movie.

Ah, but if they do then they could potentially preemptively fuck over Marvel and the similar sounding Thanos arc. Earliest Marvel can get out Avengers 2 is 2014, Justice League could come out the summer before easily.

(Green Lantern's Parallax, anyone?).

Yeah, I think that was mostly a problem of execution rather than concept.

[Magus]

But why not just copy Marvel's plan? Pick a third superhero besides Batman or Superman to begin a new reboot of interconnected movies with, much like Iron Man kicked off the Marvel-movie universe. Then have one movie each for four or five of the major ones and then have the Justice League movie. Doing it in reverse doesn't make sense to me.

The only thing this requires to go well is that the individual movies be good. I think we can bank on a rebooted Batman or Superman being decent, but Warner Bros. has had a hard time getting a third franchise going. And yeah, it's not so much the concept of Green Lantern/Parallax, but their execution. Going for a big ensemble movie without building up the individuals within it seems like more of the same bad execution.

If I were them I would create a game plan for a DC-movie universe. Start with trying to get a third hero going well to start. The Flash would probably be a good one to start with since I hear they are already developing a Flash movie. Then do that thing where you cliffhanger off the ending of the movie to preview the next one and create a real plan for how you are going to build up to a Justice League movie. Don't just throw a Justice League movie out there and think people are going to then be real excited about seeing a movie with one of the individual members who aren't Batman or Superman based on whatever success Justice League has.

I mean, there are arguments that the public will like a Justice League movie without there being individual movies first. 4 or 5 of them have pretty large cachet with the general public, unlike the Marvel heroes in the Avengers. The average person didn't have any idea who any of them were other than probably the Hulk and Captain America, whereas most people are pretty familiar with Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, the Flash, Aquaman, etc. But that they would accept a Justice League movie and then go on to watch a Cyborg movie, or a Martian Manhunter movie...I dunno.

[Lumenskir]

But that they would accept a Justice League movie and then go on to watch a Cyborg movie, or a Martian Manhunter movie...I dunno.

True, but then the problem is more about playing the pros/cons of "Is [X] ready for primetime?"

Related: What would everyone's ideal starting movie-JL line up be? For me, looking primarily at mass appeal and acting enticement, I'd go Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, John Stewart GL (so that DC can have the implicit diversity card ready to deploy), and The Flash. Aquaman might still be too much of a joke, and Martian Manhunter might need a higher Q Score and groundwork to explain why he's not just green Superman.

[Intern Nin]

Aquaman might still be too much of a joke

Aquaman isn't a joke. He's the punchline.

[Magus]

Hard to ignore both Aquaman and Martian Manhunter...obviously they felt Cyborg could stand in for one of them, but I can't necessarily think of a seventh to take the place of the other. Captain Atom would be interesting for what he brings to the plot, or...I dunno, Elongated Man? I can't see that going over better than Aquaman.

Plus you have to keep in mind if they were going to make a Justice League movie they'd probably want it to either follow the first Justice League line-up or the current one to tie it in with the current comics.

[Lumenskir]

Plus you have to keep in mind if they were going to make a Justice League movie they'd probably want it to either follow the first Justice League line-up or the current one to tie it in with the current comics.

Is that what Avengers did? I went with five to match up with how many heroes were in that one (counting SHIELD as one hero).

[Magus]

Oh, well, I figured the Avengers had seven, really, if you count Nick Fury. Which you should, I mean, he had his own comic book back in the day. And I certainly considered Hawkeye and Black Widow to be separate heroes, too.

And Justice League to me always has seven at the least, too. It's a nice number...five would work too, I suppose, but seven just seems right.

[The Sevenshot Kid]

Donald Glover would be fucking awesome as Cyborg.

DC should just launch into a Justice League movie with the current line-up and maybe they could put in Hawkgirl too if they wanted. Aquaman is a fucking necessity. Done right, he could be the break out character like the Hulk was in Avengers. Imagine a badass Aquaman summoning sharks and telepathically inducing seizures.

For the villain, they have no choice but to go with Darkseid. There's no other credible villain that would work in a movie and you can't spring a Legion of Doom without any set-up (maybe they could if they could find someone capable of adapting the totally awesome Justice). DC could totally fuck over Marvel by pulling the Fourth World card before they can play Thanos because, let's be honest here, Thanos is totally a Darkseid rip-off.

The main problem DC has is that the individual stories of each hero are more interesting than the team stories. The only time I can say that wasn't true was in the cartoon series and Warner Bros. isn't smart enough to pull those writers in. They hired the fucking guy that wrote Gangster Squad.