ST Episode VII Box Office Discussion

First off, let's not make any bold assumptions that we're at the end of cinema as a form of entertainment when we're still within five or six years of Avatar. Cinema still is a popular form of entertainment, but 2014 was a really lackluster year for cinema. You had one guaranteed hit from an aging film series that needs to pander to international audiences to continue making big, the obligatory, boring, and poorly marketed first half of yet another YA book series wherein the final film is split into two parts, the third part of an aging film franchise adapted from a book series, and three surprise hits in The Lego Movie, Guardians of the Galaxy, and The Winter Soldier.

It was a slow year, and there was nothing that screamed "Huge Box Office Success" as supposed to "Obligatory Box Office Success" and "Unexpected Box Office Success". On the other hand, 2015 is so saturated with anticipated blockbusters to the point of near over saturation. Then a drop with 2016 (And claims of more Box Office Death and Blockbuster Saturation), then 2017 and 2018 fall somewhere in between with more surprise hits than main titles, and finally 2019 hits 2015 levels again and 2020 becomes another 2016/2014 with more surprise hits than expected successes.

 

The saturation is from old names like Star Wars, Jurassic Park, Mad Max, Terminator and Fast and Furious.

That will get a lot of buzz to those that look for it. That doesn't mean they will or can all hit box office that is necessarily appreciably more.

13 movies in 2014 made over 200M the same as 2013, 11 in 2012, only 7 in 2011, 10 in 2010 and 10 in 2009.

 

200m in 2014 dollars is not near as much as 200m in 2009 dollars.

 

Well supposedly SW Episodes 8 and 9 have tentative dates for December 2017 and December 2019 which I think is horrible (especially for Episode 9 in December 2019).

 

Actually I think they just saved Episode 9, considering that Shazam, Justice League Part II, and Infinity War Part II are all going to be clogging up May, June, and the rest of the 2019 summer. Disney isn't going to cannibalize it's own franchises, they're going to try and make December Star Wars a thing that happens, and if Episode 7 beats the odds it might do so.

 

Get used to December - think of Star Wars as a Christmas present.......

 

I used the DVD on the BD/DVD combo packs to rip for a digital file anyway, the digital downloads never quite work with every playback device as advertised.

 

New Box Office question about TFA:

In the recent light of Lucas' statements about his stories and the very recent statements about TFA using too much retreading, how do you think this will, if at all, affect the box office totals if people feel it's just a rehash of the original and not much is new?

 

Distancing from the prequels/associating with the OT is smart marketing. "Phantom Menace" has become pop culture shorthand for "bad movie," as evidenced by this Variety review of Jupiter Ascending:

I hope the writers have come up with an original plot. I worry about Abrams' ability to discern good plot from bad given Star Trek into Darkness, one of the crappiest-plotted Trek movies ever made (and that's saying a lot).

 

As has been gone over again and again we know how that rubbish works. The writer of course will not bother to also include that TPM became and still is one of the biggest movies of all time.

Oh wait that is because it's Star Wars and therefore people went to see a "bad" movie regardless. Oh but wait it also hurt the Star Wars brand. You know the terrible hurt that a franchise that has made billions and billions from box office to home video to all platforms.

So where is that damage? Only in the minds of people who didn't like the movies not the actual audiences that went to see the movies.

One can only imagine that this person will use the "been-there-done-that way imaginable" phrase over and over again for their TFA review.

You can't use it for TPM but that is the "problem" for those people. That is exactly what they wanted it to be.

 

Some huge movies have terrible reputations that exist alongside, and are not mutually exclusive with, their past box office success. You have to acknowledge that the main reason a writer would include "Phantom Menace-esque" in a review is that he believes there is an agree-upon meaning of that phrase that his readers will understand. And people reading that review will get a reinforcement of the impression that Phantom Menace has a bad reputation. And that exchange of meaning and reinforcement of reputation and belief about the prequels is a real phenomenon. Impossible to say exactly how general/widespread it is among the moviegoing public. And knowing that will affect the marketing decisions about TFA that studio executives will make. It affected the choice of plot, the pre-production development of the film, the decisions to distance Lucas somewhat from the project, etc.

I don't know how big an issue it is for the box office of Star Wars, but it's easy to see Disney taking it into account as they've made and marketed this movie.

 

I hope so too, but I'm a JJ apologist when it comes to STID. I didn't think anything was wrong with the direction, but he didn't write the script, which is where all of the issues come from. Ultimately he does have some say when it comes to the story but that was a big studio film where I think he was contracted to begin by a certain date and didn't have as much control over the project as he does for TFA.

 

But STID is pretty much a reenactment of "Space Seed", one of the best regarded ST episodes.

 

The episode script and the movie script have next to nothing in common with each other.

But in general I think the possibility that TFA just won't be much good whether or not it focuses more on an OT version of the GFFA is at least as big a concern as reputational damage done to the Star Wars brand by the prequels (no one would ever confuse "Phantom Menace-esque" with a compliment).

 

Then they are confused in the first place and there is not much that can be done for them. I love to feast on these people and bust the myths.

The reputation damage is by propagated people who don't know what they are talking about.When you call them out on it they retreat because they know they have nothing to stand on.

 

I think you've missed part of the reality, and that's regardless of its box office performance and how people felt about the movie initially, the reputation of poor prequel quality has become hard-baked into the cultural phenomenon of the prequels, and that people take it seriously precisely because it's been repeated so often. The repetition becomes the reality, and has the potential to weigh on the future box office performance of the movies. There's no question that when people use "prequelesque" as shorthand for "bad movie" then everyone pretty much knows what is meant and shares in the joke. That's the cultural resonance of the prequels. You just have to accept it.

 

I would rather have rectal surgery and a root canal at the same time, without anesthetic, while listening to JJ Ice Fish than go see that piece of crap. I'm sure anyone in the not pooping their pants demographic will agree.

 

Alvin and the Chipmunks 4 - I would rather have a fecal transplant !

 

I mean it all matters as to what market they want to reach. Kids will see it anyways, fans will see it anyways, what they want to do is reach for the "on the fence" crowd, the sort who were skeptical about comic book movies not named Spiderman until Avengers came out and became a huge hit. They want to make Star Wars "cool" again, from a certain point of view. Phantom Menace isn't really this legendarily bad film, that's mainly just geek culture and things that discuss geek culture, but the franchise's overall absence from the big screen in any meaningful way in years really has done a number on the public reputation.

That's what they want to hit with the marketing, and that's why they're so concerned with pushing the "new" in Star Wars, because they want to distance themselves with "old" Star Wars, if that makes any sense. Basically they're selling the new Star Wars to the new fans and the old Star Wars to the old fans. They want to push the new over the old because the old fans will show up anyways.

 

I think that's true amongst geek/nerd culture... However, I think most 'normal' people (and they are the majority) can't so readily distinguish between AOTC or ROTJ etc. indeed, most people outside of the fan community don't really understand the concepts of PT, OT and ST. So whilst I agree that there's a perception that the 'new films' (as they were at the time) are inferior to the 'old films', and that perception shapes the reality, I think it's only perceivable to a certain/specific demographic. It's become a bit like saying 'the old Sean Connery/James Bond films are the best'... which isn't quite the experience on the ground.

 

You don't have to look far to see examples of PT ridicule in mainstream culture, so it's not so confined to geek/nerddom as some suggest. However, I really don't have a clue about how anyone would quantify the impact of the PT being held out as an ongoing pop culture joke on the box office for the sequel trilogy. Maybe none. Maybe some, maybe quite a bit.

 

Hmmm. Apparently Jupiter Rising didn't meet the qualifications to being TPM-esque.

First off it didn't replace TPM as almost inarguably the most anticipated movie of all time and it looks like it's going to be a huge bust with a 176M budget never mind the promotion cost and so far 18M domestic in 3 days.

In one day TPM made 28M, after 3 days 60M. and by the end of the first weekend (Wed debut) it made over 100M. Never mind how much the audience liked TPM and gave it a Cinemascore of A- to JA's B-.

Funny those people who use this term disappear when these facts are brought up. Like that TPM is still 5th all-time at the domestic box office ABOVE "Star Wars" and 16th worldwide all-time ABOVE "Star Wars."

The problem for we who are part of that culture is that the reality is that we are a vast minority many who think that we are somehow special.

As a point of example I also love Doctor Who and those fans also have a similar relationship to the show of the 60's and 70's being akin to the OT and then the 80's being akin to the PT. It's nonsense of course but a certain segment truly believe it.

Another point is that when I tell people that for all the years the series was on the air that half the audience was female they can't take it in. To them Doctor Who is a show for young boys and girls didn't watch it. Their experience is so couched in the fanverse as opposed to the wider audience that actually kept the show on the air for 26 years.

Yes people when the show was being seen by an average of 7-8 million viewers a week for 26 years half the audience was female. That doesn't make them all fans but they were all viewers.

 

you'd love it here in phoenix Qui-Riv-Brid. about once a month one of the idiot reviewers in the arizona republic works in a prequel-bash in a review of a movie that has nothing to do with Star Wars. i emailed one of them about it a couple of years ago and the guy actually got sarcastic with me on about an 8 -year old level.

 

I'm shocked that people didn't predict that Jupiter Rising was going to fail

 

It is odd. Because if you watch TPM on an 8 year old level like ANH you'll have a great time.

If you look deeper into both of them you will also have a great time but for TPM in particular as it has to set up not just the PT but the entire saga.

The success must burn this guy so deep that he can't stand it.

I really don't know how he is going to like the new movies when they are going to be the PT as much as the OT meaning it's going to be Star Wars. In fact if the rumours are true then it's going to delve back into many of the themes of TCW for the ongoing movies, comics and books.