2017 was a pretty terrible year, but not in the realm of comic books. The TV shows and movies are higher in frequency and production value and the books they’re based on are gaining more attention. And what better way to discuss the years best than a podcast? Player.One’s Phil Martinez and Autumn Kelly joined forces on this week’s episode of Cape Talk to decide on the best superhero properties of 2017.
Best: Agents Of SHIELD
The scope of Agents of SHIELD gets bigger and better every year. While the end of Season 4 dragged a little bit with the framework storyline, Ghost Rider’s role early on in the season tied into the finale. The later time slot gave the series more creative leeway and the season left off with a huge cliffhanger in space. The Season 5 midseason finale earlier this month might have been the best of the year. We got nostalgic with Lance Hunter’s return and the series went back to its roots.
There are two close seconds: The Gifted and Legion. Both were standalone X-men properties and both were pleasant surprises. Polaris, Eclipse, Dreamer and other less-popular comic book mutants on The Gifted make the series feel different than the movies. Unlike The Gifted, Legion largely studies David Haller, the son of Professor X, as he tries to separate his abilities from reality. The show’s placement on FX instead of Fox provides for amazing visual effects and production design.
Honorable Mention: Legends Of Tomorrow
This superhero mashup introduced on Arrow and The Flash struggled to find itself as first, but has now perfected not taking itself too seriously. No one actor gets too much screen time and the show takes place in a different time zone each week, giving the costume designer a chance to go wild.
Biggest Disappointment: Inhumans (Phil) And Iron Fist (Autumn)
The Defenders wasn’t bad enough to win because the first half of the series was great. When it came down to deciding between Inhumans and Iron Fist, we disagreed. While the former is definitely the worst show--the acting was not good, the writing was terrible, the cinematography in the IMAX premiere did not meet expectations--the latter was not at all socially aware. Iron Fist, the character, was problematic. He came off as just another privileged white boy, and was unlikeable from the start. To make it worse, it seems like he might have been purposefully written that way so he could redeem himself for Heroes For Hire in The Defenders. Even though he was noticeably more enjoyable and better alongside Luke Cage, it just doesn’t feel right.
Honorable Mention: The Flash
The Flash is one of our favorite shows, but the end of Season 3 was terrible. Why did it have to be some stupid time remnant of evil Barry? The whole Iris dying storyline was overdone and it was a chore turning in to watch a villain in a big blue metal suit kick Barry’s ass.
Best Movie: Logan
Logan changed the rules for the superhero genre. Hugh Jackman’s emotional farewell performance paired perfectly with a small child killing grown men left and right.Plus seeing Xavier old and crazy and Wolverine in real pain… it was a lot. The acting was great and it can stand on its own against the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Almost Tied: Wonder Woman
It’s a typical origin movie but we’re confident the sequel will be even better. Wonder Woman wasn’t safe, but felt like it was because the movie had to be. As the first big, well-known female superhero, there was a lot riding on the film’s success. And it was the biggest success in DC Comics recent history. Gal Gadot is basically holding down the DCEU. It even had our favorite moment of the year (we’ll get to that later).
Best Moment: No Man’s Land -- Wonder Woman
Whether it’s Wonder Woman plowing through No Man’s Land using her shield to clear a path through the german army or jumping up into the tower when she saves the small town (which brought Autumn to tears), both of those moments would win the best of 2017. There was so much emotional impact of watching Diana do what needed to be done when everyone was doubting she could.
The top three moments we came up with were all from DC Entertainment. The second was Superman fighting the Justice League. The brief interaction between he and The Flash was priceless. The third best moment was the Crisis On Earth X crossover. There was more superheroes in that CW event than there ever has been in any superhero movie.
Best New Character: Prometheus (Autumn) And X-23 (Phil)
The nominations included Valkyrie from Thor, Mantis from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 , X-23 from Logan, the rock dude from Thor, Elongated Man from The Flash, Polaris from The Gifted and Prometheus from Arrow. It’s too bad we’ll probably never see X-23 again because i that storyline seems like a one-off, but she was surprising and amazing. Prometheus is the strongest villain on Arrow since Deathstroke. Josh Segarra brought the acting on the series to another level and made every character perform their best. Because of Prometheus, Season 5 had the best finale in Arrow history.
Best Character: Spider-Man (Autumn) And Wonder Woman (Phil)
White Canary is a phenomenal leader on Legends. She’s been holding it down in Rip Hunter’s place for a season now and we like to give credit where it’s due, but there were so many other great nominees. Wonder Woman, Coulson (unfortunately not Agent May because she was in coma for half the season) from Agents of SHIELD, and Cyborg gave the strongest performance in Justice League. Hugh Jackman gave his all to Wolverine in Logan, but it wasn’t enough to beat out Tom Holland who made Spider-Man his own.
