Confessions of a Comic Book Guy is a weekly column by Steve Bennett of Super-Fly Comics and Games in Yellow Springs, Ohio.  This week, Bennett looks at this year's geek movies, the new DC logo, and "We Can Be Heroes."

Roughly about this time every year I feel compelled to compile a list of upcoming 'genre movies' (i.e. comic books/SF/fantasy/horror/TV adaptations).  You know, our kind of movies.  But it's begun to feel a tad superfluous, seeing as how any of you could do the same given ten minutes of free time and access to the 2012 Preview issue of Entertainment Weekly -- both of which I had.  Even now Christian Bale as Batman, wearing what apparently passes for a Batman costume these days (as with 1997's Batman & Robin one indicator that the franchise was well past its best by date was having Batman dress up in unnecessarily overcomplicated and overwrought outfit that's an offense to even the current comic book version), is glaring at me from the cover.  I'm sure I've missed a couple but so far that list includes...

The Dark Knight Rises, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Men In Black 3, Skyfall, Brave, Snow White & the Huntsman, The Hunger Games, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, The Amazing Spider-Man, The Avengers, John Carter, Battleship, Mirror, Mirror, Dark Shadows, Prometheus, Gravity, Total Recall, The Twilight Saga -- Breaking Dawn, The Three Stooges.

I admit I partially do this for myself, as a way of deciding which ones I'm actually looking forward to as opposed to those I'll grudgingly go see.  But as I hurtle ever further away from the all important 18-35 demographic both lists get shorter; these days my preferred method of seeing most big Hollywood releases is in the safety of my home while listening to the Rifftrax commentary.  That's the only way I managed to get through the last two Transformers and is the only circumstance I can conceive where I'd ever see The Hunger Games.

But I also do it so I could ask what I call "the question."  Is the mainstreaming of science fiction and comic book movies good for the comic book industry, a.k.a. "What's in it for us?"  But it has become pretty clear over the years the answer is "not a thing."  It's been pretty firmly established that comic book movies don't translate into higher sales for even the comic books they’re based on.  And they can’t increase mainstream acceptance for geek culture because, well, it’s already an intrinsic component of popular culture, which should be good news for us.  Except it doesn't seem to have made any of us a penny richer.

This year's list is the kind that in decades past would have been at home emblazoned across the special preview issue of Starlog (which was, for those of you weren't there, a magazine that performed for nerds (like me) most of the vital functions of the Internet before there was an Internet).  The fact that these kinds of movies are promoted without a second thought in Entertainment Weekly kind of goes to show just how co-opted geek culture has become; our stuff has gotten so assimilated we’re just another ingredient in the soup.

Well, there's going to be another new DC logo starting in March (see "DC Unveils New Logo").  I've seen them come and I've seen them go and, no sir, I don't like it.  Not out of nostalgia but because it's ugly, overly complicated and just for want of a better word too "designy" (if that actually is a word).  Whoever designed it seems to have forgotten to make it attractive and instantly recognizable.  But in spite of all that it's entirely possible it'll grow on me because I find I really don't mind seeing on actual DC Comics.  In context it makes them look, well, modern.

And, finally, there’s DC Entertainment's We Can Be Heroes, a multi-million initiative to support the efforts of the humanitarian aid groups fighting the hunger crisis in the Horn of Africa.  We all of course remember the well-intentioned benefit comics, Marvel's Heroes for Hope and DC's Heroes Against Hunger but this of course is much, much bigger.  To quote from the press release this is a "Multilayered Campaign To Leverage All Time Warner Advertising Platforms Generating Significant Awareness of the Crisis."  Along with promoting their new version of the Justice League (in a year where Marvel's The Avengers is going to be everywhere).  We Can Be Heroes is going to be its own brand, complete with merchandise it would be easy to be cynical about this, see it as just a PR stunt versus what appears to be an insurmountable problem, but I'd much rather be hopeful as well as grateful to see superheroes atrophied moral authority being used for a change.  If nothing else this should be a reminder that instead of worrying about not being able to do more we should start by at least doing what we can.

The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.