Summary
- DC characters are often portrayed as weaker in movies than they are in the comics, downplaying their abilities for the sake of the story.
- Movie adaptations that alter a character’s power level can be seen as unfaithful to the source material and can cause controversy among fans.
- Examples of weakened characters include Atom Smasher, Penguin, Cheetah, Lex Luthor, Superman, Bane, Supergirl, Batman, Ares, and Parallax.
The characters of the DC Universe may be based on those from the comics, but often the transition from page to screen renders them much weaker. DC’s characters rank among some of the most prolific movie superheroes of all time: Superman and Batman alone have each seen a handful of distinct on-screen adaptations over the years, with many other heroes also having their own blockbusters along the way. Then came the DCEU, the first shared DC movie universe to combine multiple heroes under one cinematic banner. Across these adaptations, many characters from the comics have found their way onto the big screen.
Both in the movies of the DCEU timeline and beyond, DC characters are often much weaker on film than they are in the comics. Their power levels are occasionally significantly downgraded in service of their respective movies’ narratives, and villains are regularly made significantly less powerful in order to have the heroes vanquish them within the span of a single movie. However, downplaying a character’s established abilities or power level is often a way to make a movie adaptation seem decidedly unfaithful to the source material, and often contributes to controversy.
10 Atom Smasher (Black Adam)
Of all the characters in Black Adam, Atom Smasher is hardly the most powerful, but he’s a respectable hero in his own right, particularly in the comics. However, Black Adam portrays him as a clumsy, bumbling young hero who is largely unable to reliably control his powers, and is often shown to cause issues for his fellow JSA members. Though the film certainly didn’t alter the hero’s power set, it did subtly change his personality to make him much less powerful as a hero, as his difficulty controlling his power and managing basic hero work makes him seem decidedly weaker than his comic book counterpart.
9 Penguin (Batman Returns)
Batman’s rogues’ galley is filled with iconic villains, and though the Penguin may not be his most iconic nemesis, he still ranks highly among them. Tim Burton’s Batman Returns introduced a version of the villain who was significantly weaker than the character from the comics, though. The film leaned heavily into the character’s penguin gimmick, focusing on altering the character in order to make him seem more like his namesake. However, in doing so, Batman Returns failed to appropriately depict the character as the criminal mastermind that he traditionally is in the comics, and killed him off before he could live up to his villainous potential.
8 Cheetah (Wonder Woman 1984)
In the DCEU movie timeline, Cheetah is one of the franchise’s first villains chronologically, which is appropriate considering she’s Wonder Woman’s main nemesis in the comics. However, Wonder Woman 1984 substantially weakened the villain, making her a more tragic and sympathetic figure. In the comics, Cheetah is the ruthless and violent antithesis of Wonder Woman, whereas the movie simply portrays her as an unfortunate victim of Maxwell Lord’s magic. The film also relegated her to a secondary villain, implying that she was nowhere near the threat to Wonder Woman that her comic book counterpart usually is.
7 Lex Luthor (Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice)
In the comics, Lex Luthor is one of DC’s most powerful villains. Despite his lack of traditional superpowers, his brilliant intellect, capacity for manipulation, and status as a master tactician are all qualities that make him more than a match for Superman. In Batman v Superman, Jesse Eisenberg’s Luthor excudes none of these qualities, and is instead portrayed as an eccentric and somewhat unhinged young billionaire. By altering the villain’s characterization, Batman v Superman robbed him of his most powerful qualities, making the movie villain seem much weaker than the Lex Luthor from the comics.
6 Superman (Justice League)
Though upcoming DC movies will introduce a new iteration of Superman for a rebooted franchise, the DCEU’s last full appearance of Superman highlighted how much weaker the hero was than his traditional comic book characterization. After the Justice League successfully raises him from the dead, Superman comes back without his memories and spends most of the film recovering them. In fact, Justice League only seems him act heroically in its final scenes, doing very little to showcase his ability to lead and inspire his fellow heroes. Though the hero himself remained somewhat overpowered, he was still depicted as a much weaker character than he is traditionally in the comics.
5 Bane (Batman & Robin)
1997’s Batman & Robin is widely considered the worst Batman movie ever made, but one character that seemed to get the worst deal of all was its version of Bane. In the comics, the villain is not just a physical powerhouse but brilliantly intelligent too. However, Batman & Robin opted to forgo the latter part of the villain’s personality and simply portrayed him as an empty-headed brute. Bane’s intelligence is every bit as important to his power set as his unnaturally oversized muscles, so it’s fair to say that Batman & Robin made him much weaker than it should have despite his amazing strength.
4 Supergirl (The Flash)
The Flash introduced Supergirl to the DCEU – albeit a version of the hero who existed in an alternate universe. Having spent several years trapped in a kryptonite prison, Supergirl is significantly weaker than she is usually written to be in the comics, though here it is for a valid reason. Even after recovering her power, however, she’s easily beaten by General Zod, with The Flash‘s ending revealing that Zod will kill her in practically every eventuality. It’s an almost insulting power downgrade for a classic DC hero, and though the reasons why were clearly explained within the film, it’s still a step-down for her traditional comic book characterization.
3 Batman (The Batman)
As one of DC’s most iconic heroes, it’s a well-known fact that Batman is the most powerful hero without superpowers. The Batman‘s grounded narrative seemed to forgo this idea, though, instead making its version of the Dark Knight decidedly weaker than he is in the comics in order to facilitate its story. Despite being the world’s greatest detective, Batman is easily outwitted by the Riddler and is unable to decipher the villain’s plan until it’s far too late. What’s worse, he’s also physically overwhelmed by a handful of untrained Riddler henchmen, proving that The Batman‘s version of the hero is both less intelligent and less physically capable than his comic book counterpart at this point in his story.
2 Ares (Wonder Woman)
Wonder Woman‘s main villain is Ares, the god of war, who reveals himself to Diana before an epic showdown in which Diana kills the villain. In the comics, Ares is pure evil and lives to cause death and destruction, but the film portrays him differently. Ares is far more sympathetic to Diana, and proves relatively easy for her to kill early in her superhero career. The comics paint him as a recurring villain who harbors a deep-seated hatred for the Amazons, and given his status as a god, he’s not so easy to dispatch. However, Wonder Woman makes him much weaker, allowing Diana to emerge victorious from their battle.
1 Parallax (Green Lantern)
Green Lantern is widely considered one of the worst superhero movies ever, and its treatment of its main villain indicates why. Parallax is the living embodiment of fear and the Green Lantern Corps’ biggest enemy, proving almost impossible to beat on multiple occasions in the comics. The film sees Hal Jordan not just defeat Parallax in his first outing as a Green Lantern, but kill the being permanently by driving Parallax into the sun. Having such an important DC villain killed so offhandedly did more than just make Parallax seem weaker than his comic counterpart, as it also made Green Lantern one of the worst movies in the DC Universe.
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