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Nowadays, superhero stories are perhaps the most popular movie subgenre out there, as proved by how they’re unprecedentedly large cultural phenomenons that rarely fail to break the box office. Honestly, it’s hard to imagine that it will ever get old to watch these paragons of power and righteousness fend off evil and save the day.
However, not all superhero movies settle for a black-and-white representation of heroism. Some of them take a more morally grey approach to their characters, showing the dark side of superhero life and that not all of these characters are always entirely virtuous. Some do this in a laidback, tounge-in-cheek way, like Megamind; while others take a much grittier approach, like Dredd.
10 ‘Darkman’ (1990)
Although superhero movie fans know Sam Raimi best for his acclaimed Spider-Man trilogy, it’s worth remembering that his first incursion into the genre came over a decade before his first adaptation of the Wall-Crawler: Darkman, about a scientist left for dead who embarks on a journey for revenge against those who burned him horrifically.
Darkman is, fittingly enough, a darker kind of superhero story. You might argue that the titular protagonist, a master of disguise with a thirst for vengeance, is more of an antihero than anything else. Either way, the film’s message on broken identity and the effects of unchecked power is as important today as it was in 1990.
9 ‘Dredd’ (2012)
After an alarmingly lackluster adaptation in 1995, fans of Judge Dredd were concerned about the 2012 reimagining. Thankfully, Dredd exceeded all expectations with its faithful take on the character and thrilling over-the-top action, some of the best of the 2010s.
Superheroes are often embodiments of justice. In the dark, crime-ridden dystopian future where Dredd acts as judge, jury, and executioner, the hero played brilliantly by Karl Urban represents a dark and ruthless form of justice that often blurs the line between heroism and violent authoritarianism.
8 ‘The Crow’ (1994)
Though The Crow is most famous for the tragic story of its production, it’s a film much more deserving of praise than it gets nowadays. The late Brandon Lee is incredible in the lead role, a murdered man who is brought back from the dead by supernatural forces to seek revenge.
The film explores themes of loss and the darkness that stems from it, showing a main character that’s constantly struggling to keep his humanity alight in the face of the rage that consumes him. The Crow shows that a hero’s quest for justice and selflessness can be filled with grisly violence.
7 Guillermo Del Toro’s ‘Hellboy’ Duology
Leave it to Guillermo Del Toro to explore complex themes through a darkly magical tone. The director has dipped his toes into many subgenres over the course of his career, including superhero movies on a couple of occasions: Hellboy and Hellboy II: The Golden Army, which remain the two best possible adaptations that fans of the story could hope for.
Both films present interesting morally ambiguous situations, and a hero haunted by his dark origins. Hellboy is a stand-in for those grappling with the shadows inside them, showing the fight for what’s right will always manage to beat those shadows.
6 ‘Watchmen’ (2009)
Zack Snyder is well known for his darker, grittier interpretations of superhero stories. That kind of tone may not always work perfectly, but it’s hard to argue that it certainly worked for his take on Watchmen, based on Alan Moore‘s legendary graphic novel.
The characters of Watchmen are some of the most complex in the genre, morally ambiguous and hard to call superheroes per se. That’s precisely where the story’s strength comes from: It’s a provocative and profound examination of vigilantism, nihilism, and the flaws that can cause society to decay.
5 ‘Megamind’ (2010)
In its time, Megamind was dismissed as just another above-average DreamWorks Animation movie, and nothing more. In recent years, it has garnered a cult following appreciative of its brilliantly written narrative and great satirical take on the superhero genre. It has great animation, nuanced characters, and some of the best needledrops in the studio’s whole filmography.
When the movie begins, Megamind is nothing short of a supervilllain. The comedic story sees the protagonist go through an existential crisis in search of meaning and purpose. Through a wacky family-friendly story, the movie shows that no one is born or made truly good or evil, but that their choices are what define who they are.
4 ‘The Dark Knight’ Trilogy
Most superhero fans willl tell you that when it comes to trilogies in the subgenre, it hardly gets any better than Christopher Nolan‘s take on Batman in his Dark Knight trilogy. Superhero stories had rarely been grittier or more grounded in reality before, and audiences and critics alike loved that.
All three films in the series find different ways of pushing Batman to his limits, placing him in situations that test his values and morality. Dual identities, darkness, and the effects of vigilantism are all themes that the trilogy is concerned with, and it explores them in the most interesting of ways.
3 ‘Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse’ (2023)
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse had a massive task on its shoulders, but to no one’s surprise, it managed to exceed them. The animation is staggering, the abundance of awesome versions of Spider-Man is a delight for fans, and the story is marvelously written and executed.
The film is a brilliant examination of the very concept of superheroes, with a unique perspective on backstories and the effect of loss on these beloved kinds of characters, proposing the possibility that they needn’t suffer a grim twist of fate in order to become heroes. Miguel O’Hara, a fan favorite alternate version of Spidey, serves as Across the Spider-Verse‘s antagonist, and it’ll be fascinating to see how his role evolves in the sequel.
2 ‘Logan’ (2017)
James Mangold took the world by storm in 2017 with Logan. Though it wasn’t the last film in Fox’s X-Men franchise, it certainly felt like a swan song—And what a swan song it was, bringing the story of Wolverine and Professor X to a moving close in a bleak, modernized version of a Neo-Western.
Logan shows an aging, more vulnerable version of Wolverine as he’s forced to grapple with the effects of mortality as it begins to catch up to him. It’s the most violent and morally grey version of the character that the franchise has seen, showing the isolation that can come from the superhero lifestyle for someone like Logan.
1 ‘The Batman’ (2022)
Movie versions of the Caped Crusader are aplenty, but few are as nuanced, compelling, and faithful to the source material as Robert Pattinson‘s version in The Batman. The film is a fascinating neo-noir detective story, combining the best elements of all previous live-action depictions of the hero.
The Batman shows a version of the Dark Knight who’s in his early years of fighting crime, still learning to channel his rage and mark a distinction between his Bruce Wayne and Batman personas. The film’s message is one of hope, where Batman learns that he must channel his anger and thirst for vengeance into a quest for justice that allows him to become Gotham City’s beacon of light.
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