Makers and stars of fantasy movies face the toughest of audiences: their fans

By Anthony Breznican
The Associated Press

DENIS POROY / AP Dressed as "Star Wars" characters, Yvette Perono and her brother Steven ride the escalator Saturday at the Comic-Con convention in San Diego.

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Now Hollywood has discovered a place where it can try to leap that fan skepticism in a single bound: Comic-Con International.

The sci-fi gathering was attended by about 80,000 people over the weekend, including celebrities and filmmakers from such upcoming films as "Batman Begins," "Fantastic Four" and "Constantine," who tried to show their reverence for the comic-book characters they are bringing to the screen.

"There are 80,000 people who are going to pass through here, and there are only 35,000 at the Democratic convention. What does that tell you?" said Lance Henriksen, star of the upcoming "Alien vs. Predator" film.

Thus Michael Chiklis, Emmy-winning star of "The Shield," showed up to talk about his new role next summer as The Thing — the mutated, orange rock-man from "Fantastic Four" — and outed himself as a fellow comic-book geek.

"When I was 18, I said, 'If they ever make a "Fantastic Four" movie I'm going to play Ben Grimm [The Thing's human name]. ... I had a big affinity for [The Thing] — a kinship for the lovable lug with a temper."

Unlike people who favor comedies, dramas, mysteries, thrillers or romance, the sci-fi and fantasy fans take a possessive stance on their entertainment and relentlessly hound transgressions in chat rooms and Web sites in the months leading up to a movie's release.

Such aficionados turned green with anger over the computer animation for "The Hulk" and mercilessly whipped Halle Berry's leather dominatrix costume in "Catwoman." But when fans approve, they show up again and again, and tell their friends.

"Constantine," which stars Keanu Reeves as the title character, a vigilante who comes back from the dead to fight evil, had a number of hurdles to overcome at Comic-Con.

Director Francis Lawrence said the movie title was changed from the original "Hellblazer" because it was too close to "Hellraiser," the horror series about the demon Pinhead. The look of "Constantine" also is different: Once blond and British, Constantine is now the dark-haired American Reeves. Lawrence said he felt confident the "Hellblazer" comics lovers could be persuaded to accept the changes.

Other movies that fit into the fantasy genre, but are not necessarily comic-book adaptations, also showed up at Comic-Con to win approval.
 
But fans don't just want respect for the characters; they also want respect for themselves.

When Sarah Michelle Gellar arrived Saturday to promote her upcoming horror thriller, "The Grudge," the first question she got was: Why, during seven years of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," had she never visited Comic-Con before?

Gellar had anticipated that question and read a top-10 list of joke excuses. The audience laughed only sporadically; they wanted a real answer.

They eventually warmed to her, but first she had to give them some tough love.

When one woman asked Gellar whether she ever turned to her characters for the inspiration to solve real problems, the actress quipped: "You know they're not real, right?"

That finally earned her an unrestrained laugh.

Such a hard-core fan base must be taken seriously, said Henriksen of "Alien vs. Predator."

"They are critical," he said. "Say this movie comes out and doesn't hit every note; that will be letting them down and they're going to get really mad."