Speculation Is Disney Capable of Learning the Lessons of John Carter and Phantom Menace?

I never saw John Carter, but I have a hard time equating it with TPM.

 

Um . . . I don't think TPM had a major advertising issue like John Carter did. People were going to see it because it was Star Wars. And that won't change for Ep. 7.

John Carter, on the other hand, was new territory, and didn't have brand-name recognition already dug in. You're comparing apples to oranges here.

 

Phantom Menace has made over a billion dollar at the box office. I'd say they learned their lesson to DO EXACTLY THAT since they paid 4 billion for the franchise.

 

Me too. And being a fan of TPM I hope they learned the lesson to make more movies like both of them.

 

I never bothered to see John Carter. If Episode VII is the same kind of "failure" that TPM was, I'm sure Disney won't shed a single tear on the way to the bank.

You really shouldn't compare John Carter to TPM. The latter made a helluva lot of money. Maybe you should compare it to a legit flop like Star Trek Nemesis.

I didn't bother with John Carter because it looked OK in the trailer but the all the info I heard about it how it was where the inspiration for Star Wars and Avatar came from. Well, I've seen both, so why both with John Carter? Plus the title wasn't likely gonna bring anyone in. "John Carter" is a dull, dry. If the had gone with John Carter of Mars or Mars Wars, or something else then maybe they could have drawn in a few more people.

You know, John Carter might be the reason no one at Disney fought the purchase of Star Wars. Instead of a trilogy of "Star Wars Lite" movies they had planned around the John Carter material, they'll go for a sure money-maker.

Disney learned from John Carter and TPM. Without "Star Wars" in front a movie of that quality ain't making money.

 

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I quite liked John Carter

 

Why do people bother worrying about reviews or how a movie is promoted with franchise movies???? Franchise movies are review proof because essentially they are made for the diehard fans, and they are pretty much going to see it no matter what. Whether Episode 7 gets awful reviews or not, I could care less as I am seeing it anyway. Now if it doesn't feel like 'SW' to me, then I will re-evaluate whether I will even bother with Episode 8 & 9, but I have been a fan since 1977, so I can't see myself leaving the franchise now!

The only movies I read reviews on are original movies that usually come out Christmas time, as they are more serious drama's that get recognized by the Academy. A movie like Lincoln and Zero Dark Thirty, I was interested to see what the reviewers said along with what my friends and family said. When it comes to Star Wars, Batman, Harry Potter, Spiderman, etc, it all comes down to how each person feels about those type of movies, and no reviewer will ever skew me either way.

 

That's a good point. Compared to standalone movies, movies from a known franchise really are pretty review-proof.

 

That's why studio's will milk a franchise as much as possible, simply because most of the time its a cashcow with a built-in audience. The Hangover 3 comes out this weekend, despite the Hangover 2 getting AWFUL reviews a few years ago. I guarantee it gets bad reviews, and I also guarantee it does great at the box office this weekend.

Original movies are easier to review because everyone is looking at them as a mass audience, so classics like Lawrence of Arabia, Gone with the Wind and The Godfather, all had great reviews, and are great movies that nobody really disputes. But when you get to sequels or prequels, it all depends on how much you love to see that story being continued that will determine whether you care to see more movies. I pretty much love all the SW movies, even though I readily admit not all the movies are great, yet I love Raiders of the Lost Ark, but never had any interest in the sequels.

 

TPM may have made a lot of money because it was Star Wars but it could have been a much better movie

 

I love it that people are saying that simply because a film took in money, that's the only thing that determines if it's good or not, while at the same time and on the same thread people are also saying that the reason TPM made money where John Carter didn't was because of advertising. Seems like the only thing that speaks to, rather than the quality of the film, is the effectiveness of brand recognition. People went to see TPM because it was a Star Wars movie; people didn't go to see John Carter because it was about nobody - nobody people cared about or were interested in seeing, at any rate. But the first Star Wars movie in sixteen years, that was something people were interested in. That was what brought in the box office; that was what sustained it during its run when some of the word-of-mouth must already have begun to take the form of "Huh? What?"

And to be perfectly honest, I simply don't care what a film made financially during its run. That's not a valid criteria on which to judge whether a film is good or not. Money is dirt to me; it's here today and tomorrow it's in someone else's wallet. It buys me goods and services. That's all. If a film does make money, if it earns a profit for the studio that made it, the companies that backed it, and the stockholders those companies are responsible to, that's a fine thing, but it says nothing about the actual quality of a film itself, and that's what matters to me. Money is no yardstick of quality; it's not a form of measure to determine if something is good. All that says is that someone paid to see it; it doesn't say anything about whether he liked it, or felt his money was well spent. Would anyone argue that the Transformers movies are good films simply because they made money at the box office? Would anyone argue that Wild Wild West is a good film because it made money? Conversely, would anyone argue that Citizen Kane was a bad film simply because it didn't make money? Oh, and for the record: if someone "doesn't understand all the brouhaha" over that film, they're not remotely qualified to judge the quality of any film, any time, any place - FACT.

I don't care about monetary considerations because I know that in a year's time, or a decade's time, when I'm watching a film long gone from the theaters, none of that's going to matter. Whatever film you care to think of in your head, the rule applies. At that point it has nothing to do with money; it has to do with how you yourself respond to a film. Does it touch you? Does it make you laugh? Cry? Mourn? Celebrate? Does it immerse you in the experience of the film, tonally and/or emotionally, without taking you out of that experience of immersion at any point? Does it become something you treasure, something you find new things in each time you watch it? Does it reward such repeat viewings? Or, if it's not a film you like watching a whole hell of a lot, is it instead a film you take out every now and then to treat yourself to, like it's a particularly fine wine? "It's been a good week, I've put in my hard work; I think I'll treat myself to a pipe or a glass of Sauterne, and, oh, how about Apocalypse Now, or maybe Argo, or Seven Samurai?" When I'm in my lounge chair in my office watching the movie, it's not going to matter at all how much the movie made; it matters if I enjoy and/or gain something from the experience of watching it, if not every time, then damn near that.

If films like TPM make any readers here feel that way, then fine. Good for you. I don't share that opinion, but I respect it. I'm not going to yet again descend into a tirade about why I myself didn't like the film when the smoke cleared, because at this point, there's really nothing to discuss. That film is in the can and it's not going to change now. It is what it is. Every possible argument, either for or against that film, that can be made has been made. For better or worse, the prequels are done and gone; the prequel era is ending also. I do maintain that those films should NEVER have been so divisive, and they didn't have to be. THAT'S the lesson Disney needs to take from TPM: that the one thing Episode VII should be - needs to be - is something that both fan factions can enjoy and endorse. The ST needs to erase the disconnect between the people who, for whatever reason, liked the prequels and those who, also for whatever reason, didn't like them. That entire period of our lives is over and done with and it's not coming back. I want films good enough to make me truly not care about that period anymore, because I'm too excited about THIS period to care anymore. That's not hard to do, and it's certainly not impossible.

The thing is, I'd have to say that Disney/LFL have already begun implementing the lessons they've already learned, and as someone who has MAJOR issues with Lucas as a filmmaker and as a person, it pleases me to note that some of those major decisions were carried out even before the Disney purchase, when G-Walt still had full power to make such decisions: Lucas himself, unquestionably an idea man before he's anything else, contributed ideas that, if Alan Horn can be believed, have good potential; with Michael Arndt, Lucas himself secured a writer with excellent credentials and an obvious understanding of why Star Wars worked and moved an audience; with Lawrence Kasdan, Lucas gained a bulletproof consultant who not only knows how to write for this universe, but who also has the ability to keep the spirit of the ST connected to that of the OT; with Kathleen Kennedy he gained a successor who not only had an established list of credentials no one would question, who not only knew him well enough to understand how he would think and decide things, but who also has the sensibility to know when to think like Lucas and when NOT to.

So if one were to ask me if Disney/LFL is capable of learning from the mistakes of the past, I'd say yes. If one were to ask me if we're already seeing any evidence of that, I'd also have to say yes. What will become important as 2015 approaches is, did they implement what they learned properly? It's not a question just of learning lessons from other people's mistakes; it's a question of whether, in attempting not to make those same mistakes, they end up making entirely new ones that are just as divisive, if not more so.

 

Except at "change points" where some significant modification is made. Going from TOS movies to TNG movies in Trek, or the "non-reboot reboot" of JJ Trek for example. Though some might argue that such constitute "new" franchieses in the first place.

 

Definitely a reboot is not a given, as Batman Begins was a success which spawned 2 more sequels, but Superman Returns was not a success the next year.

 

These are really good points. Abrams may or may not prove to be one of the entirely new mistakes. If Trek is a test case, I think we can agree that Abrams remains unproven in his ability to make a truly compelling movie with mass global appeal. The next Star Wars will likely cost $200 million or more to make. On paper, they can pretty much justify any amount up to $350 million or slightly more in combined production and marketing costs. They would be crazy to spend anything less. Yet Abrams has not fully demonstrated that he can breathe new life into a tired brand and generate a really profitable movie on that kind of a budget. Of all the Trek movies, the 09 reboot remains in the lower half in terms of return on budget. It earned a sequel by barely squeaking into profitability on ancillary revenue.

True, Star Wars has been a bigger brand than Trek from 1977 forward, but it's not clear how much erosion there has been since the prequels. The brand has been "sustained" by not so very good video games and the limited appeal of the Clone Wars series and the less than amazing 3D re-release of the Phantom Menace.

There are some potentially good decisions to redress these sustainability issues: the exclusive EA contract for videogames, the new animated series set in the pre-ANH Vader era, etc. Disney's biggest commercial move seems to be the effort to stamp out the memory of the prequel.

 

^Which is unfortunate as it wind's up limiting the potential market.

They're making the "safe" play, just like Paramount did with JJ Trek. Go to the "proven" well (as they see "proven").

 

I don't think Disney or anyone will ever "Stamp Out the Memory of the Prequels"! They are there, and they will always be there. They are part of the franchise and more importantly the Saga. The only thing Disney has done is change the focus back to the Original Trilogy. Now with that said, the pressure is on to deliver at least a movie on the caliber of ROTJ from the offset with Episode VII or there won't be much of an audience interested for an Episode VIII or IX.

 

Are fans capable of enjoying a space opera?

 

Sez you. Sez Disney, "Damn! That made a billion dollars! Take it and make more so we can get billions!" Pretty simple math, actually.

 

Great video.

 

You can debat quality all you want, but TPM wasn't a financial failure. John Carter was. To the point that the next two films have been put on hold infinitely. You can also talk about JJ not truly "breathing life" back into a series with Trek, but look at the facts. Star Trek (2009) was profitable. Nemesis drew slightly more at the domestic box office then Star Wars: The Clone Wars even though the form's budget was about 8 times as much. THAT'S FAILURE!

You people should be happy. Disney could have easily looked at TCW movies as example. Over $100 million in global box office sales with a budget of about $8.5 million (and it was awful). They could have just started cranking out those movies one or two a year, but we get Live Action ones.

 

STID (I love using that as an acronym) is kinda underperforming so far.

Anyway. TPM is one of the most successful movies all time at the box-office. "John Carter" is not. If there's any lessons to be learned, they veer in TPM's favor.

 

Under-performing a little, which is sad because it's overall a better film then the first reboot. That being said it's already passed John Carter's total domestic intake and it's only been a week.

 

True (though at the same time, it's also made much, much less than "Iron Man 3" did in its opening weekend). I'd like to think that JC could've done better if it had been marketed worth a damn, but even then, it wasn't a good enough movie for me to worry too much about. Can't say that I enjoyed either of the new ST movies, especially how this last one was essentially TWOK redux.