After the success of Superman II, Richard Donner is hired to direct a third film. The film focuses upon the marriage of Clark Kent to Lois Lane, whose happiness of broken by an invasion of Earth by Braniac. Superman ends up giving his life to destroy Brainiac and save his adopted home; in the end it is revelaed that Lois is pregant with his baby. For decades, the people argue over whether the Superman or Star Wars trilogy were the better film series.
In 1982, going off the success of the Superman series, DC greenlights a film version of Green Latern, which is to take place in the same universe as the Superman films. Burt Reynolds is chosen as the star to play the socky and arrogant Hal Jordan. Although older than many wish, Reynolds brings star power to the role.
This eventually leads to the greenlighting of a series of comic book based films throughout the 1980s. Marvel soon gets into the game by producing Spider-Man, staring Jeff Goldblum as Peter Parker, and quickly also created a big-screen adapation of their television show 'The Incrediblel Hulk" in 1986. This lead to "The Avengers" 1987.
The comic book movie trend is often seen as reaching its height with the Tim Burton/Daniel Day Lewis "Batman" series of 1986-92" (the first of which featured Johnny Depp as the Joker in then Oscar winning performance) despite the controversy caused by Day-Lewis' arrest in 1985, stemming from his arrest, and later release, after beating a mugger near to death while on 'patrol' while researching his role.