Seth Rogen Says Marvel Movies Are Made For Kids

Comedian Seth Rogen tells all that Marvel Mmvies are ‘geared towards kids.’ The actor reveals his thoughts about the MCU in an interview with Total Film.

Rogen is known for comedic roles like The Interview, This Is The End, and Sausage Party. Even though he’s known for his comedic talents, he has done a lot of serious roles too. Just recently, he starred in Steven Spielberg’s The Fableman. He’s also part of the animated adaptation of the comic The Invincible for Amazon Prime.

The actor has done work behind the scenes such as writing, directing and producing films and TV shows. He wrote Superbad and Pineapple Express. He also produced Sausage Party and Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising. He directed This Is The End and The Interview. And he has been working actively as a producer on the live-action adaptation of The Boys, which is also on Amazon Prime.

In an interview with Total Film, he said:

One of the first things we ever bonded over was a love of comic books. I still have all the comic books I grew up with somewhere. I would go to the comic-book store every week. So as someone who just loves these stories, and always fantasized about seeing them brought to life, I think it’s cool. I like a lot of the films.

Rogen admits that he loves the medium. It’s something he grew up with. And seeing it in live action is something many of us comic book fans have been wanting to see.

I think that Kevin Feige is a brilliant guy, and I think a lot of the filmmakers he’s hired to make these movies are great filmmakers. But as someone who doesn’t have children… It is [all] kind of geared toward kids, you know? There are times where I will forget. I’ll watch one of these things, as an adult with no kids, and be like, ‘Oh, this is just not for me.’

Marvel Movies Are Just Not For Him, Says Seth Rogen

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Not everyone is a fan of Marvel. Filmmakers like Francis Ford Coppola and Martin Scorsese have told the public that Marvel is not cinema. Scorsese said that Marvel movies are like theme park rides. Ridley Scott doesn’t like either Marvel or DC-related films.

But Seth Rogen is a fan of comic books. Just like any comic book fan, especially if one is a collector, it’s not just Marvel or DC that you’ll be reading. Even DC comics made a separate brand just to define their mature content with DC Vertigo which produced The Sandman, Swamp Thing and Constantine.

I remember when the first issue of The Boys came out. We were big fans of [writer/creator] Garth Ennis, because we’d read Preacher already, and we bought it. We had the same experience that I think, now, audiences are having, which is: ‘Oh, we’ve been reading Marvel for the last 15 years and now there’s starting to be stuff like this, which is a great addition to this landscape. It’s [the same genre] but not considering younger audiences in the slightest. If anything, it’s much more geared towards adult audiences.

There are several shows now under DC and Marvel, but both of them have been focused mainly on the general audience. Even Netflix has tried making their own with Jupiter’s Legacy, but has found more success with The Umbrella Academy. The Umbrella Academy also has a mature rating since season 3. Even with movies, the superhero comedy Deadpool has found an audience with its mature rating.

Even the animated show Invincible, starring Steve Yuen, is focused on a mature audience.

I think just as naturally to us as The Boys fell into the comic-book-store landscape as a comic, we thought it would fall well into the media landscape as a TV show. But truthfully, without Marvel, The Boys wouldn’t exist or be interesting. I’m aware of that. I think if it was only Marvel, it would be bad. But I think it isn’t – clearly. An example I’m always quoting is, there’s a point in history where a bunch of filmmakers would have been sitting around, being like, ‘Do you think we’ll ever make a movie that’s not a western again? Everything’s a western! Westerns dominate the fucking movies. If it doesn’t have a hat and a gun and a carriage, people aren’t going to go see it anymore.’

Seth Rogen Loves Comics, Just Different Ones

Credit: Amazon Prime

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Even though Marvel’s movies didn’t start the comic book genre of films, they did popularize it. Because of MCU, DC has been trying to catch up, and other companies have been looking into other superhero comics to adapt.

While DC did have the Arrowverse, which was successful for a while. But its family-friendly tone and stretched-out story lines did push away some of their audiences.

Amazon Prime’s mature-oriented show The Boys has been one of the best TV shows that feature superheroes. Three seasons in and it’s still getting good reviews from Rotten Tomatoes. The third season has been labelled “Certified Fresh” and holds an approval rating of 98%.

The situation, sadly, is that we now have two separate fields: There’s worldwide audiovisual entertainment, and there’s cinema. They still overlap from time to time, but that’s becoming increasingly rare. And I fear that the financial dominance of one is being used to marginalize and even belittle the existence of the other.

No one can deny that Marvel films have been a powerhouse in terms of blockbuster box office films. They are not immune to bad films. But they still have a strong audience regardless of what critics or audiences say. Some just watch it just because it’s a Marvel film.

While original movies feel like it’s struggling to break into the market. Some filmmakers have opted to release their films through streaming because it has a better chance of being seen than put beside a Marvel film.

This is not Seth Rogen’s first foray into comic book adaptations. Yes, we know him from The Green Hornet, but that one came originally from a radio drama. Rogen produced Preacher back in 2016 for AMC, which starred Dominic Cooper. The series lasted for four seasons.

Preacher was made under DC’s imprint Vertigo. In the comics, The Boys is actually part of that same universe as the Preacher.

The actor loves comics, and it shows. But yes, his preference for comics has changed. He’s just not into the mainstream brands. He’s just into more mature titles like The Boys and Preacher.

What do you think of Seth Rogen’s perception of Marvel movies? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

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