If a CoH movie were actually made, what story should it tell?

I'm thinking movie focusing on the Rikti War (though strong characterization would be a struggle; the trilogy idea is a good one), followed up by a modern-day, slightly more cartoony TV show focusing on a bunch of newbie heroes.

CG would be a strong possibility for both.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go rewatch all of the CoX trailers and keep on dreaming.

If I was in charge of translating CoH into moving pictures...

...I'd realize it's called City of Heroes for a reason. Paragon City is home to a legion of costumed adventurers. Sure, Statesman and the Phalanx are important, but they're not the star. The city is.

As such, a movie would be an episodic tale of interweaving stories all focussing on various people in Paragon City and how the city and its history shaped them. Think Crash with superheroes and alien invasions.

There could be the struggling young heroine only recently arrived in the city, the former costumed crusader who was paralyzed during the first Rikti War, the newsstand vendor who sees all the heroic headlines each day and has become jaded to the whole hero business thing. You could also show new employee orientation at Crey, a teenager who comes under peer pressure to try out Dyne or the Hellion Initiate needing to prove himself by doing his first arson job. There wouldn't be a lot of costumed fights involving the main characters and an awful lot of dialogue. There would however be at least one major battle between the Phalanx and a suitably impressive enemy serving as the backdrop for part of the narration, and I'd like to give screentime to other Paragon luminaries such as the Clockwork King as well.

Just never in a major role. The city's the star, and it's made up of ALL the people who live in it.

It should be about the heroes and villains that populate paragon and the rogue isles. Mabey something like common grounds.




BTW THANK YOU HICKMAN!

The destruction of the Freedom Phalanx and the disbanding of Longbow alongside the rise of the real heroes of Paragon City (aka the players and the PPD).

*smoldering with hate at the hero-side NPCs*

Having not read the thread yet, I think a CoH movie (one of many) should be about the first Rikti invasion. All the events that so far has just been described would make for awesome visuals. Thousands of heroes fighting aliens all over the world, Statesman downing the mothership, the Alpha and Omega team's going to their respective dooms... I think that would be the most iconic CoH story, since it sets the background for pretty much everything. Anyone watching the movie would then be prepared to start playing right away.

Rainbow Jester teams up with state man to take down the evil Mr. Marks and on the way they meet Orange Jack, my new villain.

There have to be explosions. Superheroes blow stuff up. Supervillains blow even more stuff up. No thank YOU, people like Michael Bay, for giving shiny, eye-candy explosions a bad name by tying them to "plots" that don't even measure up to glorified toy commercials.

But yeah, Rikti war. Plenty of explosions there. And let the Freedom Phalanx stay in the background. Make up some original characters for the movie, and let them develop over the course of the war. The main characters of the CoH movie should be more like War Witch and Apex; characters more like the ones we play, not some "uber-awesome" premiere superteam that was designed just to be uber and awesome. Also, I want to see Steven Sheridan in his "Doc Science" persona in there somewhere.

If CoH was made into a movie, it would be horrible. As we all know, movies based on games universally wipe their bums with the storyline and rewrite it in their own image. I'm sure no one here needs examples, but to name a few there's Super Mario Bros, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, Alone in the Dark, Wing Commander and Double Dragon. None of which were anything at all like the game they were intended to replicate.

Ms. Liberty would probably turn into some drama queen teen fussing over boys in Steel Canyon high. Statesman would turn into the overbearing father figure, despite being her grandfather, Synapse would be the fast-talking comic relief and Sister Psyche would be the damsel in distress. At least Back Alley Brawler wouldn't change much!

Toss in Hamidon and a few token Hellions, Freakshow, Council and Arachnos goons and mix well with a sprinkle of sugar. Leave in the oven to bake for ninety minutes and serve to an audience of young children who have never even heard of the game.

I think the fact that a movie about this game can be interpreted in so many different ways, says a lot about how much variety there is here.

I think a CoH movie is very unlikely, but if a live-action one was going to be made then I think the first movie would have to go with a low-to-middling budget to test the waters, as CoH isn't a well-known franchise with a massive in-built following (like Transformers or the big Marvel/DC heroes). That pretty much rules out masses of CGI’d Rikti (the CGI budget would be taxed enough with handling all the superpowers), so I’d leave them for sequels if the first movie is profitable.

Also as this is the introductory movie that establishes the franchise for the mainstream you'd need to keep the number of characters small - you don’t want to confuse the norms - and too many characters means too little time spent developing each one. And lets face it, studio executives would want the film to focus on Statesman & Recluse, as their faces are on all of the advertising and merchandising for CoH and their stories are central to the lore of the franchise.

So within these limits - i.e. that this can’t be a mega-budget ego-trip based around player-characters - I’d probably do a pared down adaptation of the Web of Arachnos novel.

Intro/pre-credits: Late WW1 trenches - establish Marcus Cole and Stefan Richter as friends. Mustard gas attack, Marcus affected, but Stefan gets gas mask on him and drags him to field hospital. Marcus ill, so Stefan bolsters his spirits with mythical stories he’s heard from other soldiers about the Well of the Furies granting immortality. Ridolfo Uzzano, then a priest, is visiting patients in the hospital - meets Marcus & Stefan - hears their story and tells of a rumour he has heard about the "Path of the Dark" as a route to immortality.

Act 1: Post-WW1 Marcus & Stefan seek and find Well of the Furies and gain their incarnate powers (1930 in lore), while Ridolfo meets Arakhn, joins her in Arachnos and follows the Path of the Dark to become Requiem (1926 in lore). After the Well collapses Stefan washes up ashore in Italy, meets Uzzano/Requiem again and is recruited to Arachnos. Marcus doesn’t know if Stefan survived so he goes back to the US, begins relationship with Monica Richter, and starts to fight crime as Statesman (Monica joining him as Maiden Justice, plus Dark Watcher and 1-2 others from pre-WW2 Freedom Phalanx). Possibly show Brass Monday’s Nemesis attack (1932) as the climax to Act 1 if the budget stretches this far (unlikely).

Act 2: WW2 era, Arachnos scheming has put Mussolini in power, Recluse & Requiem have become valued lieutenants of The Weaver. Requiem's ambition causes him to break away and create the 5th Column for the Axis, then lead the WW2 sneak attack on Independence Port. Meanwhile Recluse has The Weaver assassinated, takes over Arachnos, pushes out Arakhn/Nictus and moves to the Rogue Isles. Requiem fights Statesman and loses (Act 2 climax), but recognising him he tells Marcus that Stefan isn’t dead, before escaping. Statesman goes on to help win WW2 (gratuitous Nazi-bashing and tank-throwing montage to segue into Act 3) and while in Europe looks for Stefan to no avail.

Act 3: It’s the 1950s/60s, Recluse deposes President Marchand and takes over Rogue Isles. Statesman starts to feel less relevant and a bit "out of place/time" with his old fashioned values (especially in the 1960s) - plus he hasn't aged leading to tension in his relationship with Monica who has. When he hears about this "Lord Recluse" supervillain who other heroes cannot stop he decides to go sort things out, just to prove he is still relevant/needed - emotional impact as Marcus realises his “friend” Stefan is Recluse and the movie ends with a Statesman vs Recluse showdown.

It’s a pared down version of the lore, but the movie needs that - you can’t fit everything into 2 hours. Then if that film makes money the second and/or third movies could tackle the modern era Freedom Phalanx in the Rikti War with Hero 1, or the war on Drugs/Superadine (plus Superadine link to alternate realities leading to Dr Webb’s expedition and the Reichsman invasion as climax), or the Praetorians, or anything else that would prove too expensive and too big for the debut/origin movie.

The CoH/V movie should start around I10: Invasion. The return of the Rikti.

From a narrative perspective, the first Rikti War is a lot of fighting with no pay off since a reason isn't know for why the Rikti attack - that doesn't come out until they return, which is the 'twist' you need to throw the Rikti into a whole new light. Otherwise you end up with "Independence Day", just with more spandex.

Instead, the story should be a rookie hero starting out with an older and slightly washed-up supergroup - they aren't top rung, but they are effective in what they do. Rookie learns the ropes vs some other groups (importantly: Nemesis) - the writer could have fun with some superhero tropes here, if they wanted - but stumbles across the fact that the Rikti have re-opened the portal to their homeworld and are restocking.

Prior to I10, the Rikti are scary, but the population on Earth are effectively under siege. They've been locked down and will eventually run out of logistics to conduct an effective fight with. To this extent, the Freedom Phalanx lets Vanguard deal with them and is now worried about what is going on in the Rogue Isles. This is why it is a little bit hard to convince them that the Rikti are a growing threat and why the rookie hero and his SG have to provide more solid proof of what is going on. Somewhere in this would be a flashback / remembrances of what the Rikti did the first time around, probably tied into some of the characters of the SG.

At this point there would be the mission where you fight the robot versions of Manitcore and Positron in the script - there's the twist on the villains. So it becomes a race against time to knock out the militant leader and install the traditionalist or see another full-scale invasion against a better prepared Rikti.

It has to be one movie that is self contained. No point worrying about explaining everything in the sequel, or detailing CoH/V lore in detail. If you get the three picture deal, worry about CoV in the second one and the Coming Storm in the third.