Please No, Not a Blade Runner Sequel 585
bowman9991 submitted a story that ought to make even the most stone-hearted amongst you cry. He says "Travis Wright, one of the writers behind Eagle Eye, has been working on a sequel to Ridley Scott's Sci-Fi classic Blade Runner. Script proposals have explored the nature of the off-world colonies, what happens to the Tyrell Corporation in the wake of its founder's death, and what would become of Rachel. Travis said he intends to write a script 'with or without anyone's blessings.' Director Ridley Scott appears interested in a sequel too. At Comic-Con in 2007 Ridley said, 'If you have any scripts, you know where to send them.' It's doubtful he'll have time anytime soon though. He's already stated his next two science fiction films will be an adaptation of Aldous Huxley's Brave New Word with Leonardo DiCaprio and an adaptation of Joe Haldeman's The Forever War."
I've got a better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
How about you devote all the energy, time, and effort that you would have put into doing yet another ill-advised sequel or remake into writing something ORIGINAL? Who knows, you may actually produce the next Memento, Reservoir Dogs, or Slumdog Millionaire. At the very least, you'll be able to sleep at night. Do you really want to die being best known as the "asshole who wrote that god-awful sequel to Blade Runner"?
And, on a related note, if you're a filmmaker and have ever thought to yourself "Hey, I bet a remake of 'It's a Wonderful Life' starring Ice Cube and some sassy kids would be great!" please, dear God, stay out of Hollywood.
Super Suck (Score:5, Insightful)
Without a Phillip K. Dick story to bastardize, this script could go into turbo-shitty land really fast.
Highlander (Score:5, Insightful)
Ignore it if you don't want to watch it. (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't get the whole "this sequel is terrible, it shouldn't have been made!" thing. You don't have to watch it. The fact it's been made doesn't affect the original in any way whatsoever. Chill out.
Besides, there's an outside chance it could be really good. The Bladerunner idea is a great starting point.
Forever War.. (Score:3, Insightful)
I guess we can thank GW for starting the forever war.
But seriously, I hope they don't fuck it up. One of my favorites!
I Don't Even Care Anymore (Score:5, Insightful)
Please No, Net a Blade Runner Sequel
Who cares at this point, really?
Disclaimers: I'm not an economist, I love Philip K. Dick & I could care less for Blade Runner the movie.
I see it as there being finite number of movies Hollywood has the money to make each year. I'd rather see a Blade Runner Sequel than the fourth or fifth Austin Powers movie (can you believe that Myers is on contract to make two more?) so why not? I mean, like the article says, the novel is out there [wikipedia.org], it's not like if they transform that story into a movie or make their own script it's going to affect my perception of the original Blade Runner or Philip K. Dick novel. What the article fails to mention is there are actually four Blade Runner novels ( Blade Runner 3: Replicant Night [wikipedia.org] (1996), Blade Runner 4: Eye and Talon [wikipedia.org] (2000)). Go ahead, turn them all into movies, you know the fans will reward you for it with piles of cash. It's better than Legally Blonde: Supreme Court Captain!
I think there have been other movies based on this novel--what of Spielberg's AI? Was that not a butchered version of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? also? I don't see this as quite cut and dried as CmdrTaco ("don't-ruin-perfect?"--I would hardly call any of this material perfect). I mean, I bitch and moan about movies like Snakes on a Plane & The Transporter 8 as I read great novels by great sci-fi writers like Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle [wikipedia.org] (which, although controversial, I opine would make a fine movie)--why not use these great stories that are already out there to allow good directors to create (potentially) great films?
I like to watch original movies from Warner Independent Pictures [wikipedia.org] and Fox Searchlight Pictures [wikipedia.org] but the public and I seem to disagree about where the money in Hollywood should be spent so why do I care that they rehash old crap and dilute brand names when that's how the market rewards them? Can you be critical of them making money? Is that not why they're in that business? Whore yourselves out for all I care, I'm not going to watch it unless there's a Rifftrax for it.
And let's not forget that there are good examples of this actually working out there like The Shining, The Shawshank Redemption, The Lord of the Rings, even Batman Begins & The Dark Knight grossly overshadow Batman Forever & Batman & Robin.
So I ask you, why do you care? You aren't forced to see the movie and if you do, it's going to give you something you love and cherish the most: something to bitch vindictively about.
Re:Ignore it if you don't want to watch it. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What about a prequel? (Score:3, Insightful)
Sequel or prequel won't matter. What you are looking for in a sci-fi movie doesn't exist. That's the big difference between true science fiction and what hollywood calls science fiction. You will never see true science fiction on the big screen because the average, movie going, lobotomized, audience member wouldn't understand what they were watching.
Re:Ignore it if you don't want to watch it. (Score:5, Insightful)
For folks that have a passion about a world created by a movie, then a crappy sequel taints that world.
Which takes us right back to the GP's original point: "You don't have to watch it."
The Highlander sequels did nothing to ruin the original classic for me, because I never saw them, and never will.
So, here's my advice. When/If the movie comes out, wait until everyone else has seen it so you can get some reviews, then decide whether or not you will go see it based on those reviews. If everyone says it sucks and "taints the world" of the original, then stay away from the theatre.
The Forever War, hooray... (Score:2, Insightful)
Kurt Russel -- Soldier (Score:4, Insightful)
The movie Soldier is an amazing movie. Not that it is perfect, by any means, but Kurt Russel has about 12 spoken lines, but carries the whole movie by body language and facial expressions.
I am a closet Kurt Russel fan, and wish, in a better world, he got better parts. His acting is cartoonish because he gets cartoonish parts.
Similarly, I was joking with my son a few weeks ago about the movie "Tropic Thunder" and Robert Downey Jr. It is a awesome that Robert Downey has such a screwed up personal life, it means his talent and ability are relegated to "fun" movies like "Iron Man" and "Tropic Thunder" as opposed to boring movies like "Chocolat," "Cider House Rules," or "The Ice Storm." :-)
I'm not worried: I just don't give a fuck. (Score:5, Insightful)
I have given up hope to see any worthwhile SF movie, in this century. After the 70's, they have been progressively dumbed down. One of my favourite SF movies was "The Andromeda strain", from 1970 (IIRC, won't bother checking with IMDB). It was good, hard-ish SF without unnecessary drama and NO brainfarts. Then they decided to remake it as a two-part mini series last year, and obviously, they HAD TO dumb it down. Because we all know that people today are dumber than they were 30+ years ago... right? I don't hope to see such underrated gems as was "Logan's run", "Demon seed", "2001: A space odyssey" etc.
I blame the "Star Wars" saga for this. Oh, I can hear a rumble, as if a billion slashdotters rose up in horror (I have some karma to burn), but that's what I believe: "Star Wars" had little to do with SF - it should be called a costume western - and it didn't make your neurons work. But it was grand, it had interesting special effects. In brief, it was entertaining without taxing your brain. Just like any James Bond movie does. And the producers of Star Wars made gobs of money, and so, that became the blueprint for future SF movies - make them dumb and entertaining.
So today we only have pseudo-SF movies, like "Minority Report", "Battlestar Galactica" and so forth (boy, am I going to be modded down today!) but whenever someone tries to make a movie even slightly intellectually challenging, like "A.I." he/she gets vilified and suffers dismal box-office failure.
So, fuck the movie industry and fuck the dumb audience. I have no hope for a good SF movie anymore. I'll stick to books - Stephen Baxter and others are still churning good, brain-stimulating hard-SF worth my time.
Re:I'm not worried: I just don't give a fuck. (Score:4, Insightful)
but A.I. did suck.
The ending was a massive digression and the premise, while dark, was not brought to the levels of, say, elfen lied, which did a much better job of portraying a dark, dissociated view of human corruption.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:1, Insightful)
If you've got a business to run, it doesn't matter if you are selling cat piss in an aerosol can, if people buy it and you make a profit it is your prime directive from the market to make that profit, unless you can make more profit doing something else.
Unfortunately, familiarity sells, thus explaining McDonalds - better to get a meal you know is familiar crap that at least didn't kill you last time than to risk getting something unfamiliar that might be worse.
You would think people would behave differently when selecting entertainment, but they don't.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Star Trek is turning into a Shakespeare kind of production. Within 50 years, they'll be discussing who's Kirk or Spock is better and then Trouble With Tribbles will be performed in the park every 4th of July.
Re:I'm not worried: I just don't give a fuck. (Score:3, Insightful)
"A.I." stirred in me an ocean of questions about consciousness, the self and sentience. Many of the conclusions and doubts I have today, have their roots in the thoughts that the movie has induced in me. Maybe it could have been better - and the short story by Aldiss is also great, but it has a different "bent" than the movie. BOTH are worthwhile, in my opinion. And we all know that opinions are like hemorrhoids, as every asshole has them, including me and you - but alas, the situation is similar to the "Blade runner" movie WRT the Philip K. Dick story/novel ("Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?"). Both are great, but they are different. They are different art forms, too, so it's a bit like comparing apples to oranges, but I feel that the Dick novel is a dark masterpiece, and if you don't feel slightly nauseated but glad to have read such a deep, thought-provoking SF, you have not appreciated it completely. Still, I also like the movie.
But these are just my opinions, and any asshole has a few, as we all know.
Please Oh No! (Score:1, Insightful)
NOT a wretched sequel to the "Blade Runner" abortion of Philip K. Dick's best book.
The Hollywoodization of "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" excised all but one concept in the book: the protagonist hunts androids (oh no! let's call them "replicants"!). A depopulated Earth devastated by radiation... nah, let's make it OVERpopulated! Psychopathic androids with a parallel police department... nah, let's make the android leader a witness for antiwar sentiment! Mercer... Mercer? WTF, we can't make sense out of a Dickian "fake fake" Messiah! Write that suckah outa tha script!
And of course, Deckard CAN'T be married... he has to fly off into the sunset with the (android) girl!
Re:Ignore it if you don't want to watch it. (Score:4, Insightful)
You can't KNOW that it'll be awful until you see it (though you can have a pretty good gut feeling).
Then you have no one to blame but yourself for not listening to your gut.
Honestly, if you're so enamoured with a movie that another movie can impact your enjoyment of that first movie, then don't take the chance.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
As you get older, less and less is original. "Original" work is generally (as the initial poster and then the child posts pointed out) something you haven't heard of yet. Stick around for a few decades and you'll realize just about every song you hear, every movie you see, every book you read, you have heard, seen, and read before in some fashion.
But don't give up hope: there may be no original plots, but a story is all in the telling, and THAT can be original.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
It doesn't cost you more $2000 in equipment and then your elbow grease.
Sure, as long as you:
* have no Hi-def widescreen
* don't want multiple shots of the same scene
* use low-quality audio
* use non-pirated software
* have no CG effects
* don't include computer costs
* don't pay anyone
* consider working time worth nothing
That $2000 will cover a single halfway-decent camera.
Terminator... (Score:3, Insightful)
Terminator II was 100 times better than Terminator I, but Terminator III was 100 times worse.
What does this mean? It's all about the script, not the material.
Ender's Game (Score:3, Insightful)
I keep hearing how a studio won't sign off on a movie that involves so many young actors, involves kids killing kids, involves arguably no adult leads, and in many ways is unfilmable. Try getting little kids to do the Battle School stunts.
However, the solution is so simple. Hire Robert Zemekis, who has done dark, mature material (see Beowulf) and family material (see Back to the Future, Polar Express, Roger Rabitt). He could find the right tone.
Even better, he is a special effects genius who has been perfecting mo-cap. In many scenes in watching Beowulf I forgot it was animated because it look so realistic, which was a big jump from Polar Express, and I imagine he will only get better with the technique.
With mo-cap, he can use older, better actors to play all the kid parts, but animate them to be age appropriate for the roles, do the Battle School stunts properly, etc. Also animated violence on kids is different from filmed violence on kids.
Not to mention the Fantasy Game sequences, the buggers, the space battles, etc.
This movie is crying out for mo-cap and animation.
Instead I read that Orson Scott Card rewrote the script to focus on Mazer Rackham as an adult lead, which is fucking stupid.
Card and Zemeckis need to do mo-cap Ender's Game, yesterday.
It would be Harry Potter meets Star Wars and do 400 mil domestic. Count on it.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Your post is the typical ignorant apology for Business As Usual we hear sheeple bleat every other day.
Your theory leads to hive mind and idiocracy, as one never goes broke underestimating the intelligence or the taste of the average american.
The entertainment industry is one of the single greatest blocks to genuine human progress.
RS
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:3, Insightful)
Ahem, the guy who wrote that short story wrote the movie. That is the director's brother. He was adapting his own work into another medium.
Given that Nolan wrote both, he can be seen as creating something original.
Jonathon Nolan also wrote the screenplay for The Prestige (adapting someone else's novel, but a fucking fantastic adaptation none the less) and the screenplay for The Dark Knight, which pulls from several comic story lines for inspiration, but could be seen as an original story arch.
Picking on Nolan is picking on the wrong writer.
Do Replicants Dream of Replicant Sheep? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:2, Insightful)
Niven, Please (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I'm not worried: I just don't give a fuck. (Score:5, Insightful)
So today we only have pseudo-SF movies, like "Minority Report", "Battlestar Galactica" and so forth (boy, am I going to be modded down today!) but whenever someone tries to make a movie even slightly intellectually challenging, like "A.I." he/she gets vilified and suffers dismal box-office failure.
Did you just seriously say AI was intellectually challenging? There was nothing "intellectually challenging" about AI. It was simply the worst SF movie ever made, and that's saying a lot. In fact, it was SF in name only - you talk about costume western that is Star Wars (and I don't necessarily disagree) - AI is nothing more than fluffy drama tear jerker that tried WAYYY too hard with ridiculously unbelievable characters, plot holes from here to the moon and horrible ... absolutely HORRIBLE acting. There was absolutely NOTHING redeeming about AI, and the fact that you hold it up as something to be admired (intellectually challenging? Seriously?) leads me to believe you have absolutely no idea what good SF is. Your credibility in that department is pretty much shot.
Re:The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly was a sequel. (Score:2, Insightful)
What if memory could be captured and re-implanted in one generation of Replicant after another, so that consciousness would span several lifetimes/bodies?
Have you read the Frank Herbert Dune books? Bene Tleilaxu and the axlotl tanks; Gholas with preserved memories. It's used as a plot device through the "God Emperor of Dune", and really comes together as you're supposing in "Dune: Chapterhouse". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bene_Tleilax [wikipedia.org]
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Bzzzzt... movie snob alert.
T2 was an action movie. But it was a GREAT action movie, one of the best ever. It may not be an 'intelligent' as Blade Runner (the latter of which is one of my favourite movies of all time) but in terms of its genre it was largely unsurpassed until at least The Matrix.
Otherwise I agree with your post 100%. Although that To Kill a Mockingbird sequel sounds great, can I suggest Vin Diesel for the role of Atticus? I also have a title lined up for you: "2: Killa Mockingbird".