In case you haven't yet, make sure to check out Part 1 of this article first!
By the late ‘90s, the comic book movie genre was scrambling to find its footing after the abysmal release and box-office plunge of Batman & Robin in 1997. In hindsight the ‘90s wasn’t really the most stellar time for comic book movies, and there surely weren’t enough of them being released to even be considered a “genre” anyway. There were a few good ones sprinkled in there that I’m quite fond of, but aside from the highly profitable Batman franchise that had been running since 1989, no other comic book properties got quite the same mainstream recognition as Batman did during this time.
Following flops in the ‘80s and early ‘90s like Howard the Duck, The Punisher starring Dolph Lungren, and Captain America starring Matt Salinger, Marvel Comics was practically benched for the majority of the ‘90s and it wasn’t until the company’s bankruptcy and later recovery when Marvel finally start getting some of its major properties into theaters- Blade (1998) and, to a larger degree, X-Men (2000), which was sort of a prologue to the massive cultural atomic blast triggered by Spider-Man in 2002.
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