I think DC has more compelling characters than Marvel. Call me a counter-culturalist, call me stupid, but this is the hill will I die on.
Let me clarify. I think Marvel does certain things better than DC. After all, it is the biggest movie franchise ever. Even if what it does better is pandering to sheeple by means of jaw-dropping visual effects, it’s better nonetheless. My point is that, when looking at the heroes and the villains for what they are, there seems to be a winner as far as crafting realistic and deep stories.
Like any good superhero tale, let’s begin by looking at origin stories.
Many DC critics say that a huge flaw in the comics is that heroes were simply born into circumstances that would facilitate their super-career. People say things like “Batman wouldn’t be anywhere without the Wayne fortune funding his Batmobile,” or “Superman is only here because his dad shipped him off of Krypton.” OK, fair. At least DC heroes did not fall into their jobs like Marvel heroes. People who were destined to be great, or devoted their lives to avenging their parents, seem more inspiring than a high school student who just happened to get bit by a sciencey bug.
Once you have a good hero, you need a great villain for them to fight against. Many Marvel fans argue that because Marvel villains think they are doing the right thing, they are more realistic or compelling than the DC villains who just want to act out.
There are some people who, if stumbling upon superpowers, would do wrong while thinking they were right (think of a radioactive Son of Sam or Zodiac Killer, for example). There are others, many more, in fact, who were already committing petty crimes just because they could— and now they have laser beams. It seems more accurate to heighten day-to-day evil than to assume most villains would have a messiah complex.
There are a hundred different rabbit holes to fall into in this debate. Marvel makes better movies than DC does, but DC has always had the market cornered in television. Marvel shamelessly copied DC characters, but they did make them more appealing. “Batman vs Superman” was bad — fair, but it’s only 0.2 IMDb points below “Spider-Man 3.”
At the end of the day, there are no clear winners except the fans who get to explore the universes that they love. That being said, talking about the “epic cinematography of ‘Spiderman: No Way Home,’” does not benefit society at all, so stop doing it.