character of The New Frontier and the lynchpin for the entire story. Further his origin is interesting and different to the one that we got in the film and what is usually seen in the DC universe. In The New Frontier, Hal is a pilot for the US air force and fights in Korea. This whole idea adds an extra layer to the character. Further by following this template, the audience gets the chance to connect to Hal Jordan. Hal only becomes Green Lantern near the end of the book and therefore we would really know the man behind the ring. The other main character that gets an origin from this book is The Martian Manhunter. Manhunter is another brilliant character who could be shown in a really interesting way on the big screen. His detective skills could add a whole new layer into Gotham and show the world that Batman can connect to the DC Universe very easily. There is a brilliant line in Cooke’s work that shows Batman’s paranoia, and his detective skills in one go. Batman is so desperate to protect the world that he must have weapons to fight off even his allies, shown through him discovering that Manhunter’s weakness is fire. He explains tha the carries kryptonite with him to keep Superman in check and that he only needs a match to do the same to Manhunter. This adds a very interesting layer to the League as a whole: most, if not all apart from Hal, fear Batman. It illustrates his power and most importantly for the Bat-fans, keeps The Dark Knight’s presence centre stage. Furthermore, DC’s
main speed hero, The Flash, gets a decent amount of focus in the book, but as with the three main heroes, he doesn’t get an origin story. This could work to his favour. Just think of Hawkeye from The Avengers. Many people who didn’t know who he was could follow his story and also be intrigued by him. The same could happen to The Flash. Do we need his origin explained? Surely his name kind of does the work for us and even if it does not, surely all we need to know for this film is that he is a guy that can run really fast. We know we like The Flash and we want to see more, so this would lead onto the next set of films to explain his back story if necessary.
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the whole spotlight. Further, if Justice League were to be connected to the Henry Cavill depiction of Supes it is likely to ruin my final argument for The New Frontier: keep it in the nineteen-fifties.
Although you could easily modernize the story and make it all link to the world in the twenty-first century I honestly think that taking the X-Men First Class route would work much better for Justice League. First Class showed that this works and that people can relate just as much to characters that are set in the late fifties than they can with characters that are in the new millennium. Further if this version of the league is in its own little universe there would be no problem with setting it in the fifties. So this is what I would do if I had my hands on the Justice League. To me we have a written script with Cooke’s book and all that needs to be done is pick a director and a cast who are suitable to take on these iconic roles.
Most importantly is whether or not Justice League is part of a shared universe like The Avengers or not. I think this all relies on Man of Steel. Nolan’s Batman is clearly in its own universe. Green Lantern seemed to be a part of a possible shared universe but the film failed and therefore it will probably always just be the Emerald Gladiator that populates that version of the DC Universe. If Man of Steel gives the impression that Supes is the first of many then this could open up the potential for a Justice League movie. But I am not sure if this method works with DC characters. I think they are so iconic that they actually work better when they are in their own universe getting
Luke Halsall
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