Joek3rr
Master Member
You're thinking of Cade Skywalker. He lived approximately 130 years after Luke
Disney could sell Lucasfilm ?
- Thread starter bwayne64
- Start date
kamandi
Sr Member
He used drugs to drown out the Force and suppress his ability to hear Luke's ghost.
Joek3rr
Master Member
These days with a few exceptions, I find I don't care for much, post-TCW. I just finished the three Clone Wars omnibuses from Dark Horse. Holy crap were they good. TCW can take a hike.
HeartBlade
Sr Member
Maybe Jedi, like humans in LotR, live for a very long time. Aragon is like 800 years old. That’s baby years for him lol. He does still kinda converse with Luke’s force ghost so he is aware of him and isn’t too far apart in genealogy.
I thought they did a better job with “force healing” with Cade too. It being specifically a dark side power also added weight to Cade’s struggle to use it as well as fit the “kind of established” lore of Sith using the Dark side to live unnaturally long lives and Palguis learning to “conquer death” through the Dark side unlike ST where Rey has it cause whatever and there doesn’t seem to be much cost.
I feel that’s been a general trend with movies and storytelling at the time where “subverting expectations” and breaking down and analyzing the hero and exploring their flaws is the “in” thing to do. We also had that with Craig Bond who is much more emotional and gloomy compared to his previous entries. Maybe it was because Game of Thrones which “subverted” the traditional heroic fantasy took off in a big way so everyone wanted to get in to the “heroes army infallible and can lose” genre of storytelling.
Problem is this really only works when you use is rarely and there is hope for redemption at the end imo. Heroes can begin sad and struggle but they have to have a happy triumphant ending or it’s just depression fodder.
HeartBlade
Sr Member
True. It could have been one short scene but seeing all three together and happy would have been a nice bit of service to the fans.
Thats probably why then lol. On a more serious note, why are there so many articles criticizing movies for “giving the fans what they want” like that is a bad thing? Its the fans that pay for this stuff.
They mock fans and fan service because the people who write those articles are shills for the studio and if the studio can use the media to discredit any criticism from fans, they'll use it to deflect. These types get free merchandise or exclusive access to premieres, connections to industry insiders, etc. We've even seen some of these types exposed for their laughable bias in the last few years. Does anyone recall Christian Harloff who defended every single choice Lucasfilm made during the Sequel Trilogy, only to pitch a fit when he wasn't given early access to Galaxy's Edge when his other shill media coworkers at Collider got in? Yeah. These guys are in the back pocket of Lucasfilm and they're not the exception, they're the rule. If you work in entertainment media, you have to walk that line of not pissing Disney off or you won't get access and can't do your job.
These types only say what tows the company line or they get cut off, left to fend for themselves. The reason why YouTube saw a boom in the form of content creators opposed to this was in direct response to sites like Collider, which poses as a site for fans but is actually bought and paid for. YouTube creators got sick of the studios and the media slandering them so they made their own channels to give the honest perspective of long time fans, not the regurgitated lies that Lucasfilm has been peddling the last decade that they care about the fans. They don't care about you. Like with anything else you have to select your viewing habits wisely, but for as much as you hear people whine about "click-bait YouTubers" you'll find an equal amount of Lucasfilm media shills who have far less credibility because they have zero objectivity. It's tough biting the hand that feeds but if it suits them or becomes incovenient for them, they will cut you loose like a dirty secret, happy to pile on you if need be.
If Johnny Depp got cut off at his lowest because Disney was gutless to stand next to him during his trial, don't think for one second that nobodies like us have a chance if Lucasfilm deems us to be a problem. So be wary if you decide to defend Lucasfilm because you do so at your own peril and they might just leave you high and dry in the end.
These types only say what tows the company line or they get cut off, left to fend for themselves. The reason why YouTube saw a boom in the form of content creators opposed to this was in direct response to sites like Collider, which poses as a site for fans but is actually bought and paid for. YouTube creators got sick of the studios and the media slandering them so they made their own channels to give the honest perspective of long time fans, not the regurgitated lies that Lucasfilm has been peddling the last decade that they care about the fans. They don't care about you. Like with anything else you have to select your viewing habits wisely, but for as much as you hear people whine about "click-bait YouTubers" you'll find an equal amount of Lucasfilm media shills who have far less credibility because they have zero objectivity. It's tough biting the hand that feeds but if it suits them or becomes incovenient for them, they will cut you loose like a dirty secret, happy to pile on you if need be.
If Johnny Depp got cut off at his lowest because Disney was gutless to stand next to him during his trial, don't think for one second that nobodies like us have a chance if Lucasfilm deems us to be a problem. So be wary if you decide to defend Lucasfilm because you do so at your own peril and they might just leave you high and dry in the end.
Joek3rr
Master Member
I think the problem is, most fan service is nothing more than hollow nostalgia bait..... looking at you Dave and Jon. What's better is when you craft a film that fans didn't know they wanted to see, until they see it.
CT1138
Sr Member
Any day now, I promise! And then they're gonna decanonize the ST, hire ONLY SW fans to make the movies (regardless of whether they know what they're doing, or what makes a good movie), and Kathleen Kennedy will commit seppuku for her destructive transgressions against our beloved franchise!
Source: trust me bro!
Solo4114
Master Member
Yeah, man, anyone taking this seriously is trippin' ballz. Disney isn't selling LFL.
To be fair, whatever the outraged fan reactions are, the new Star Wars trilogy made a lot of goddamn money. It's not an especially well-told story, and it's clear they had no plan and let JJ faff about with his whole style, but it still made plenty of money.
You ask me, KK's real screwup has much more to do with hiring Lord & Miller for Solo, letting it get waaaaaay too far in, and then having to hire Ron Howard to un**** the film. The Solo film itself is a terrific, very entertaining movie. I did not have any interest in it initially because "Why the hell would I want a Solo origin story?" but it actually helped solidify something for me that I'll get to later. And I enjoyed the hell out of it and would love to see more films with those actors in that world, or spin off into other characters. Gimme the Donald Glover Lando trilogy, man!
Meh. Don't care. After the first one, I didn't like any of the other films I saw, and I tapped out at #3.
My understanding was that the Little Mermaid and a lot of the live-action adaptations have been designed primarily for the overseas market, rather than the domestic one. I thought that was where they'd made all their $.
Dude, do you like anything at all?
Thank you. Lucas is not this infallible golden boy. He has his fair share of crap, too, and Disney's had some great stuff come out in the last few years. Andor was amazing and, in my opinion, actually an important story to tell. My only complaint about it is that we won't get to spend several years watching the development of the Rebellion and what that would actually, really mean.
Mando has been a lot of fun. I've watched it primarily as a binge thing after it's all dropped, and I think that's made the unevenness of the seasons less of a problem because I'm not sitting at the end of the week saying "THAT'S IT?! Come on!!" I'm just saying "Huh. Ok, that was different. Well, on to the next one!" I really dug Kenobi as an exploration of the character.
The only issue I think is that Disney/LFL hasn't quiiiite figured out what I think they really need to. But again, I'll get to that in a bit.
The original Zahn trilogy was great. Some of the other books were ok. But by and large, the EU novel series, at least up until they dropped a moon on Chewie, were crap. I know. I read most of them. And they were crap. People pining for the good old days forget that THEY DIDN'T FRIGGIN' EXIST.
You want to know who did the best EU work? The team at West End Games. Why? Because they understood the critical thing that I think everyone has failed to realize about Star Wars.
Star Wars is a setting. It's a backdrop against which you can tell different kinds of stories. That's it. And it doesn't have to be a setting locked into a single timeframe, either. It's just...a setting.
Star Wars is also big enough to allow for a lot more than it has in the past. I LOVE the fact that we get TV Star Wars now. LOVE IT. Why? Because it means every individual entry doesn't have to be a grand slam. And because TV allows stories to breathe more and develop. I think that film is an incredibly limiting art form. It can produce great stuff through the imposition of those limitations, but I enjoy longer form storytelling way more these days, and I find that it's done better, too.
But you know what? Just like with Marvel, which again has not all been 100% winners, Star Wars is big enough as a franchise to manage a few duds here and there, and keep on trucking.
Which is why Disney isn't gonna sell it.
I think a lot of what's cut into the corporate profits of media companies that you're seeing has ZERO to do with anyone's pet theory about how their personal dislike of XYZ movie must be the reason for all the failures. It's way more likely to be due to a combination of the proliferation of media platforms, people pulling back on their subscriptions, the loss of distro fees as a revenue stream, the move away from theaters, and now the writers' strike and the likely impact that'll have on revenues.
It's not because they "went woke and went broke." It's not because Kathleen Kennedy is the devil. It's not because JJ Abrams is a roller-coaster engineer and not a storyteller. It's not because of any of our individual personal points of dispute with our favorite franchises. It's larger, industry-wide economic pressures resulting from shifting content generation and delivery models, and people trying to figure out how to monetize that stuff while also turning a profit, coupled with the boundless rapacity of investors and the pressure to always be growing profits instead of building stuff that lasts.
Star Wars is a not a setting. You need engaging, relatable characters with arcs and a discernable plot, otherwise you're watching a screensaver. All the set dressing and production design in the world can't save a script without those elements. Otherwise if the setting was the key factor in this franchise every single story would have been a mega hit. The only consistent thing Star Wars has done is hire some of the most talented production designers in the industry. By that metric every single show and movie should have been unquestionably successful and we know the opposite is true. It's been mixed at best.
Likewise Galaxy's Edge should have been a slam dunk because people were supposed to be immersed in the world. Suffice it to say that would be a no brainer, if that were true, no? As far as the West End games are concerned, consider that playing a roleplay game and watching a movie are two completely separate experiences.
Keep in mind, if "Star Wars is a setting" then the harsh criticisms against the Disney era material would be directed at the set design, costume design, special effects, all of which create the fictional environment in which these stories take place. The overwhelming majority of hate towards their material has to do with story, characters, and plot points. Barely any of the production work is mentioned as the fundamental problem behind these movies. You might get the occassional beef with a ship design or something, but that amounts to jack when people get into the specifics of why these movies and shows suck so bad.
Their character development is either lacking or non-existent. Their plots either make zero sense, or they completely contradict the continuity of the material that preceeded it or even contradicts itself within the same show or movie. The people writing these stories show no respect for their audience whatsoever based on the countless articles and social media posts that openly mock or slander them to deflect any critical thought and most of them have told the audience that they didn't write these stories for them, but wrote them as a way to satisfy their own ego, or to promote political ideas. That's why many fans can't stand the material. I can accept a few bad production design choices. What I can't tolerate are the aforementioned issues that have plagued the franchise since 2012. That's why I won't watch it.
I think it would be more accurate to say that you personally percieve Star Wars as a setting and that's why you enjoy it. Which is fine and it explains why you've enjoyed a lot of the material being released because for you it's less about the characters and more about the atmosphere and environment. Though I don't think that's a sufficient explanation for many of us because it doesn't track given the evidence.
Likewise Galaxy's Edge should have been a slam dunk because people were supposed to be immersed in the world. Suffice it to say that would be a no brainer, if that were true, no? As far as the West End games are concerned, consider that playing a roleplay game and watching a movie are two completely separate experiences.
Keep in mind, if "Star Wars is a setting" then the harsh criticisms against the Disney era material would be directed at the set design, costume design, special effects, all of which create the fictional environment in which these stories take place. The overwhelming majority of hate towards their material has to do with story, characters, and plot points. Barely any of the production work is mentioned as the fundamental problem behind these movies. You might get the occassional beef with a ship design or something, but that amounts to jack when people get into the specifics of why these movies and shows suck so bad.
Their character development is either lacking or non-existent. Their plots either make zero sense, or they completely contradict the continuity of the material that preceeded it or even contradicts itself within the same show or movie. The people writing these stories show no respect for their audience whatsoever based on the countless articles and social media posts that openly mock or slander them to deflect any critical thought and most of them have told the audience that they didn't write these stories for them, but wrote them as a way to satisfy their own ego, or to promote political ideas. That's why many fans can't stand the material. I can accept a few bad production design choices. What I can't tolerate are the aforementioned issues that have plagued the franchise since 2012. That's why I won't watch it.
I think it would be more accurate to say that you personally percieve Star Wars as a setting and that's why you enjoy it. Which is fine and it explains why you've enjoyed a lot of the material being released because for you it's less about the characters and more about the atmosphere and environment. Though I don't think that's a sufficient explanation for many of us because it doesn't track given the evidence.
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HeartBlade
Sr Member
Damn, didnt know about the Collider thing but thats hilarious/sad. It sucks when media loses its impartiality because then it just becomes pure propaganda to feed to capitalist consumption machine, just shut up and consume product and wait for more product. Same thing with the game industry with every “official” thing from articles and “professional” reviews to “game awards” just being mechanisms to get people to buy games rather than actually merit art. Its a joke and definitely feel like Mugatu seeing how much people clamor over game of the year awards.
True. I think good fan service is stuff that weaves into the story and provide a narrative payoff that stands on its own but provides an extra nod to the hardcore fans who can derive a deeper meaning from the action that took place, thereby rewarding fans for their commitment.
I just find it funny that articles are using the argument “movie gives fans what they want and that is what makes movie bad,” and use appealing to fans as a demerit for a movie.
It made a lower ROI than the prequel trilogy according to Forbes (6.2x budget vs 7x for PT) and killed alot of interest in the franchise though. It made money but will people really come out to see the Rey movie or its subsequent sequels is the big question.
I dont think Solo was good but KK’s biggest crime was not mapping out a story and sticking with it. Good or bad, a plan and story is better than no plan at all. As debated, yes there was a storyboard before TFA but the fact that Rian said he wasnt beholden to anything when making TLJ is basically saying he was not aware of any overarching story points he had to follow and could do whatever he wanted.
Saying Star Wars is just a setting is like saying Lord of the Rings is just a setting or Star Trek is just a setting which isnt true. While they do have their own worlds; they also have their set of established organizations, internal rules, and concepts that also need to be upheld. There is also the “core” trunk of the series that has more expected stipulations while side stories can “branch out” and take more risks by focusing on different aspects as long as they do not conflict with the core. And while branches can flop with minimal impact, if the core stories flop, your franchise is in trouble.
And lets not forget that until the MCU, Marvel was pretty dead. The only actually valuable characters they had were X-men (mostly wolverine), Spiderman, and Fantastic Four; hence why they could sell those characters to other studios for money. Marvel can be used as a bad example of what happens when a franchise goes on for too long which the MCU seems to be repeating.
'Batman Forever' made money.
'Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2' made money.
'Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeaquel' made money.
'Terminator 3' and 'Genisys' both made money.
Superheroes, space warriors, pirates, super robots, dinosaurs, city-destroying monsters . . . all these big franchises have movies that made money at the time but they are considered weak or terrible in hindsight.
Ticket & merch sales are only partial measures. The broader/longer effect on the franchise matters too.
Disney's SW sequel trilogy made money on paper but it was not a success in the bigger picture.
'Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2' made money.
'Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeaquel' made money.
'Terminator 3' and 'Genisys' both made money.
Superheroes, space warriors, pirates, super robots, dinosaurs, city-destroying monsters . . . all these big franchises have movies that made money at the time but they are considered weak or terrible in hindsight.
Ticket & merch sales are only partial measures. The broader/longer effect on the franchise matters too.
Disney's SW sequel trilogy made money on paper but it was not a success in the bigger picture.
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Okay cool, I'll check back in like 2 months
There certainly are industry wide factors that have seen films perform poorly at the box office, no doubt. Though not accounting for audience dissatisfaction is ignoring one of the most crucial reasons for the declining returns. Studios have gotten to the point where they look to every reason under the sun to explain their diminishing profits, but they never address the fact that many long time fans simply dislike the content they produce. I think ignoring that is not just foolish, it's willful ignorance and now they're paying for it. Literally.
All the industry factors don't help matters, but if your customers stop buying the product then that's going to affect the bottom line. I think studios are so far removed from reality that they forget that the audience holds all the power in this scenario and fans are too willing to give up all their agency by assuming they can't do anything to change the way studios do business. The beauty of a free market is that you can choose where to spend your hard earned cash. If the service doesn't meet your needs you go where it does. People just continue to accept the lie that they can do nothing when they can simply go elsewhere for their entertainment.
Do I honestly think Disney will sell Lucasfilm? No. Do I believe Kennedy and her cronies will be fired? No. Will they retcon the ST or other material? No. Should they retcon it? No. Let them live with their choices. Is Mike Zeroh ever going to report something credible? No. Will Doomcock lose that ridiculous helmet? No.
Ultimately the studios are responsible for their decisions, good or bad. I think it's time we all start recognizing our part in this equation and stop letting megacorporations dictate the rules when it comes to pop culture. You tell them what you want and how to treat you with your wallet. If you love what you see, by all means enjoy it, but for the rest of us, we need to take a hard look in the mirror and start putting our money where our mouths are.
All the industry factors don't help matters, but if your customers stop buying the product then that's going to affect the bottom line. I think studios are so far removed from reality that they forget that the audience holds all the power in this scenario and fans are too willing to give up all their agency by assuming they can't do anything to change the way studios do business. The beauty of a free market is that you can choose where to spend your hard earned cash. If the service doesn't meet your needs you go where it does. People just continue to accept the lie that they can do nothing when they can simply go elsewhere for their entertainment.
Do I honestly think Disney will sell Lucasfilm? No. Do I believe Kennedy and her cronies will be fired? No. Will they retcon the ST or other material? No. Should they retcon it? No. Let them live with their choices. Is Mike Zeroh ever going to report something credible? No. Will Doomcock lose that ridiculous helmet? No.
Ultimately the studios are responsible for their decisions, good or bad. I think it's time we all start recognizing our part in this equation and stop letting megacorporations dictate the rules when it comes to pop culture. You tell them what you want and how to treat you with your wallet. If you love what you see, by all means enjoy it, but for the rest of us, we need to take a hard look in the mirror and start putting our money where our mouths are.
Solo4114
Master Member
I think you're misunderstanding what I'm getting at. Obviously, any film or TV show or book or video game or whatever piece of entertainment needs to be well-constructed story-wise. Towards that end, yes, you need interesting characters (not walking tropes), a gripping, entertaining plot, etc.
My point about "Star Wars is a setting" gets more at the insistence that "It's not Star Wars without XYZ surface-level factor." Like "It can't be Star Wars without Jedi!" or "You can't have Star Wars without the Force!" or "It's not Star Wars unless there are white-armored bad-guys! And an Empire! And super-weapons! And..."
When I say "Star Wars is a setting," what I mean is that Star Wars is bigger than just reiterating the OT endlessly, and that the Star Wars universe can serve as a backdrop to a whole range of widely varied excellent stories. Hell, it's already doing that. Andor is probably the best, highest quality argument for how Star Wars is a setting.
Again, this misunderstands what I'm getting at. My point is that Star Wars -- as a setting -- is a backdrop within which you can tell stories.
Which is, I'll note, literally what I said in my previous post. To wit:
(Emphasis added.)
My issue with the Star Wars sequel trilogy is that it felt to me like they tried very much to ape the original trilogy, out of a fear that Star Wars couldn't possibly expand beyond stories about Skywalkers and Siths and Jedi and rebellions and empires. Like, without those surface-level things, it wouldn't be Star Wars, and I'm calling bunk on that. I think it was exactly that kind of "We have to just reiterate what we did before" crap that led to a lackluster, poorly planned trilogy, because nobody ever really had any vision beyond "Just do the old thing again but embiggen it and with flashy FX." And all of that ignores that you can tell all kinds of excellent, compelling stories within the Star Wars universe that have **** all to do with Jedi, chosen ones, the Sith, the Dark/Light side of the Force, etc., etc., etc. But because they couldn't see beyond what already existed, they ended up producing an overall story that feels like a mostly uninspired retread that was haphazardly thrown together, is big on 'REMEMBER THIS?!" references, but short on actual compelling story.
That's a fair point. Personally, I'm curious about the Rey film, mostly because I really liked the cast from the sequel trilogy, but I don't feel like the stories they got to be a part of were all that great. I think they have great potential to be really compelling, interesting characters within a terrific story...but it mostly hasn't happened yet.
I thoroughly enjoyed Solo as a heist-oriented romp set in the Star Wars galaxy. I loved exploring different facets of that universe, and I thought a bunch of the characters and concepts were interesting. The story itself was perfectly fine and entertaining. For me, at least, it didn't need to be some mindblowing experience; being entertaining was enough. I'd have liked to have seen more of that side of the Star Wars universe, especially with Glover's Lando, but even with Ehrenreich's Solo. Although I'd be perfectly fine with it not being Solo himself, and rather other characters in that same general sphere.
I don't think the core "flopped" though. I think some loud fans didn't like it. And the rest of the audience was mostly neutral-to-fine about it. I think there are larger forces at work here that are making life hard for film studios at the moment, and they have nothing to do with "Luke should've kicked more ass" or whatever.
I'd also note that at the very least, Star Trek is absolutely a "setting." And if you don't believe me, just look at TNG and DS9. If Trek wasn't a "setting," neither of those shows would've existed. Instead, we'd never have gotten past Kirk, the original Enterprise. It'd just be endless iterations of "The Adventures of James T. Kirk & Friends." Why? Because "Well, it's not Trek without Kirk!" Bulls***. TNG proved it.
Now one may quibble with what's come since then (I was, for example, not really a fan of Enterprise, and I'm still lukewarm on DS9, although I get why people dig it). And, of course, you still need actually interesting stories for the end product to be good. But I'd argue that JJ's Trek films are lackluster precisely because they don't realize that Trek is a setting, and that you can look beyond just Kirk & Co. I'd also argue that they misunderstand what makes that setting work in the first place, because they're more concerned with very surface-level trappings, just like JJ's Star Wars sequel films.
Honestly, I don't get all the complaints about the MCU currently. I watched the new Ant-Man film and I enjoyed it. I've dug their TV shows on D+. I dunno. I think folks "want" all-rising-action-and-climax-all-the-time, and that's not where things are with Phase 4 or 5 (or whatever phase we're in -- I can't tell). That and they want all their stuff neatly mapped out and, again, I don't think that's where things are with the MCU at the moment. Most folks seem to think of the period between The Winter Soldier and Endgame as the "Golden Age" (while also ignoring the "meh" entries like Ant-Man 2, GOTG2, and Captain Marvel, all of which are still good but not at the level of "great" of many of the other films in that era). That was 5 solid years where the worst film you got was only "Eh, pretty good," and audiences knew exactly where it was all heading because they telegraphed it all.
And now...people don't see where it's headed exactly, and the films are only "You know, decently entertaining, but not super amazing."
I'm curious as to how much the "it didn't turn enough profit" is actually driven by reality and how much is driven by ******* investors who always want more-than-the-last-time.
All true. But I also don't think the damage to Star Wars is as profound as some think it to be. (Especially the rage-mongers on Youtube. Don't forget to smash that subscribe button, kids!)
I think the sequel trilogy was beset by creative issues in large part because they didn't have a plan. And I think production-wise Kennedy made some real mistakes. She should've gone in with more of a plan or at least required JJ to map out a lot more. She should've held tighter reins on the overall project of the trilogy by ensuring that future directors basically stuck with the plan. And she made the mistake of tapping Colin Trevorrow to write the 3rd film and then apparently fired the guy because
"Colin was at a huge disadvantage not having been a part of Force Awakens and in part of those early conversations because we had a general sense of where the story was going," Kennedy said. "Like any development process, it was only in the development that we’re looking at a first draft and realizing that it was perhaps heading in a direction that many of us didn’t feel was really quite where we wanted it to go."
(That's a direct quote you can find here: Star Wars boss says Colin Trevorrow was at ‘huge disadvantage’ when dropped from Rise of Skywalker by the way.)
I suspect their "general sense" was always "So, we're re-doing the original trilogy mostly, just with younger actors, right? Ok, cool." It's why TFA feels like a retread of ANH, and why ROS brings back Palpatine and kinda feels like ROTJ. But mostly, I think the problem is they had a "general idea" but hadn't actually plotted things out for real.
I think "longtime fans" do not make up the bulk of the ticket-buying population. As such, they're far less of a consideration. Where I think longtime fans become more of a factor is in shaping the "narrative" about the film itself. Even if plenty get dismissed as "toxic fans" (and in some cases, rightly so), they influence the zeitgeist about a film and that can shift how audiences respond to it both in the short term and in the long term. But at the same time, "longtime fans" are idiots who don't know what they want, and this has been true since forever. They seem to want "The same as it was" but also "something new" and they can't articulate what that is, only what isn't what they want. In other words, they can't tell you "I want XYZ," but they can sure tell you "I definitely DON'T want ABC."
Over my years on this forum -- closing in on 25 now -- what I have seen from fans is basically a lot of tired reiterations of existing stuff that never, ever pushes the boundaries let alone breaks the mold. They want to remain comfortably ensconced in the old thing they loved, they don't want things changed, but they want it new and fresh.
I actually think the discussions for years around Ghostbuster 3 is a perfect example. They just wanted more of the same, but with a younger group of comedians (usually whoever was "hot" at the time) and to have the old guys "pass the torch" to them. Well, we got that with Ghostbusters Afterlife, and while that was an entertaining film, I think of it now as a fairly uninspired retread. Oh look, Gozer's back. Oh look, all the old guys are back for 4 min to "pass the torch." There's nothing that really feels fresh, though. There's new ghost types, and it takes place in a rural setting instead of an urban one. And....that's about it, really. Everything else just sorta feels like "Haven't we done this already?" That movie hasn't really stayed with me in any sense. I've felt zero desire to re-watch it. It ended up being entirely disposable to me, even though I kinda liked it. And I think it's mostly because it didn't really do anything all that interesting or new. It was just...you know...more of the same.
I'm sure longtime fans loved it. But it also doesn't seem to have launched a brand new, thriving franchise. It feels more like a cash-in on the old IP.
I think, ultimately, that people do this, whether they realize it or not. They stay home when they aren't interested. They go when they are. But what influences that decision can vary widely. I've had zero interest in going to see the new Indy film. Mostly because I can't get past the "HE'S 80 YEARS OLD *********!!!" aspect, but they're still trying to make him an action hero. It just feels...tired. That plus I think the original IJ trilogy is perfectly good as it is. No need to keep going back to the well. Let's move on.
Other people may be grappling with the impact of inflation and trying to decide "Do I really wanna spend $100 to take the family to the megaplex to go see a movie? I mean, it'll be on one of the digital services soon enough. I can just wait." Couple that with the theater experience itself having been kinda crappy for a long time anyway and you may end up with people staying home for reasons that are entirely separate from "It's because they disrespected the fans!" That's part of the equation for some people, but for the vast bulk of the moviegoing public, it's not.
There's a saying among screenwriters - Trust the audience when they tell you what's wrong. Don't trust their advice on how to fix it.
I think it's applicable to these franchises in the broader, longer-term sense. Everybody has the same feeling that we've been getting too much retreaded no-risk stuff for too long. But there's not a lot of agreement on new directions.
Creativity correlates inversely with incentives in some studies. Students being told to 'do something creative' produced less creative works than students being told to do whatever they wanted. We're seeing this in the extreme filmmaking-by-committee lately. The 'South Park' guys can be very creative with dirt-cheap animation because they can take risks. A studio spending $300m on a tentpole has to run everything past the marketing team and their results are very bland & predictable.
I think it's applicable to these franchises in the broader, longer-term sense. Everybody has the same feeling that we've been getting too much retreaded no-risk stuff for too long. But there's not a lot of agreement on new directions.
Creativity correlates inversely with incentives in some studies. Students being told to 'do something creative' produced less creative works than students being told to do whatever they wanted. We're seeing this in the extreme filmmaking-by-committee lately. The 'South Park' guys can be very creative with dirt-cheap animation because they can take risks. A studio spending $300m on a tentpole has to run everything past the marketing team and their results are very bland & predictable.
