Burka Avenger

The Superhero industry, has been, for the most part, fairly exclusive since its origins. Most of the characters have been white males who save the day. Although the industry have been becoming more progressive as of late with the introduction of characters such as Kamala Khan as Ms. Marvel, it still has a long way to go. Recently, a Pakastani company released The Burka Avenger, a cartoon about a female, Muslim superhero. Not only will this cartoon serve as a big step forward in the Middle East, it will also offer something for western superhero creators to emulate. I'm very excited to see the full series!

Lego Dimensions?

Over the past few years, there has been an increased amount of commercialization between tangible toys and digital downloadable content. Companies such as Disney have been able to profit off of the success of toys such as Disney Infinity and Skylanders. Now Lego, in partnership with DC comics, is releasing Lego Dimensions, which follows the same business model as Disney. Buying this product allows access to downloadable in-game content. This drives consumers to both purchase new products as well as play the existing game. I am looking forward to seeing how this product competes in the existing market. 

Batman '66 Cartoon

In recent years, Batman has taken on a much grittier, more serious persona with the Nolan Batman films and the Arkham video games. However, for a large generation, Batman was defined by the campy television series in the mid-sixties lead by Adam West and Burt Ward. Next year will mark the fiftieth anniversary of that television series, and DC has decided to celebrate by producing an animated feature film focusing on the batman universe in the television show. DC most recently had a comics run featuring West's rendition of the classic character, and are building upon that.

The new feature has confirmed voice acting from both West and Ward, as well as a few of the original cast from the sixties, including former Catwoman Julie Newmar. I'm very excited to see how this fits in with the number of batman films that are being produced over the next few years!

Shared Universes Across Media

Although brands often synergize in order to reach the widest audience, it is not often that those media exist in the same universe. For example, there have been many iterations of Avengers cartoons over the past few years, but none have actually been included in the actual canon in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Although the characters are the same, their stories exist in completely different spaces; if something happens in a cartoon, it won't affect the events that occur in the movies.

However, there has been a recent call to consolidate the varies forms of media into one collective storyline and canon. The biggest industry to do this is the superhero industry. Two of the largest organizations to do this are Disney's Star Wars and the DC Television Universe. Back in the eighties, there were a number of Star Wars comics that were released by Marvel. Although they contained numerous adventures of Luke and the gang, they were never considered to be part of the actual Star Wars canon. Now, Marvel has decided to change that.

The company has decided to release a series of comic titles, including Darth Vader and Princess Leia, that tell the tale of what happened between the events of episodes IV and V. This is the official story and will be considered part of the official canon, even though they occur in a completely different medium than the films.

Likewise, DC Television is doing something similar. The group has received great critical acclaim for the shows Arrow and The Flash, which both air on the CW. Now, they have announced a cartoon titled Vixen, which will exist in the same universe as the live action shows. Both Flash and the Arrow will make an appearance in the show (in cartoon form) and will have the same exact story line as before.

I think this is a really cool way to integrate various forms of media with each other.

Fan Created Superhero Media

I'm a big fan of the superhero genre. I watch all the films, I read the comics, and I binge all the superhero TV shows. As I often peruse comic book websites, a big thing that they feature is fan created videos. Most of these are videos are mashups of various movies, cut to look like two characters exist in the same universe and, usually, fight each other. Although they're never spectacularly well-made, they can certainly be entertaining.

Every once in a while, there some really brilliant videos that play on the superhero genre and have some really decent animation and visual effects. The effects are cool and are fairly easy to do, I've found upon looking up various how-to videos. These videos just go to show how the market is drastically expanding, and how anyone can be a content creator. Here's my favorite one: It's Batman vs. Darth Vader.