Hype: The Phantom Menace Vs The Force Awakens?

Love it or loathe it, the only movie that has matched TFA was the anticipation for The Phantom Menace back in May 1999. So cast your mind back 16 1/2 years. Which was/is the more anticipated movie? But first you must unlearn what you have learned about TPM back when we thought it would be the greatest movie of all time.



Internet: The biggest difference of course is the internet. Sure we had internet back in 1999 but it wasn't as widespread. No social media. Slow 56k connections. I remember logging into a Star Wars chat room on release day to talk about the movie. No internet meant people were paying to watch a movie just to watch the TPM trailer and sleeping outside theatres for days, even weeks to buy tickets.

Time: 16 years had past between ROTJ and TPM. There was a pent-up demand for Star Wars. However only 10 years have passed between ROTS and TFA. Also unlike the time between ROTJ and TPM (especially the barren spell between 85-91, there has consistantly been new Star Wars over the 10 years. New TV shows, books, comics, games, toys. It never went away. However for a lot of people it's been 32 1/2 years since this is the sequel to ROTJ.

A new generation: Time has also meant there is now another generation of fans who grew up with the prequels. More people = more anticipation.

It has to be good, right?: In 1999 no one expected that TPM *could* be bad. Now although everyone is hopeful TFA will be great, i hear a lot of people saying "what if it isn't?"

 

I was a guy who went to a movie just for the TPM trailer. The Waterboy, I think... Honestly do not remember. But I remember the trailer!!

I remember waiting over an hour for that trailer to download days later. Ahh, good ol dial-up days.

I'm very excited for this movie, but I think the hype was bigger back then. I loved buying those figures. We didn't even know who most of them were.


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As with anything, it can be tough to compare different time periods, and also it has been incredibly difficult to decide if TFA has indeed passed TPM in anticipation. I am not sure you'll ever have a real answer to that one, just a feeling that they're both pretty close. I wrote a book on TPM titled Anticipation: The Real Life Story of Star Wars: Episode I -- The Phantom Menace, where the book's primary drive is focused on TPM as the most anticipated film of all time. It absolutely was at that time, without question.

While I'd love to continue to argue that TPM remains the most anticipated movie of all time, I think a strong argument can be made that TFA has matched that. I think at some point you get to a 100/100 anticipation level where you honestly can't judge which is more, they're both different and equally awe-inspiring.

One month ago, my gauge was something along the lines of, "Well, USA Today ran a 50 day countdown until TPM came out, with a new Star Wars fact every day." But now, a few days ago, USA Today announced Star Wars December and are running something about Star Wars every day. So that's a wash. Time Magazine has Star Wars on the cover and so does just about every other magazine still in existence that had TPM on the cover. You can't really go by magazines / media because it appears TFA is every bit the equal to TPM.

Advance ticket sales are now done online rather than at the box office primarily, so we didn't have camps of people like the past films, but is that a fair way to judge whether a movie is more anticipated? Not really. It's just a statement about how die-hard our fan base is that they will wait in line for weeks to see a movie. That will always be the most impressive part about the anticipation for the past three Star Wars films, but it's not a fair way to disqualify TFA for the title of Most Anticipated Movie Of All Time.

One argument in favor of TFA is the original cast returning. While everyone was excited for the prequels -- and I love the prequels -- I think there's definitely a sense in the general public that everyone kind of wondered, huh, what if they did make more Star Wars and brought back the original cast? It almost seemed impossible, like too much time had passed, and it just wouldn't ever happen. Then somehow, magically, Lucas reaches out to them, he reaches out to Kathleen Kennedy, and pretty soon LFL is part of Disney and Star Wars 7 is announced. I sat and stared at my phone for 30 minutes looking at news, thinking about it all, and just dumb-founded. Wait, more Star Wars? Wait... Lucas doesn't own Lucasfilm? More Star Wars?! Hmm... I hope it's good!

I think with the incredible advance ticket sales and interest we're seeing in this movie, TFA is either the most anticipated film of all time or second only to TPM. I also think the argument could be somewhat solidified in TFA's favor depending on the box office results. The Phantom Menace had an incredible multiple at the box office, so it had amazing legs befitting a successful, well liked summer blockbuster. VERY few movies make only 15% of their total box office from opening weekend like TPM did. Given that we can be pretty much about 99% sure The Force Awakens doesn't have the same multiple, it will be more front-loaded than TPM even if it has a 95% Rotten Tomatoes score and amazing word of mouth. That means if TFA passes TPM's adjusted for inflation gross with, say, $775 million, and becomes the highest grossing movie ever, and also in the process breaks the opening weekend record, it would be fair to say it was the more anticipated film from the only way we can judge the numbers.

That would be 1) A bigger opening than TPM with more tickets sold, not just dollars, and 2) More tickets sold total to TFA than TPM, despite better legs from TPM, so you'd have to think that would make it arguably the most anticipated film.

 

Nothing ever has been or ever will be more overhyped than THE PHANTOM MENACE. Some films, such as THE LORD OF THE RINGS and THE DARK KNIGHT came close, but nothing has equaled, much less surpassed, it, including THE FORCE AWAKENS

 

I think the hype may be higher this time due to the involvement of the core OT characters. That's really the only thing making it any bigger than TPM.

 

I don't know, the hype for TPM was pretty huge. I almost didn't graduate because of it - I went to opening night instead of studying for my government final. I remember being dumbfounded that we were finally getting NEW Star Wars. It was an event, and it was all over the news.

That said, it wasn't really NEW Star Wars. We knew who Anakin was going to become, we were looking at a young Obi-Wan, and even without the soundtrack spoiler, we knew Qui-Gon was going to die eventually. We were finally getting the whole story, but in a way, we already knew it. With TFA, it seems more like it's something new. My fellow spoiler-free forumites can relate - I have no idea what's going to happen. Even my favorite characters are a mystery to me again. That just seems bigger to me. The merchandising seems pretty similar to what TPM was. The Star Wars aisle is huge again, they're marketing copies of the movies everywhere, and you can fill your pantry and bathroom with products oddly branded with Star Wars.

So, my vote goes to TFA.

 

Easy TPM is the most anticipated prequel and TFA the most anticipated sequel.

If there positions in time were changed then the difference would be fairly minimal.

The only actual advantage for TFA is therefore Luke, Leia and Han returning but that is unique to TFA as TPM couldn't do that so it is an extra factor.

 

Living in Japan, I don't think I even noticed TPM until I saw the novelization at a book store that sold foreign books. This, despite me being neck-deep in the NJO at the time. With TFA, I'm seeing SW everywhere. It probably doesn't hurt that the release date is the same as the rest of the world, too [face_still_bitter_after_all_these_years]. So, on a purely regional note, I'd say that TFA is more anticipated.

 

I hope you're right, because Variety is predicting that TFA will have an almost impossible time beating or matching TPM in Japan. TPM was a MASSIVE hit in Japan, so I can only guess the hype was pretty big over there at the time as well, because it eventually went on to make $103 million. TFA is expected to make $80-100M but with one source saying it's very tough to cross that $81 million threshold (whatever that translates to in Yen, I guess). I really hope TFA can be the highest grossing SW movie ever in Japan, it would definitely help the worldwide box office!

 

Calling it evens out to the same level of massive goddamn hype. TPM was the first Star Wars movie in almost 2 decades, people were a-hungerin. TFA is the first (really) in over a decade but has the original cast back so it all sorta evens out to "fasklasd lkjyjklqwlkaylaynl jkqy ykllamn yjlqkl;jyj kqlqlkyj freak out akljsyj akljyajklykla" levels of hype.

 

This seems to be a very regional thing, because I’m not seeing much hype for TFA in Japan. There’s lots of promotion, but there’s also a lot of promotion for The Peanuts too. At one point the post office was selling these washi tapes with Darth Vader and stormtroopers design, but they got replaced for The Peanuts before I managed to grab one of those.
And the Japanese around me aren’t talking about TFA. There was a lot more hype and excitement for Frozen for instance (but then again, Japan loves Disney).
I do think it will be a box office success, but I doubt it will beat TPM…. we’ll have to wait and see.

 

Hard to say. I think the hype is different this time. Not sure if there's more or not, but after so many people were disappointed with the prequels, it feels like some people are very hesitant. Whereas for TPM, people were only hopeful and happy.

 

Since TPM hype has been described pretty extensively on this forum, I won't go into that. But I do want to add one thing that doesn't often get mentioned, and is a reason I always feel TPM hype will never be matched.

Realize that for the longest time the big elephant in the room concerning Star Wars was that it began on Episode IV, which obviously indicated that three entries in the series lead up to what we saw in the OT. It was in the back of every Star Wars fan's mind and a constant question about what could possibly have come before ANH. Especially because many fans were interested in the story arc of the central most intriguing character in Vader/Anakin, and wanted to see what happened and how he became that way. In some ways, the OT never quite felt complete, and it was always a question of when, not if, these earlier entires would come out. That pot boiled for 20+ years spanning two generations, and finally when it was announced that Episode I would be coming out, the pot finally boiled over in excitement and anticipation.

With TFA, there isn't that sense of inevitability to it, no lingering questions or loose ends since the last installment. We could go decades without an Episode VII, there could be an announcement that there will be no additional episodes at all, and there wouldn't be much of a fuss about it. Sure, every now and then there might be some inquiries about a possible continuation of the saga, there would certainly be fan speculation about what happened after ROTJ, but that's it.

So while there certainly is a great amount of hype and excitement for TFA, there isn't that must have sense about it.

 

I would say that the hype level is about the same. One critical difference is that the hype for the phantom menace was more about Star Wars as a saga. The impression I get now is that the hype for the force awakens is much more closely tied to the original trilogy, whilst simultaneously criticizing the prequel trilogy or rather pretending it never happened. It seems like there was much more focus on the future of Star Wars back then. We just did not know what direction Lucas would go. Now there seems to be this nostalgic looking back to the "old days" there is this excitement for making a movie by doing things the "old ways" and so on.


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Even though we always knew Lucas envisioned a nine episode saga, both times I didn't expect to see a Star Wars film ever again. When TPM was announced, I was excited. There was probably more of a chance we'd see that trilogy come to fruition as opposed to the Sequel Trilogy. Now, here comes TFA. I didn't think this would happen at all. So I'm excited. I can't say which one I was more excited for but I didn't see either one happening. Thank God they did.


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I think these two comments nail it.

and this...

Although some have tried, there is no way to quantify which movie has the bigger hype. I think what we can say is that the hype is different for each type of Star Wars fan: a) Those old enough to have seen the originals in the theater, b) Those who grew up with the Prequels (born between 1986 & 2005) and c) the rest who only really have Clone Wars and Rebels. Mind you, I am not downplaying any of these segments as I am sure a 10 year old could love Rebels just much as any of us loved seeing Han and Chewie back in the old days.

That being said, this is perhaps another reason why this topic is so fascinating.

 

One extra reason for TPM was back in 1999 the huge, big budget sci-fi fantasy movies were few and far between. Now they are the norm. Just look at the movies we have to look forward to in 2016 for people who love the genre: Deadpool, Batman V Superman, Civil War, X-Men Apocalypse, Suicide Squad, Doctor Strange, Rogue One, and many more. In 1999 we had TPM, The Matrix and The Mummy.

 

That's an interesting spin though. My wife was pregnant with my oldest when RotS came out. I went into that movie knowing that I would never take my children to a Star Wars movie with me. When I bought my premiere tickets, they were all around the computer making sure I got one for them. When 18-year-old me waited in line for TPM, I was with a bunch of guys, and to be quite honest, we probably all needed a shower. The company is much more important this time.

 

I don't recall seeing so much Star Wars stuff for sale EVERYWHERE last time, nor the number of people wearing Star Wars shirts. We had a waiter at Kerby Lane restaurant wearing a light saber on his belt the other day. I once heard Kevin Smith talking about how comic book movies have made comic book heroes cool, when before they were just something for geeks and fanboys. It seems to have crossed over and pushed SW mania to another level.

 

TPM hype was much bigger. Disney is better at advertising and has a more diversified brand name, that's it really. But TPM was way bigger. Why?

You have to go back to '90s to understand. For one, there wasn't NFLX, On-Demand, TiVo, DVD or BluRay. From 1983-1999, a whole generation of people still watched movies on VHS tapes in their VCR. Or they relied on TV Guide to watch movies at their broadcast times on television. And none of that could replicate the experience people had watching the films when they first came out in theaters. Moreover, high-end VFX weren't abundant throughout other movies. All the way up until 1999, the visual effects in ROTJ were still cutting edge. Star Wars was simply legendary and unequaled in all of action adventure sci-fi moviemaking.

And finally, the franchise had been flawless to that point. Sure there were people who considered it nerdy and were anti-Star Wars, but most people who liked the films were united in their fondness for them. There was no rift among the fan base. George Lucas could do no wrong and was admired by all. The man had made 3 brilliant films, how could anyone expect he would mess up the new ones? Everyone expected TPM to be just as good if not better than its predecessors.

And then the prequels came out and ... for many ... ruined everything. Some people like them, and if that's you, hey do your thing. Most people find them terrible though and regardless they certainly caused a rift in the fanbase. The SE changes, the elimination of the OOT, the prequels, the revisionist history throughout the films to make the originals "match" with the new ones, the inconsistencies ... I mean we could go on and on but they have really divided the fan base.

And now of course we've had many other films with CGI and brilliant VFX. It's no longer new to see such amazing shots in movies. DVD, BluRay, TiVo, NFLX, streaming on the internet; access to films is a lot different nowadays. I'd say its impossible for TFA in 2015 to match the hype of TPM in 1999.

 

My feelings towards the prequels and TPM in particular is complicated but what you've said just isn't true. Gallup polled people around the time of TPM's release. Maybe their sample was just dodgy but the results show that the reception was overwhelmingly positive.

If you hate them, just as you said, do your thing but unless you've got reliable data to back it up then I can confidently say you got your "some" and "most" there the wrong way round. Most people like them and some think they're terrible. If we're really going to be honest, that's just as true for Return of the Jedi.

A lot of people know that there's a good chance they won't enjoy the film all that much. Maybe that's why the hype seems stronger. People rallying behind Star Wars like this is an act of faith.