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What is the worst cinematic universe company intro?

Which is the most unholy, vile of all introductory sequences?

  • Marvel

    Votes: 30 8.3%

  • DC

    Votes: 30 8.3%

  • Dark Universe

    Votes: 118 32.6%

  • Call of Duty

    Votes: 138 38.1%

  • DreamWorks

    Votes: 31 8.6%

  • SEGA

    Votes: 3 0.8%

  • Other

    Votes: 12 3.3%
  • Total voters
    362
WaveBird

WaveBird

Member
Oct 29, 2017
1,793
I really dislike the Star Wars one just because of how long it takes to get a show going. When I was watching Andor it just felt like it took forever to get to the actual show.

But now that I've seen Call of Duties, probably theirs. Had no idea it existed as I haven't really played since MW3 era games but man, that just isn't good.
 
Htown

Htown

Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,353
I don't like the Star Wars one.

"Here's some fuckin helmets and droid heads in a dark room, I guess."

Why bother? Might as well just skip to the Star Wars text.
 

Deleted member 8579

Oct 26, 2017
33,843
Star Wars one is awful, soulless and I don't need to be reminded of that trilogy or C3PO!

Old Marvel one was way better.
 
Rated-G

Rated-G

Member
Oct 29, 2017
1,376
I could have sworn the DreamWorks one was just a special thing for their 25th anniversary? I've only seen it for one movie so far but the way I understood the tweet when this was revealed it was just for that.

Kind of like how the current Disney 100 intro has more legacy stuff around the castle like Pride Rock and stuff.
 
LewieP

LewieP

Member
Oct 26, 2017
18,193
The DC one is so bad, for much the same reason that their movies have mostly sucked whilst they've been using it:

"don't show any faces, because we might recast anyone at any time"

"shove in a bunch of characters at the end, even though we'll never use all of them, because the vast majority of what we will ever do just centres around batman and a few others"

I'm sure it'll get a new one under James Gunn though.

Classic EA doesn't get enough respect for this. Even for games I didn't play/enjoy, they did a great job of this. A consistent and highly recognizable brand, but tweaked to fit the vibe of whatever the game is.

About a third of the way in:

youtu.be

EA / Electronic Arts ALL INTRO LOGOS (1983 - 2019)

Everything Electroniic Arts intro-logo= 1983 - 2019 =EA Games / EA Sports / EA Kids / EA Interactive Stories and more...
youtu.be youtu.be
 
Lkr

Lkr

Member
Oct 28, 2017
9,748
CoD is the worst and also the most hilarious. i've played 10 games in this series and couldn't identify a single character for you
 

Deleted member 34949

Account closed at user request
Banned
Nov 30, 2017
19,101
The Sega one is awesome and doesn't seem inappropriate at all.

First time seeing that CoD one, that's hilarious
 
Kalentan

Kalentan

Member
Oct 25, 2017
45,215
Nerdkiller said:
Who in the hell even cares about CoD's characters that much to warrent this?
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Ironically, more than you'd think lol.

Like it's actually kind of funny in that video that they said that the more character driven stuff is a recent CoD thing and that the older games not so much. When the Black Ops games (1 and 2 in particular), and older Sledgehammer games were always more character driven. In fact the last CoD where you just controlled a "grunt" was probably... sort of MW3? Otherwise they've had a heavy focus on the characters outside of the Pre-CoD4 and OG MW trilogy. And even then, Price, Soap, Ghost, and so on were wildly popular characters.
 
The Chosen One

The Chosen One

Member
Oct 26, 2017
6,929
The Sega one, cot damn, it brings a tear to my eye.

It's like a deep bear hug to all long-time Sega fans., saying "I haven't forgotten our childhood together, even the obscure games we used to play."

Edit: For example, in whatever intro Nintendo comes up with, I doubt we'll see the Virtual Boy or Elite Beat Agents in their collage in the way we saw the Sega Saturn and Space Channel 5 in Sega's.
 
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VinylCassette64

VinylCassette64

The Fallen
Oct 26, 2017
2,455
The Marvel logo is an interesting case in that technically, the original "comic flipbook" logo is still used....just on Marvel productions not handled by Marvel Studios. In other words, go book your tickets for any and all upcoming Sony non-MCU Spider-Man movies. *shrug*

(Though I think I may slightly prefer the "Phase 2" version of the logo over the current one. It's an interesting midway point between the pre-MS "flipbook" logo and the current MS logo we've had since Phase 3; and I kinda prefer the way the theme music ends.)

The Dark Universe one just comes off as hilarious rather than actively terrible; just for the sheer amount of hubris on display at the time and the shining relic of dishonor it merely exists as now. It's not for nothing that people were either cracking jokes, or telling true stories; that there were reports of laughter in theatrical screenings for the The Mummy 2017 when the film opened with that logo.

I don't know if I'd call it the worst in the thread (I would say it's probably the most self-congratulatory of the lot); but that DreamWorks logo hurts a lot in the sense of this is what it replaced.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6n3B01aRcvA

It's a simple concept with such a visually striking execution (it's a mix of 2D animation and CG, with a gorgeous painted look, and emphasis on that last bit--this would had fit perfectly with Puss in Boots: The Last Wish's aesthetics instead of the new logo).

Now to go against the thread premise, I'm going to offer what I think is a great "cinematic universe" company intro. I love how Laika's closing credits logo is a medley of all of the films they've done so far, with each latest film getting it's own reference added on to the end. Can't wait to see what they do with their next animated film Wildwood (whenever that's finished or released).


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRX-U-6AVzs
 
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DanGo

DanGo

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,779
Most of them suck. I don't think highly of the Marvel movies, so that might color things, but the Marvel intros are really tacky since they just utilize all the promo shots for marketing and merchandising. It's just a string of those bad cutout power poses that you'd see on a toy package or one of those cheap non-theatrical posters they'd sell at Toys R Us back in the day.

The Star Wars one is similarly bad, since it also relies on the kinda of generic promo art given out to their licensing partners.

Pop-O-Matic said:
The Marvel one especially hurts because they had the PERFECT intro before they blew up:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75BYdIw0W_Q
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This one, however, is cool.
 
Sande

Sande

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,075
The Dark Universe. For the obvious reason, and also it's just kind of ugly and boring. Call of Duty is a close second.

Has that Playstation intro actually been used in something? It seems to always just be the Marvel copycat one with characters from that specific game.
 
Malverde

Malverde

One Winged Slayer
Avenger
Oct 27, 2017
3,637
Unceded Tongva and Acjachemen land
The PlayStation one particularly bothers me for 1) being a shameless ripoff and 2) not feeling like a celebration of all things playstation. No Ape Escape? Twisted Metal? Jak and Dexter? Patapon? Killzone?
 
roguesquirrel

roguesquirrel

The Fallen
Oct 29, 2017
5,498
The sheer hubris behind the Dark Universe one is massively funny but I think "what if we showed the DARK SIDE of the Universal logo for our DARK UNIVERSE?" is at least a unique spin on things while the CoD & Sony ones are pure "we bought the MCU intro off wish" vibes
 
Liam Allen-Miller

Liam Allen-Miller

Member
Nov 2, 2017
6,863
Shibuya
Call of Duty and Dark Universe are so terrible for different reasons. Dark Universe looks reasonably nice but as mentioned before in this thread, the absolute hubris of the thing is what gets me. Call of Duty's doesn't even look nice to me, even before getting into the actual content on display In the logo.

I still dig Marvel's- I think it was a cool original thing that they did and I have no issue with it. I appreciate that it gets updated over time and the variant versions have been nice. Personally I really hate Star Wars' opener. To me, it was always self evident that everything Star Wars was taking place in a shared space. I didn't need a drab opener showing me classic characters to highlight what was always known.
 
Sande

Sande

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,075
The first 15 seconds of the Marvel intro are perfect. I'm lukewarm on the scenes on letters thing. Funnily enough that's the part everyone copies.
 
Khanimus

Khanimus

Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
40,614
Greater Vancouver
JasonMCG said:
I dislike like the Star Wars one (aside from the music). It doesn't relay the idea of a universe full of heroes, rogues, and villains to me at all.


View: https://youtu.be/0XKgwINUNj0
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The Star Wars one is awful lol

You have Star Wars and then do this anemic nothing of an intro? Know what you could do? Just start your movie with a big 'STAR WARS' taking up the screen. Paired with like... I dunno, a really iconic anthem to catch your attention or something...
 
Night

Night

Late to the party
Member
Nov 1, 2017
5,266
Clearwater, FL
I just reviewed them all and it's a tie between Star Wars and PlayStation for me. Mainly because they should be way more impressive given what they represent.

Dark Universe is so bad too, though. Especially considering they counted their chickens before they hatched.
 
Mr. Sam

Mr. Sam

Member
Oct 26, 2017
1,031
I saw the Dreamworks one before the new (excellent) Puss in Boots film and it took me a minute to recover.
 
Shyranui

Shyranui

Member
Oct 29, 2017
744
Spain
As a massive fan of Star Wars... it's Star Wars.
Just a slideshow of helmets. They couldn't find anything more boring and unmemorable.
 
GamerJM

GamerJM

Member
Nov 8, 2017
15,795
Dark Universe because it feels like a cheap corruption of the classic Universal opening. I actually think it looks the worst even taking aside the hubris. It looks fake.
 
PeakPointMatrix

PeakPointMatrix

Member
Oct 25, 2017
19,461
Psamtik said:
The new Dreamworks one is godawful. The very definition of fixing something that wasn't broken.
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I think it's a direct response in educating mass audiences which movies are theirs; a huge pet peeve in animation circles is hearing the average person think all animated films come from Pixar or Disney. Illumination has the Minions littering their logo, I think it's fair game if DW wants to further set themselves apart with their own IPs in this very direct way.
 
D O T

D O T

Member
Jan 1, 2021
4,303
the first thing I noticed on that sega intro was Welkin from Valkyria Chronicles. Maaan, sega need to make a new sequel, or at least a remaster port of 2 and 3 for this gen.
 
SunGodNika

SunGodNika

Member
Jul 11, 2022
527
LewieP said:
The DC one is so bad, for much the same reason that their movies have mostly sucked whilst they've been using it:

"don't show any faces, because we might recast anyone at any time"

"shove in a bunch of characters at the end, even though we'll never use all of them, because the vast majority of what we will ever do just centres around batman and a few others"

I'm sure it'll get a new one under James Gunn though.

Classic EA doesn't get enough respect for this. Even for games I didn't play/enjoy, they did a great job of this. A consistent and highly recognizable brand, but tweaked to fit the vibe of whatever the game is.

About a third of the way in:

youtu.be

EA / Electronic Arts ALL INTRO LOGOS (1983 - 2019)

Everything Electroniic Arts intro-logo= 1983 - 2019 =EA Games / EA Sports / EA Kids / EA Interactive Stories and more...
youtu.be youtu.be
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
DC's formula has been hiring directors they don't trust, butchering their films, and then repeatedly breaking glass on Batman, because he's the only superhero who you can't fail with. Not even Joel Schumacher failed with Batman, and he tried his damndest.

If there will no longer be a shared universe, then they should just do character-specific logos instead.
 
Keldroc

Keldroc

Member
Oct 27, 2017
12,071
Htown said:
I don't like the Star Wars one.

"Here's some fuckin helmets and droid heads in a dark room, I guess."

Why bother? Might as well just skip to the Star Wars text.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Yeah as silly as so many of the others are, this one is actively annoying. Both due to the time it takes up, the lack of interesting visual, and the very obvious "chose these so nobody gets paid likeness royalties" element of it. Just run the fucking show already.
 
Kneefoil

Kneefoil

Member
Oct 25, 2017
4,487
I think the intro sequence to Dark Universe actually works. Their attempts at filling that universe ended in failure, but I don't hold that against the intro.

Call of Duty, though, I laughed out loud when I first saw it. I simply could not believe they were doing it. There's the glorification of war, but also, I don't believe you could find many people that care about the characters or stories shown in the intro. Yet, they're really trying to convince you that these guys are so cool and you should try to be like them.

The CoD intro is both sad and funny but it's not meant to be either.
 
Yakumo Fuji

Yakumo Fuji

Member
Apr 22, 2019
293
My instant thought when I saw the thread title was Star Wars. So glad that it has been mentioned here. It is absolutely dire.
 
Jimnymebob

Jimnymebob

Member
Oct 26, 2017
19,774
I like the idea of the Dark Universe one, but it feels like it lacks polish: like it doesn't feel as official as the Universal logo.

I also kinda hate the MCU one. The Marvel Studios one was fantastic until they started doing the DOOM 64 3D letters thing, and then they made it even worse by focusing on the MCU as opposed to comics.
 
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