Almost every Marvel movie comes down to one question: What does it mean to be a hero? It's the lynchpin of every single origin story the MCU has told over the last ten years and often carries into sequels and team movies. It's a fair question, one that is ultimately at the core of most superhero stories in any medium. The problem is that with rare exception it's the only real theme behind the MCU. With films like Iron Man 3 focusing on PTSD and the media's culpability in the perpetuation of terrorism or Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 exploring the complexities of family dynamics, it shows Marvel can stray from their basic premise, yet they rarely do.
Warner Bros., on the other hand, has allowed their DC Comics filmmakers to center each film around central questions that are unique to each film. Man of Steel explores alienation and "destiny versus choice." Batman v. Superman explores Superman's place in a very real modern age of pessimism and skepticism. And, as simple as it may be, Wonder Woman's entire story is anchored around the theme of love and the idea that humankind is inherently good and worth fighting for. These films may tackle these ideas with varying degrees of success; they might not provide the "right" answers to the questions they pose, but rarely does a DC film fail to at least try to engage its audience on a level beyond the one that every single superhero movie from the last 20 years has.
