Elizabeth Banks
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What made the 2000 version of ‘Charlie’s Angels’ a success? Was it the star power of the cast? The bombastic action scenes and campy attitude? Nah. It had to be something else, but what? Luckily, the woman behind a newly rebooted franchise, Elizabeth Banks, knows the answer.

The Herald Sun via Heroic Hollywood captured an interesting quote from the director of the 2019 ‘Charlie’s Angels’ reboot film. She posits that two of the most successful female-lead action films in recent years were hits because they belonged to a particular genre:

“They’ll go and see a comic book movie with Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel because that’s a male genre. So even though those are movies about women, they put them in the context of feeding the larger comic book world, so it’s all about, yes, you’re watching a Wonder Woman movie but we’re setting up three other characters or we’re setting up ‘Justice League.’”

Banks was eager to discount the success of ‘Wonder Woman.’ All that love just because it was part of a cinematic universe? That argument doesn’t hold much water. ‘Wonder Woman’ was praised while ‘Justice League’ and the ‘Batman V Superman’ prelude were both panned. Critics weren’t all too kind to this latest version of ‘Charlie’s Angels.’ The film currently sits at 58% on the Tomatometer. Some of the top critics are calling it “mediocre” and “frustrating.” Professional critics do need to be taken with a grain of salt these days, though.

 

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‘Charlie’s Angels’ opened on November 15th and grossed $8.7 million and had a $48 million budget. The film stars Naomi Scott, Kristen Stewart, and Ella Balinska as the newest trio of the Angels. The mysterious Charlie tasks the super-spies with recovering a new piece of technology that has a highly dangerous flaw.

What’s your opinion on the success of ‘Wonder Woman’ or ‘Captain Marvel’ versus the rebooted spy series?