Top five superhero movies of 2017: Logan and Wonder Woman find a place in the list

These are the top superhero movies this year.

This is turning out to be a decade of superhero-based movies. Studios are well aware that superheroes are popular and movies based on them would lure in a large number of moviegoers. Thus, Disney, Warner Bros, and Fox are capitalising on the trend by releasing several movies every year based on superheroes from DC and Marvel. This year too saw the release of many huge, long-unexpected releases and while most of them did well both critically and commercially, many others did not fulfill expectations.

So here is our list of top five superhero movies of 2017, ranked from worst to best. Sadly, Justice League did not make the cut. I did love watching it, but that was because I had long hoped to see those heroes come alive on big screen, and not because it was a well-made movie.

5. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2: Let’s face it. Without Guardians of the Galaxy, Thor: Ragnarok would not exist. It was that James Gunn directorial that reminded us of the fact we willfully forget: the superhero is a joke. Nothing about spandex-clad beings killing bad guys makes sense. The second iteration in the series came with a better villain and an even more adorable Groot, but there was nothing terribly new that had not been done in the first movie. Still, it was undeniably entertaining and the final sequence (Yondu’s funeral) made everything worthwhile.

4. Spider-man: Homecoming: Tom Holland’s brief appearance as the friendly neighbourhood web-slinger in Captain America: Civil War actually got universal praise, so it was natural that a standalone movie will come. It did, and we fell in love with a more innocent and relatable Spider-man than either of the earlier live-action takes.

3. Thor: Ragnarok: I never would have believed that Taika Watiti could transition so smoothly from small but charming indie comedies to a big-budged superhero movie, and the result was a fast-paced and one of the funniest superhero movies ever made. What was surprising (for me, that is) was the visual quality of the film. Some scenes like Hela vs the Valkyries were like a photorealistic painting.

2. Wonder Woman: This Patty Jenkins directorial was a relatively minor film that nobody at Warner Bros must have taken seriously. But it unexpectedly became a grand success and the first (and till now, the only one) for DC’s Extended Universe. Starring Israeli Gal Gadot as the Amazonian warrior goddess, the film was more reminiscent of Christopher Reeve’s Superman movies than any recent fare in the optimism aspect and also in underling what superheroes really mean.

1. Logan: Hugh Jackman’s swan song as Wolverine was the X-Men film we needed. It strayed away from superhero film tropes, but did not sacrifice on the action, which was relentless and yet never tiresome. A dark-toned, and brilliantly directed and acted film, Logan may be the only film that is worthy enough to challenge Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight for the throne of best superhero film ever made.