Quite a few celebrities have bashed Marvel and other superhero properties. Now Stephen Dorff, who once starred in a Marvel adaptation himself, is the latest to call out the superhero genre.
Fans will recall that Stephen Dorff played antagonist Deacon Frost in the 1998 film Blade. The film itself is credited with having helped revive the popularity of superhero adaptations. However, as shared with The Daily Beast, Stephen Dorff isn’t very fond of these modern takes.
In fact, he claims he would only act in another comic book film if they “were more like when I started when we made ‘Blade,’ or the few that have been decent over the years, like when Nolan did ‘The Dark Knight’ and reinvented Batman from Tim Burton.”
He continued, calling out the rest of the genre, including DC’s latest outing Black Adam. Here’s what he had to say:
“All this other garbage is just embarrassing, you know what I mean?” Dorff continued. “I mean, God bless them, they’re making a bunch of money, but their movies suck [laughs]. And nobody’s going to remember them. Nobody’s remembering ‘Black Adam’ at the end of the day. I didn’t even see that movie, it looked so bad.”
Rather than the superhero genre, Stephen Dorff believes the best of modern cinema comes from new talents like director Eddie Alcazar, the director of the recent Sundance entry Divinity, which stars Dorff.
This is, as he puts it, opposed to “making ‘Black Adam’ and worthless garbage over and over again.”
He then took more specific jabs at Marvel’s upcoming Blade movie. Dorff scoffed at the PG-13 rating of the film and joked that it can’t keep a director attached. He suggests that they won’t find anyone as skilled as original Blade director Steve Norrington to tackle the project.
“Marvel is used to me trashing them anyway,” Dorff said. “How’s that PG ‘Blade’ movie going for you, that can’t get a director? [laughs] Because anybody who goes there is going to be laughed at by everyone, because we already did it and made it the best. There’s no Steve Norrington out there.”
It’s certainly amusing seeing such strong opinions from an actor who played such a strong part in Blade. And, as a result, played a strong part in bringing Marvel where it is today. Of course, as he notes, the new movies are still making money.