By this point in time, only nine Marvel and DC movies have received a Golden Raspberry Awards nomination for Worst Picture. That’s really not very many considering just how many Marvel and DC films there have been throughout the course of the past 40 years. If anything, even more of them should have been nominated by this point. For instance, how Superman IV: The Quest for Peace wasn’t nominated for Worst Picture is a mystery (though it did receive noms for Worst Visual Effects and Worst Supporting Actress). Other Marvel and DC adaptations that avoided getting the not-so-great main nomination but still got some smaller noms were Jonah Hex, Superman III, Fantastic Four (2005), and Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, among others.
As for panned Marvel and DC movies that didn’t even get a smaller Razzie nomination, the big examples are X-Men Origins: Wolverine and Elektra. So, if films that bad didn’t so much as get a single Razzie nomination, which superhero movies did?
1) Howard the Duck (“Won”)
The Academy Awards has never given two films in a single year the award for Best Picture. It would lessen the clout surrounding the award. The Razzies don’t have that problem, and more than once they’ve given two movies in a single year the Worst Picture pseudo award. For instance, this happened with the 1990 duo of The Adventures of Ford Fairlane and Ghosts Can’t Do It (the latter of which features the current U.S. President in a laughable performance).
The first time this occurred, though, was for the 1986 duds Under the Cherry Moon and Howard the Duck. Both films have gone on to have cult followings, in the case of the former because it was directed by and starred Prince. In terms of the latter, the cult following is attracted to just how utterly outlandish (and often outright inappropriate) the PG-rated Marvel Comics movie is. Howard the Duck was the first theatrical feature film based on a Marvel Comics property. Not the best way to start.
2) Batman & Robin
Batman & Robin is more of a cautionary tale on what not to do when crafting a superhero film than anything else, but as time has gone on it’s achieved something of a begrudging fanbase. Like Batman Forever, it’s a ’90s timepiece. A ridiculous cheeseball of a ’90s timepiece.
It was the most nominated film at the 18th Golden Raspberry Awards, with 11 noms total. It ended up avoiding the “win” for most of those dishonors, though. By the end of the night, only Alicia Silverstone got Worst Supporting Actress. As bad as Batman & Robin is, at least it’s entertaining, the same of which can’t be said of co-nominees for Worst Picture Speed 2: Cruise Control and the victor, The Postman.
3) Catwoman (“Won”)
It’s truly difficult to understand what they were going for with Catwoman. This was the first DC movie in seven years, after the awful one-two punch in 1997 that was Batman & Robin and Steel. One would think, after a break of nearly a decade, they would come back with something that, well, that wasn’t Catwoman.
Like Batman & Robin, Catwoman had the most nominations for its year. Unlike Batman & Robin, Catwoman took home Worst Picture. That’s pretty backhandedly impressive, considering its competitors included White Chicks, Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2, and the worst theatrical Christmas movie to not feature Kirk Cameron, Surviving Christmas. Halle Berry also took home Worst Actress, and she did so in person. Even at the time she knew the movie was a stinky nugget straight out of the cat box.
4) Fantastic Four (“Won”)
Josh Trank’s Fantastic Four feels more like a way to hang onto the rights than a genuine attempt to adapt the quartet to the big screen successfully. It wasn’t the first time a Fantastic Four movie felt that way, either. But, in the case of the 1994 Roger Corman produced movie, retaining the rights was the only goal. That wasn’t the situation for the 2015 movie, which is just an utter disaster of a major studio motion picture, the type of production where almost nothing went right (“almost” because at least the late Reg E. Cathey is solid as Dr. Franklin Storm).
Fantastic Four “won” three of the five awards it was nominated for. Trank got Worst Director while the movie itself took home both Worst Picture (tied with Fifty Shades of Grey) and Worst Remake, Rip-off or Sequel. It’s very rare a movie takes home both of those latter two awards.
[RELATED: The Fantastic Four Trailer from 2015 Promised an Epic Movie Marvel Fans Never Got]
5) Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice
The DCU wasn’t as well-regarded as the MCU from the very beginning. Sometimes that led to Razzie nominations that didn’t quite seem fair, e.g. Kristen Wiig in Wonder Woman 1984. Another example is Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice receiving a Worst Picture nomination. Is it crowded and a bit of a disappointment? Sure, but was it really one of the absolute worst movies of 2016? That’s debatable. At least it’s coherent, which can’t be said of Suicide Squad.
All of the other Worst Picture nominees were certainly worse. These included Dirty Grandpa, Gods of Egypt, Independence Day: Resurgence, Zoolander 2, and Dinesh D’Souza’s nonsensical propaganda Hillary’s America: The Secret History of the Democratic Party (which took the trophy). That said, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice didn’t go home empty-handed, as it “won” Worst Screen Combo, Worst Screenplay, Worst Supporting Actor for Jesse Eisenberg, and Worst Remake, Rip-off or Sequel.
6) Morbius
Morbius may not have “won” Worst Picture, but Jared Leto “won” for playing Morbius. And, yes, the vampiric installment of Sony’s short-lived Spider-Man extended universe did receive a nom.
It ran up against Disney’s Pinocchio (the one with Tom Hanks, not the Guillermo del Toro one), The King’s Daughter, Blonde, and Machine Gun Kelly’s Good Mourning. Blonde “won,” but Ana de Armas also nabbed an Academy Award for Best Actress nomination, so it all evened out to a degree.
7) Shazam! Fury of the Gods
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania may have avoided a Worst Picture nomination (somehow), but it still netted a slew of other nominations at the 44th Golden Raspberry Awards. What did receive a Worst Picture nomination was Shazam! Fury of the Gods.
Somehow, Zachary Levi managed to avoid a Worst Actor nomination for his unmodulated, obnoxious performance, but Helen Mirren received a nom as did Lucy Liu and the film’s screenwriters. Its competitors for Worst Picture were The Exorcist: Believer, Expend4bles, Meg 2: The Trench, and the trophy-grabber, Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey.
8) Joker: Folie á Deux
It will be interesting to see how Joker: Folie á Deux ages. On one hand, the Oscar-winning 2019 film seemed to set up a burgeoning Clown Prince of Crime’s reign over Gotham only for the sequel to throw that all away. So, in terms of typical superhero (or supervillain) franchise trajectories, Joker ended up going well against the grain. People were, quite understandably, quite disappointed. On the other hand, it knows what it wants to be and runs with it. It’s just absolutely no one was asking for what it wanted to be.
Even those who didn’t see what all the loving fuss was about over the first film found Folie á Deux a deeply disappointing follow-up. It quite often can be a slog and, even with Lady Gaga co-leading it, the film falls flat on its face as a musical. But maybe it’s like Babylon, a movie where plenty of notable artists have predicted it will be a flop at the time of release only to eventually develop a rabid following and retrospective clout. Either way, Folie á Deux was a massive misfire, both critically and commercially. But, as far as the 45th Raspberry Awards Worst Picture nominees go, at least it’s better than Madame Web, Borderlands, Reagan, and (depending on how you feel about it) Megalopolis. It was the most-nominated film of the ceremony, with seven total. It “won” two: Worst Screen Combo and Worst Remake, Rip-off or Sequel.
9) Madame Web (“Won”)
As mentioned in the previous entry, Madame Web was one of the nominees for Worst Picture at the 45th ceremony. And, quite rightly, it “won” that award.
It’s hard to think of a superhero movie that is worse than Madame Web. Not impossible, but hard. When it comes to what killed the non-Spider-man-focused wing of Sony’s Spider-Man Universe, this was as important as the critical and commercial failure of Morbius and the tanking of Kraven the Hunter. In fact, given how Kraven the Hunter is quite a bit better than Madame Web (meaning it’s average), one can point to this earlier 2024 film as a major factor in why that latter 2024 film flopped so hard. Fortunately, it seems most of the cast of the boring, poorly edited and poorly dubbed Spider-Man’s Uncle’s coworker movie will move on to better things. For instance, the ultra-talented Isabela Merced is currently starring in The Last of Us and will soon be seen in James Gunn’s Superman.
The post Every Marvel & DC Movie Nominated for a Worst Picture Razzie appeared first on ComicBook.com.
