ST The Last Jedi Box Office Discussion (see warning on page 307 before posting)

Wow the last two pages have been intense with the back and forth. All I can say is that I am happy that both TLJ and BP are doing great. They are Disney movies, owned by the mouse. Literally, they are becoming the studio to beat.

Ossian- I got to agree with what you said about GL. He waited too long to do another star wars movie after ROTJ. Though I like the sequel trilogy so far and it has made a lot of money, the other movies are special.

Ricardo- your also right, the numbers today favor all the new movies and we don't need to wait 20 years, in 5, we will have a new list. It's going to be that way. Soon a billion dollars will be an everyday thing event. Two billion will be the standard with the upper ante being $3 billion.

 

“Diluting the brand” is a thing. If you oversaturate the market, and the quality isn’t there, the novelty of “a Star Wars movie” won’t be the same down the road. Marvel has, not only the depth, but a diverse group of heroes to tell stories with who bring something unique to the table with each film. Star Wars heavily relies on building off of what George Lucas made and we have yet to see how things fly on their own, really.

They are working on this at least (bringing in the GOT creators for a Star Wars series, and Johnson - who’s an otherwise very good filmmaker - for a new trilogy), but we’ll see. Of course, a lot of that’s superficial recruitment based on what they worked on and we’ll have to see how the GOT guys fly without George RR Martin’s material to work from. I’d be more optimistic if it were a Vince Gillian Star Wars series as that guy has made things out of nothing.

But, to relate this back to box office, I think we need more time for the box office of TLJ to really sink in and we have more context to analyze it. It isn’t all roses and once we have more info on where BP settles and how Solo does, I think there’ll be more to say on this and whether they even can expand on it in a way that keeps the idea of “a Star Wars movie!!” an exciting idea.

 

Variety article about theater owner reactions to Black Panther's run:

Hopefully the studios take this to heart, I am all for more diverse casts and having fun blockbusters to watch all year round.

 

The Star Wars brand will be diluted regardless of quality.

One of it's biggest selling points was rarity. Folks flocked out to see Star Wars even when the reaction was divided during the PT. Because, prior to the sell, Star Wars films were rare cultural events.

Not so anymore. It's delusion to think Star Wars will continue to dominate every single year when you've got films being released sometimes less than a year apart. It's going to become a normal, big franchise, eventually with wild variations in BO intake. And obviously Disney-LFL is fine with that, as they picked the MCU model, despite Star Wars having far less known, popular characters to draw from.

Every Marvel film doesn't do Avengers/BP numbers. And there will come a time when plenty of SW films won't be doing TLJ, much less TFA, level numbers.

 

I could care less about Disney owning both franchises. For me, all that matters is do I like the films. As a lifelong Marvel fanatic it has been wonderful to see my childhood heroes come to life on the screen. And Star Wars will always be my first love.

In the last three months, I have loved Thor, TLJ and BP.

I am one happy fanboy.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Right, but you’re taking what I said out of context. It was in response to a post about Star Wars having a string of steady (but lesser) box office movies rather than relying on big tentpole movies every 2 years.

Within the context of what my post was responding to (the statement “it’s better to have 500M Star Wars movies than 1 2B Star Wars movie every 2 years”), if you dilute the Star Wars brand as much as they are on the verge of doing, I have my doubts that you get $500M Star Wars movies on a regular basis (okay, domestic), because at a certain point, who will care about the Jabba the Hutt movie? (Well, me.)

 

Disney releases this year:
3 Marvel franchise movies
2 CGI animated feature film sequels
1 Star Wars anthology film
1 sequel to a classic Disney live action film from the 60s
1 adaptation of a classic children's book (Disney's second attempt at a live action adaptation of Wrinkle in Time)

Wrinkle in Time is nothing but a big budget reboot. There is essentially no non-franchise, non sequel original Disney content in 2018. I think that's a terrible thing for cinema, personally. "Too much Star Wars" is really the least of the problem. Too much Marvel is the bigger problem. Too many sequels is the general malaise of U.S. cinema.

 

@Rylo Ken The article I linked actually talks about that as well - compared to other studios, Disney is laser-focused on big-budget blockbusters. There's some concern that mid-budget or otherwise riskier releases are being squeezed out and that the Disney acquisition of Fox might just make things worse.

 

And things can get worse if Disney starts buying out the theater chains so that they don't have to share the profits with them. Great for Disney, not great for everyone else.

 

We'll see more of a Marvel numbers type deal with Solo. I don't think it'll come close to R1.

 

I think it's going to be awhile before Star Wars becomes so diluted that it can't pull something in the 400-500 million range.

But it will eventually happen. Of course it will. And Disney-LFL is well aware of that. Star Wars can't be sustained at it's current level into perpetuity. Disney's approach is the same as MCU; milk it dry.

The difference? Star Wars doesn't have the diversity that Marvel does, at least from an general audience interest perspective, no matter how they try to convince their shareholders that it does.

IMO, at this rate, the franchise has a much shorter shelf life than Disney promised it's shareholders it would.

 

I think Star Wars has a greater potential than Marvel in the sense that the Star Wars universe is actually better created and it's not a bunch of superheroes and their bizarre assortment of magical powers and mutations and whatever. It's really close to that, but it's not close enough.

I can get tired of Marvel faster because I'm tired of superheroes. I am not sure I can get tired of Force stories though, unless of course they are all bad.

 

I haven't seen BP yet, and it's clear that BP has resonated in a major way, but bar that I just can't fine any of the Marvel films resonant in any meaningful way. Thor 3 was a lot of fun, but it was also a mess, and every time it became a Marvel film and not a Taika Waititi film, it was as forgettable as every other Marvel for me. I think Solo will do well, and be a lot of fun as well. But it's got zero shot at being the number one of the year. And I don't think it matters either. So long as it's a good adventure, and it does respectable bank, I'll take that.

 

0"55-1"02, 1"07-1"10, 1"16-1"19, 1"39-1"48, 1"52, 1"58-2"04 just in this one trailer....looks like your typical generic action movie with over-the-top bad CGI.

 

Honestly, only diehard fans talk like this. John Q Public just doesn't approach films this way. And comic superheroes are gold, and have been for decades.

I commend LFL for green lighting the two new Star Wars series with RJ and the GOT dudes, but it's a much bigger risk at this point then pulling out a Marvel superhero. RO proved they could take a risk, and TLJ took chances. I appreciate that perspective, but Star Wars is still very much unproven at this level of consistency.

 

Right superhero fatigue just isn't a thing. The current boom has been going strong for eighteen years.

 

I think it is a thing. I'm just on the early end of it. I suppose it might never get old with kids though. It's harder for something to get old when one is newer to the world.

 

There's just so much built in diversity. And the quality is consistently there in a way it's never been in history. What's being pulled off with the MCU is honestly damn near miraculous.

I'm going to be shocked if they can pull it off with Star Wars. I don't mean quality wise, because I beyond trust the quality control under KK, but viable characters/stories that will keep the public interested yearly for the next couple decades.

Certain properties are guaranteed hits; a Darth Vader or Yoda stand alone, further adventures of Luke/Leia/Han set between ROTJ and TFA, even a prequel redo, those are guaranteed BO platinum. The big test is how many folks show up for the original Star Wars content. If those dominate at the BO, Disney-LFL will have jumped a major hurdle.

 

I think it also helps that Mavel has close to 70 years of stories, characters and idea to draw from to make these movies, but more importantly they have a producer who seems to have the savy in turning these properties into a franchise and is willing to get top of the line directors to accomplish this.

 

Except I would argue that JJ, RJ, GE and RH are far more accomplished than most of the Marvel directors.

 

There's really only one place to go with SW to make it a cinematic universe like Marvel. Make either PAST or distant FUTURE stories where the Jedi (or even some other group of Force users) into galactic superheros of sorts and then have spin offs based on the new characters showing their origins.

I say go WAY back and have whole new stories with Force users coming together to form the Jedi order and each one having specific gifts.

Not really box office related but figured I'd throw that out there to show that SW can indeed become as layered as Marvel or DC.

 

If you go the "Marvel route," then you also can't have every movie be about Jedi

 

Good point BUT every Marvel movie is about superheros so....who knows? Maybe just not make 20 of them? lol

 

BP making you guys see things differently. None of you guys thought that BP could be this good, and of course we are going to say Marvel is bad and Star Wars is the future. Well,both of them can succeed and be awesome. There is no super hero fatigue and Star Wars is not on the dumps. All I can say is go Marvel and Star Wars. I love you both....

 

Also, Jumanji is at 920 million. Could someone pinch me?