'Solo' Will Lose $50+ Million In First Defeat For Disney's 'Star Wars' Empire (hollywoodreporter.com) 579
Zorro shares a report from The Hollywood Reporter: To borrow one of Han Solo's lines from Star Wars: The Force Awakens, "That's not how the Force works!" It's an apt way to sum up the troubled performance of Solo: A Star Wars Story. In one of the biggest box-office surprises in recent times, Solo is badly underperforming and will become the first of the Star Wars movies made by Disney and Lucasfilm to lose money. Wall Street analyst Barton Crockett says Solo will lose more than $50 million. Industry financing sources, however, say that figure could come in at $80 million or higher, although no one knows the exact terms of Disney's deals for home entertainment and television, among other ancillary revenues.
The force (Score:3, Funny)
Is weak with this one.
No it won't (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:No it won't (Score:5, Interesting)
Nonsense! Solo will never be profitable because neither were most of the original trilogy [theatlantic.com].
Re:No it won't (Score:5, Insightful)
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I was gonna ask if this is the typically "we pulled 300m in box office sales first weekend but only made 63 cents" Hollywood accounting...
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According to the article you posted: The original trilogy did make a profit, they just hid it.
Solo may be a different matter.
I am noticing that the critics ratings is significantly higher than the audience score, on rottentomatoes. That happened with the last Star Wars movie as well.
Bottom line: Disney is killing the franchise. There is not a real princess in the movie, and everybody is sick to the back teeth of Disney's SJW crap.
There is no worthwhile story any more, and there hasn't been since the origin
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The problem is that TFA, RO and TLJ DID. And that turned people off.
TFA was basically ANH reworked, and the primary character was an glaringly obvious Mary Sue.
RO was a better story, better directed and generally better overall. The primary was still a Mary Sue, just not so terribly overpowered.
And TLJ. If movies were drag queens, TLJ was like trotting out Divine.
The storytelling was nearly non-existent. The entire plot thread for Kelly Marie Tran was infantile and ridiculously forced. The Laura Dern c
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This was of course a movie made for streaming. It's almost the definition of not worth a movie theater trip.
Re:No it won't (Score:5, Insightful)
This was of course a movie made for streaming. It's almost the definition of not worth a movie theater trip.
I disagree. Actually, I think that "Solo" is by far the best of the Disney Star Wars movies. I think the problem is that The Last Jedi was the worst Star Wars movie ever (yes, worse than Episode I) and that pissed people off. They will watch Episode IX since they wan't to know how the story will end, but they won't bother with an "anthology" movie outside of the main storyline since they don't feel like they are missing anything important.
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..."Solo" ...the problem is that The Last Jedi was the worst Star Wars movie ever (yes, worse than Episode I) and that pissed people off. They will watch Episode IX since they wan't to know how the story will end, but they won't bother with an "anthology" movie outside of the main storyline since they don't feel like they are missing anything important.
You may be correct, but there could be another factor... Solo is unlike the rest of the Star Wars movies because it's not about magical force-wielding Jedi/Sith. Solo's characters are more "average" people than most Star Wars movies. Rogue One is the closest to Solo in terms of Force-wielding characters and Jedi vs Sith plot lines, but Rogue One characters clearly had latent/untrained Force powers, and they fought against chief evil Sith Lord Vader. Anyway, the lack Jedi/Sith and Force powers might be har
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No way was Last Jedi worse than Phantom Menace. I know there's a whole backlash by people upset that their pet theories didn't pan out and some gibberish about sjw, but on the whole it was a decent movie. Phantom Menace was just a terrible movie overall.
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Phantom Menace was just a terrible movie overall.
The Phantom Menace was a slow and boring movie with an overall story that barely held together. It was the least offensive movie of the prequels, but certainly was the most boring.
The Last Jedi was an objectively terrible movie with a bad story that was internally inconsistent and utterly incongruous. Truly, TLJ has absolutely no redeeming qualities.
Re: No it won't (Score:5, Funny)
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it will make hundreds of millions in DVD sales
People now buy blurays - DVD is so 20th century (and production is not even from Fox studio)
It wasn't a terrible movie (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not really sure where the negative vibes came from; I thought it was better than "The Last Jedi" and a lot better than "Infinity Wars".
Ron Howard did a credible job as director (you can see what was done before him).
I think it really comes down to "Jedi Fatigue" and a really stupid release date (against "Infinity Wars" and "Deadpool 2").
Re:It wasn't a terrible movie (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, I actually really liked it, in fact, I liked Rogue One a lot too and I'm beginning to think maybe the spin offs are going to be consistently better than the mainline.
As such, what bothers me is that the poor showing for Solo is because of the utter cluster fuck Rian Johnson made of the last film that was out in December. I sincerely hope they don't scrap the good films due to poor showings like this when the reason was the shit film that came out in December.
I suspect if this film had been out in December, and Rian's shitfest had been out now, they'd both have done well as Solo would've been much appreciated in December and would've led to people being excited for another release now (only to be disappointed because it'd still be Rian's shitfest).
The real problem here is the utter fuckup that is Rian Johnson ruining people's interest in December, not because Solo is a bad film in itself, on the contrary, it's quite good.
Solution: Take that trilogy you've promised to Rian Johnson back away from him and don't hire him ever again and focus on actual good directors. Don't give up on spin offs because the mainline ruined people's interest in the subsequent film when the real problem was the director doing a shit job of the mainline film.
Re:It wasn't a terrible movie (Score:5, Interesting)
For Star Wars, there were no character arcs planned and in usual J.J. Abrams fashion he introduced plenty of unresolved and mysterious plot threads that he had no solid plans for resolving while essentially remaking Episode IV. Maybe that works great for something like Lost where you can jerk the audience around for 6 seasons, but for a Star Wars trilogy you need to know where the story is headed.
I suppose you could pass the buck to Disney who could have done a much better job of managing the Star Wars property. Why they didn't have an overall script or plan in place is beyond me. If you look at the Marvel cinematic universe they seem to have that much more planned out and I think that's why it's doing so well.
Re:It wasn't a terrible movie (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, it seems that Abrams had an outline for Ep. VIII written but Rian decided to completely ignore it and write his own story.
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No completely. He did throw Snoke under the bus. But Rey's story did not change between Ep7 and Ep8:
https://www.cinemablend.com/ne... [cinemablend.com]
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But 90% of what made it awful is rather than focus on actually telling a story he was trying to make political points, with snipes at long term fans about how it's time to let a younger generation take over and such.
He can't be absolved of blame when he took a long running franchise and made it political, suddenly attacking key much loved characters and turning them into bumbling buffoons such as Skywalker, Poe, and so forth.
And if anything the story wasn't shit because there were too many things it didn't
Big gambles on small directors (Score:2)
Sounds like Fox when they handed the Fantastic Four reboot to a newbie with a couple of indie credits under his belt. That bomb plus TLJ may have discouraged studios from handing huge franchise movies to directors who only
Re:It wasn't a terrible movie (Score:4, Insightful)
The Last Jedi really set up the final episode with the biggest and most necessary change in the Star Wars universe - the final admission that the Jedi were actually pretty terrible and that the true saviour, the one who will really bring balance to the Force and peace the universe, is not a Jedi.
In the original trilogy the Jedi were described as virtuous knights, fighting for good and protecting the innocent. Luke bought into it, he didn't know any better and his initial exposure to Jedi training was pretty positive. But in reality the Jedi not only failed in their most important mission to prevent the rise of the Sith, but they were actually pretty awful all round. They considered themselves superior and claimed ownership of the Force, used it to manipulate people without a second thought, and didn't seem to care at all about injustices like slavery. The latter arguably resulted in Anakin turning to the dark side and the deaths of billions.
Luke tried to emulate them but made the same mistakes, resulting in Kylo Ren. Then he meets Rey and sees that she doesn't fear the dark side, to her it's all just the Force and a part of her. Luke realizes that the Jedi order was the problem, as does Yoda, and that Rey and Kylo Ren are the future, free from all that baggage and liberated to do the right thing.
The new trilogy has so far mirrored the first one to an extent, but this is where it really diverges. Rey isn't descended from some great bloodline, Kylo Ren isn't a Sith. Ren killed his master not to save someone he cared about, for his own personal gain. The resolution won't be the return of the Jedi, it will be the end of the Jedi and something new taking their place and starting with Rey.
Re:It wasn't a terrible movie (Score:5, Insightful)
Luke realizes that the Jedi order was the problem, as does Yoda, and that Rey and Kylo Ren are the future, free from all that baggage and liberated to do the right thing.
Yeah, because freeing someone from a moral framework and letting that person exercise his power as best he sees fit has worked so well in the Star Wars universe.
Re:It wasn't a terrible movie (Score:5, Interesting)
If that was the goal, they did it wrong.
Luke faced torture and certain death to save his father, who he barely knew, from the darkside. And here we have that same Luke about to murder his own nephew, whom he has known his entire life, in his sleep! For just starting to fall to the dark side.
Character motivation MATTERS when telling a good story. There interest here wasn't to show us how characters react in this drama, it was to take a widely-loved hero and turn him into a coward that just shrugs his shoulders and abandons his friends and family during their time of greatest need!
So, it makes zero sense that Luke would behave this way, so the story is dumb. And it doesn't stop there. Poe, formerly an elite and devoted hero of the resistance, is now a mutineer that just wants to blow everything up, and is directly responsible for getting the entire resistance wiped out. Fin is selfish and obsessed.
All our male heroes are having their characters destroyed, so their female counterparts can show their superiority, in each case. As if the bad plot wasn't bad enough, being beaten over the head with this man-shaming is just icing on the cake.
Fuck star wars.
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You completely missed my main point, and simultaneously made my secondary point for me.
I understand why, according to this story, Luke made bad decisions. I am countering that, in that exact situation, Luke would not have made those decisions. They are contrary to his character, as revealed in the prior movies. When characters act grossly out of character like that, it makes the story feel arbitrary and dumb, which is exactly what happened here.
My secondary point was that each male failure in this movie
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Really, Luke making bad, hasty decisions is out of character? Like when he abandoned his training with Yodo and rushed off to face Vader, only to lose badly? Or his brilliant plan to rescue Han and Leia from Jabba's Palace?
Where is this coming from? (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not sure where you're getting this stuff about the Jedi from.
"...but they were actually pretty awful all round"
They were? They seem to be universally loved by "good characters" in the universe. Let's see why you say the are "pretty awful"
"They considered themselves superior and claimed ownership of the Force, used it to manipulate people without a second thought"
Sure seems like they would have been running the Republic's government if they thought they were both superior and were happy to "manipulate people without a second though". But no, instead of pursuing power in the Republic they acted as servants of it.
"...and didn't seem to care at all about injustices like slavery."
Slavery was illegal in the Republic ( http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki... [wikia.com] ) so while it did exist in a few backwaters like Tatooine, this does not mean that the Jedi didn't care about it any more than the Republic didn't. They were a relatively small order patrolling the bulk of the galaxy and by their own admission, couldnt get to everything. In fact, "When the Old Republic outlawed slavery, the Jedi set about to free those held..." (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Jedi_Order).
"Luke tried to emulate them but made the same mistakes, resulting in Kylo Ren."
Specifically, what mistakes were made? The only one I know of was pulling his light saber out for a moment when he sensed the Dark side's influence on Ren.
Don't get me wrong, what you're throwing out here is certainly an interesting narrative, it just doesn't fit the facts.
Re:It wasn't a terrible movie (Score:4, Interesting)
You basically just regurgitated the premise of "The Last Jedi" - and newsflash: people hated that movie.
Luke only became "disillusioned with the Jedi" and "made the same mistakes" because that was what Riann Johnson put into the story, and that idea sucked.
I wanted to see Luke rebuilding the Jedi Order. Not failing to do so, but achieving that and it being a worthwhile goal. It's OK to have a hopeful movie and not try to make everything emo and shades of grey. Is the world like that? No, of course not, but that's why I'm watching a fantasy movie where people fight with glowing laser swords.
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Maybe that works great for something like Lost where you can jerk the audience around for 6 seasons,
You can only jerk the least intelligent or most patient segment of the audience around for 6 seasons. It was obvious to me within the first season that the show was an intellectual cocktease with no intent to put out, raising tantalizing new mysteries all the time in an attempt to distract you from an almost complete lack of answers and a complete lack of good answers. Which turned out to be exactly what was happening behind the scenes. [independent.co.uk]
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I think it really comes down to "Jedi Fatigue" and a really stupid release date (against "Infinity Wars" and "Deadpool 2").
More to being a shit film no one wanted I think. Disney are going to kill star wars dead. At the moment they are doing chest compressions but cracking all the ribs in the process.
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I think the utter joke that was TLJ lost many fans. They used Star Wars as a platform for their gender studies bullshit, just to "stick it" to those terrible white male nerds. Not even Jar Jar could achieve what they did here. The franchise is dead.
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I'm not really sure where the negative vibes came from; I thought it was better than "The Last Jedi" and a lot better than "Infinity Wars".
Ron Howard did a credible job as director (you can see what was done before him).
I think it really comes down to "Jedi Fatigue" and a really stupid release date (against "Infinity Wars" and "Deadpool 2").
I thought it was a pretty good movie, but the story seemed kind of like action pieces duct taped together, rather than a well thought out backstory of a pretty important character. Meaning, as a go watch a Han Solo adventure movie it was pretty good, as a go learn why Han Solo became who he was in Star Wars, it was OK but seemed lacking.
Personally I liked the Han Solo trilogy as a backstory better than the movie, but that's just me: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki... [wikia.com]
Damning by faint praise (Score:4, Interesting)
It wasn't a terrible movie
Being not terrible is not a reason to be a box office it. It is a $150 million mediocre movie. The characters aren't that engaging. The plot isn't that engaging. Han comes off as a gullible doofus. L3 was just pathetic especially the whole "death" scene. And, Lando crying over L3 like it was his lover? Really? The explanation of the Kessel run was pretty lame too, especially with the "carbon bergs the size of planets".
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This. The timing of the film is what really did it in. If it weren't squished between 2 huge summer blockbusters, it would've sold a lot more tickets.
I watched it on opening night - in a mostly empty theatre - and thought it was a pretty good movie, a lot more fun and less frustrating than Ep8.
Re:It wasn't a terrible movie (Score:4, Insightful)
I liked the movie a lot... it's probably up there on my top four or five of all Star Wars movies, and I enjoyed most of them (much much less so the prequels). And the other two who went with me also enjoyed it a lot.
Things that they did better than TLJ:
1. It was FUN. It was a fun movie above everything else, despite having some nice grit and darkness to certain scenes. One of the writers is the guy who did The Empire Strikes Back and Indiana Jones. The other writer was his son.
2. They didn't piss all over a beloved character, or even a beloved item (saber).
3. They didn't overdo the humor, it was the perfect mix and tone.
4. You enjoyed ALL of the characters. The good guys, the bad guys, the random side characters, the alien monsters, the sidekicks, you name it. All of them were very enjoyable.
5. There weren't 10 political agendas overtly telling you how to think. There might have been one, but it was sort of funny... maybe... mostly weird probably, but I can certainly not get hung up on it.
6. The CGI was done in good taste 95% of the time, a rarity lately. Actually TLJ did OK there, too.
What was missing from Solo that was in other Star Wars movies?
1. Don't go in expecting a bunch of Jedi duels- this is about Han before he gets involved in that world.
2. It was less explosion/laser lights/flashy than some of the newer movies. This appealed to me, you need diversity in movies or they get stale.
3. They weren't saving the galaxy per se. But for me it was nice to focus in on a smaller crowd who were after a smaller prize.
4. ? I'm sure there are other things, but this is what stands out to me.
Anyway, I'm sad to see it not doing great [yet]. But I have a lot of faith that giving DVD sales and whatnot, it will be a huge money maker.
Re:It wasn't a terrible movie (Score:5, Interesting)
Infinity wars was down a few million a day. It did not explain Solo theaters with 22 tickets sold.
Solo suffered from the pansexual comment. Audience demographics showed families attendance was down 80%. What parent wants to discuss pansexuality with their 12 year old. Awkward. yea... I know... it really wasn't in the movie.. it was a forced error on the part of the writer who gave a bad off the cuff response to a question.
Solo suffered from fan anger over TLJ. There's no way around it. Many of the peple the angriest were the ones who typically see films opening night and then repeatedly afterwards. I've seen A:IW 5 times and Deadpool II, 3 times. (BTW: I'm hearing good things about "Upgrade" a little independent Sci Fi film and I'm going to see it before it vanishes from theaters).
I was angry because TLJ humiliated and ruined Jake Skywalker (as Mark Hamill called him). And generally because the film humiliated males (Poe, Hux, Kylo, even Snoke) without any corresponding humiliation scenes for females.
TLJ was independently a really dumb film that repeatedly broke my suspension of disbelief so often that I had none left for the last half hour. I was just debating.. "do I leave and wait in the lobby or do I just sit out the last bit to see how this shit show ends?". And I went into TLJ in a very positive mood. It had a lot of my good will and had burned it all by the 45 minute mark. By the time I walked out, I'd decided not to see or buy any star wars material based on TLJ canon.
So.. I'm going to Avengers and the Solo trailer came up (1st trailer) and I literally felt sick at my stomach from leftover anger at TLJ.
EU is my canon. To say it's not canon is like Disney buy the rights to shakespeare and saying Hamlet is no longer canon. It was canon for 40 years. Some dumb soulless corporation isn't going to tell me what canon is.
Not Surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
Telling a completely new story in a great universe? Great idea [imdb.com].
Telling a derivative story in a great universe? Good idea [imdb.com].
Shooting a remake of a great movie? Decent idea [imdb.com].
Shooting a movie with an iconic character, defined by an iconic actor? Terrible idea [imdb.com].
The Star Trek remakes got away with it because the roles made the actors more than the actors made the roles (though they're still boring movies).
But Han Solo was cool because Harrison Ford is a top-end actor who absolutely nailed the character of Han Solo. A Han Solo movie without Harrison Ford is basically a movie of going "Boy, that character isn't nearly as interesting as I remember. And that guy still isn't Harrison Ford!"
It's not like there were a lack of stories to tell in the Star Wars universe [wikipedia.org].
Its really all about scripts and actors (Score:4, Insightful)
Shooting a movie with an iconic character, defined by an iconic actor? Terrible idea.
True Grit. Iconic character: Rooster Cogburn. Iconic actor: John Wayne in 1969. The 2010 remake had a good script and good actors. In particular Jeff Bridges as Cogburn. So like any other movie the script and the actors seem to be the key factors in success.
OK that's a remake not delving into an established character's past. Perhaps a more appropriate counterargument would involve a different Harrison Ford role, Indiana Jones. In Last Crusade we have River Phoenix playing a young Indiana Jones and revealing part of Jone's mysterious background. I thought those scenes worked well, again it may be all about the script and the actors. With a good script could River Phoenix have pulled off a respectable full length movie exploring Jone's youth? The Last Crusade scenes suggest that would be entire plausible.
Re: Its really all about scripts and actors (Score:2)
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Watch The Searchers. It's John Wayne's best film, and one of the best Westerns ever made.
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The reason why a star trek reboot worked is because the original star trek movies had been gone for 25 years and
the fans were ready for a reboot.
Harrison Ford had just been on the screen as han solo 3 years ago.
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He did a credible job. Everyone in the film did a credible job. I just thought the script was muddled. The second act really dragged. I found myself rather bored at that point. Ron Howard is a very good director, Apollo 13 grabs you by the balls and never lets go, but Solo just seemed kind of meh. Part of the problem was that there wasn't enough of a story to justify the running length.
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Depends, was the coach because the guy can't act, or to try and get the best portrayal for this particular character?
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Seriously, when you consider everything we know, nepotism is very reasonable conclusion as to why Ehrenreich landed the role.
Return of the Jedi? (Score:4, Insightful)
So box office returns are below estimates. But we still have to go through the PPV, the DVD/BD disc releases, streaming service, TV, then there's all the merchandise/toys, etc. etc.
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Didn't Darth Vader actor David Prowse tell us that Return of the Jedi also never made a profit? [slashfilm.com]
So box office returns are below estimates. But we still have to go through the PPV, the DVD/BD disc releases, streaming service, TV, then there's all the merchandise/toys, etc. etc.
That was because of hollywood accounting, this is because disney have royally fucked the job.
The movies are an advertisement ... (Score:3)
There are none so blind (Score:3, Insightful)
Marketing has little to nothing to do with it, but at least that's less stupid than the SW Fatigue shtick. Star Wars fans would have thrown money at the franchise forever without a second thought if they hadn't put social evangelists in charge and allowed them to burn it down.
Re:There are none so blind (Score:5, Insightful)
Star Wars fans would have thrown money at the franchise forever without a second thought if they hadn't put social evangelists in charge and allowed them to burn it down.
Doubtful that had anything to do with it. Look at the list of top grossing films in the US [wikipedia.org] we can see that number 3 is Black Panther, a film almost entirely made up of diversity hires where an SJW forces a bunch of conservatives to adopt his agenda and culminates in the creation of a reverse-racist outreach centre targeting poor black kids.
We also have Avatar, about an SJW enviro-mentalist who thinks a primitive native tribe is more important than unobtanium that could bring prosperity and wealth to several rich white guys. Force Awakens is up there, which as we know is the ultimate Mary-Sue anti-male crapfest. Even the Last Jedi is in at number 8, right above proper fan favourite manly man film The Dark Knight.
Worryingly, even femoid romantic crap like Titanic did really well. Even AmiMojo couldn't sit through that one. Somehow Wonder Woman, a feminist nightmare of a movie, did better than all the other DC universe stuff.
I know everything is SJWs' fault, but in this case maybe Solo is just a bad movie or people are fed up with Star Wars now.
Re:There are none so blind (Score:4, Insightful)
There is no problem with Wonder Woman. You're either painfully dense or trying to create an outrageous strawman (or, possibly, you've been completely brainwashed by mainstream propaganda which was legalized for domestic use about 5 years ago). Wonder Woman is a good character, a strong female heroine. Nothing was too forced there. Black Panther, well, we all should be offended at that as it's incredibly patronizing and racist. Those of us against this SJW crap aren't racist. Actually, we often view SJWs as patronizing racists. Us anti-SJWs believe that everyone should have an equal opportunity and compete (hard) on merit. That's best for everyone. We wouldn't think of giving handouts to minorities. That's been a failing strategy for decades, and it indicated a deep racism. Actions speak louder than words. No, the fact that a movie has strong female characters or strong black characters is no problem. It's a problem when you sacrifice the art to get something PC or pushing an agenda. It's like walking around with terrible breath. You have long since gotten used to it, but it's so painfully obvious to everyone else. This crap with twisting and mangling great franchises to make it PC is ruining art. Simple as that. Want to make a feminist movie? Go make one. But, don't destroy something else great in the process. Make a good movie with strong (and real, although this doesn't apply much to superhero movies) female characters and don't push and agenda, just write a good story. No one will object.
Re:The Harrison Ford factor (Score:5, Interesting)
That's not really true. It is *TOTALLY* doable. In fact, the prequels (as badly-written as they were) provide a perfect counterargument.
Ewan McGregor seemed like he was channeling the deceased spirit of Sir Alec Guinness. He *was* Obi-wan. I'm amazed at how good his delivery was given the crap direction that Lucas provided (as seen how otherwise awesome actors like Natalie Portman were rendered like, well, petrified statues with hot grits).
If they'd searched long and hard enough they certainly could have found someone who could *be* Han Solo.
At the risk of invoking Godwin's Law, Alec Guinness himself made a pretty good Hitler, and Bruno Ganz was flat out iconic. Nobody complains that they're not as good at being Hitler as the real Hitler.
By my estimation (Score:5, Interesting)
Initial production budget was 250 mil. The movie was 80% done when the directors were fired and the new one re-shot most of the movie. So I'm adding 150 mil. The promotional budget for these movies is about the same as the production, so another 250 mil. Totaling 650 mil.
The revenue:
264 mil so far, not likely to go up by much. The second week's drop was quite heavy, so I expect 300 mil in total. Of which Disney's share is anyone's guess. Roughly half, 150 mil. Pathetic. Toy sales, TV rights, DVDs? Can't be much, judging by what The Last Jedi did. It basically broke Toys'R'Us! No one but ultra-geeks and collectors were exited about those toys. The regular fans, the general public, kids... are either "Meh" about it or actively hate Disney's Star Wars. The Last Jedi killed the golden goose.
The big picture:
Disney paid cool 4 billion for the franchise. A completely safe long-term investment in index funds will bring 5-10% annually. Therefore, Star Wars needs to bring 600 million to 1 billion every year to be on par. Disney needs The Force Awakens kind of film every year. So far, the investment has been a colossal failure. Disney can eat the loss because of the Marvel movies, theme parks, etc, but Star Wars will be a case study in failure for years to come.
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You should stay away from things which require math.
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Giving the GP the benefit of the doubt I'm assuming he was referring to $1 billion gross to get $200 million in profit.
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"Disney paid cool 4 billion for the franchise. A completely safe long-term investment in index funds will bring 5-10% annually. Therefore, Star Wars needs to bring 600 million to 1 billion every year to be on par." You should stay away from things which require math.
The thing is that DIsney no longer has the $4B they would have if they just put the money in the index fund. This means that Disney must recuperate the original money invested PLUS the additional 5-10% to be on par with the original investment. Most companies try to recuperate the cost of an investment over 3 years. This means they would need to bring in $4B over 3 years just to break even. Only a 5% return would put them at $4.6B over three if you did not reinvest the profit. This means that Disney wo
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Your numbers are similar to numbers from other analysts [breitbart.com]. Looks like it'll be a quarter billion dollar loss on this movie.
For specifics (Score:4, Insightful)
Go to youtube. There are quite literally hundreds if not thousands of videos that detailed what went wrong. For one thing, there was an active boycott of Solo (otherwise known as Soylo now among fans for the apparent reveal by the writer that Lando is a pansexual right before the release of the movie). This also probably killed the movie for countless red-state movie goers who were already incensed at the blatant SJW preaching that The Last Jedi seemed to do.
Really though, the stage was set for Solo's downfall with the poor movie (look at Rotten Tomato reviews) of The Last Jedi Returns. Sargon of Akkad has a video called "Gender Wars" that received a million views. How many of those did not buy a ticket to Solo? The Last Jedi is where the bridges were burned, and Solo is the consequence of that. Not that Solo is bad movie (though it has been described as mediocre at best).
It is clear that Kathleen Kennedy wanted to inject her politics heavily into The Last Jedi. In an interview she specifically said that she did not feel like she needed to cater to the fan base. The director Rian Johnson and writer John Kasden have been treating fans inhospitably in rather poor attempts to defend their story decisions.
Kathleen Kennedy made a Star Wars film that she and her fellow feminists wanted to see. Not what the traditional fan base was looking for (e.g. how the Luke Skywalker character was treated in The Last Jedi and the nonsensical Mary Sue aspects).
It appears there are not as many feminists interested in Star Wars as there was with the traditional demographic.
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This also probably killed the movie for countless red-state movie goers who were already incensed at the blatant SJW preaching that The Last Jedi seemed to do.
I think people will read whatever they want into a movie to justify their hatred of it. For example the "preaching" that The Last Jedi had. What was it? Rose had a very negative opinion of the people on Canto Blight and how they were working for the First Order; however, when they steal the ship later, DJ points out that the owner was selling to both the First Order and the Rebellion.
Less Wary This Time (Score:5, Interesting)
When Rogue One came out, I was skeptical that a spinoff movie could be any good, so I didn't see it at first. I was impressed by it, so figured Solo might be a safer bet than I'd ordinarily expect. Now with the fan reaction, I'm not so sure. Perhaps the reason Rogue One succeeded where Solo did not is that the former stars all-new characters (with some classic characters in ancillary roles) whereas Solo puts classic characters front and center, played by new actors. I.e. don't fuck with viewers' nostalgia. The Boba Fett movie will probably crash and burn, similarly.
Just like Lord of the Rings (Score:2)
The trilogy grossed over $2.9 billion, but the studio claimed "horrendous losses" and tried to weasel out of paying anyone.
Real lose or Hollywood lose? (Score:2)
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Bulllll Shit. (Score:2, Informative)
"How can a movie that grossed $475 million on a $32 million budget not turn a profit? It comes down to Tinseltown accounting. As Planet Money explained in an interview with Edward Jay Epstein in 2010, studios typically set up a separate "corporation" for each movie they produce. Like any company, it calculates profits by subtracting expenses from revenues. Erase any possible profit, the studio charges this "movie corporation" a big fee that overshadows the film's revenue. For accounting purposes, the movie
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"How can a movie that grossed $475 million on a $32 million budget not turn a profit? It comes down to Tinseltown accounting. As Planet Money explained in an interview with Edward Jay Epstein in 2010, studios typically set up a separate "corporation" for each movie they produce. Like any company, it calculates profits by subtracting expenses from revenues. Erase any possible profit, the studio charges this "movie corporation" a big fee that overshadows the film's revenue. For accounting purposes, the movie is a money "loser" and there are no profits to distribute.
Yep. The first knowledge the general public got of this was when Art Buchwald sued over "Coming To America". He had a deal that guaranteed him a share of the profits, but Hollywood accounting practices claimed that not only were there no profits, the film somehow lost money so they owed him nothing. What just continues to amaze me is that the US government seems cool with this. If you or I as average citizens tried to dodge paying taxes this way, we'd go to jail for sure. But let Hollywood and other bu
People have figured out Star Wars (Score:5, Interesting)
My own opinion is that "Solo" is flopping because people have finally realized the series is never going to get any better.
Some background: I saw the original "Star Wars" in college. It was a jaw-dropping movie, (unless you're old enough to remember what science fiction / fantasy movies were like before the release of SW, you really can't appreciate how amazing an experience it was to see it in the theater), and "The Empire Strikes Back" was even better. But "Return of the Jedi" was a let down, in large part because Lucas had full creative control and couldn't resist inserting "cutesy" characters like Ewoks into the story, and adding a ridiculously sappy ending.
Still, two out of three wasn't bad. And then came episodes 1 through 3, which conclusively proved that Lucas knew how to build a universe, but had no clue how to write a good story. So now it's two out of six, but there was still hope after Lucas sold the franchise to Disney. Maybe (I thought), having some new people in charge might revitalize the SW universe.
"The Force Awakens" was a reasonable reboot. J.J. Abrams isn't a great director, but he's a competent one, and he avoided a lot of pitfalls by recycling the plot of the original movie. "Rogue One" was a competent one-shot, but nothing special. Now's it four out of eight good films if you're generous.
Then came "The Last Jedi", and the painful realization that really, really bad would be the new normal for Disney, and that future "Star Wars" movies would be micro-managed by Disney execs and designed to sell overpriced merchandise. And that, for me, was the end of it. When I walked out the "The Last Jedi", I knew I wouldn't be paying to see another Star Wars movie in the theater again. Most "Star Wars" movies have ranged from mediocre to bad, and it is never going to change. Disney will never let go. It'll just be bad formula movies from now on.
I am indifferent to "Solo", which by all accounts is another painfully mediocre film. I might watch it when it hits cable, but I have about as much desire to see another "Star Wars" movie in the theater as I do to see another "Mission Impossible" or "Transformers" movie, i.e. none at all. And given how "Solo" is doing, I suspect I have a lot of company.
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Some background: I saw the original "Star Wars" in college. It was a jaw-dropping movie, (unless you're old enough to remember what science fiction / fantasy movies were like before the release of SW, you really can't appreciate how amazing an experience it was to see it in the theater), and "The Empire Strikes Back" was even better.
I was 6 when Star Wars came out, and was totally amazed by it, and obsessed. Star Wars action figures from Kenner, Star Wars t-shirts, Star Wars lunchbox, etc. I was 9 when The Empire Strikes Back came out, and I saw it in the theater over a half dozen times.
But "Return of the Jedi" was a let down, in large part because Lucas had full creative control and couldn't resist inserting "cutesy" characters like Ewoks into the story, and adding a ridiculously sappy ending.
I was 12 when ROTJ came out, so the Ewoks didn't really bother me. I also saw this one several times at the theater; the speeder bike chase scene was unlike anything I'd seen up until then.
The series lost me though with the prequels. They were a complet
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Or possibly, the target demographic is not, and never has been, people in their 50s?
Perhaps not. But to the younger generations, Star Wars is just one fish in a sea of franchises, and not an exceptional one at that.
The way you extend the life of a franchise is by expanding your fan base, not by demolishing the existing one in search of a new one that may or may not support your work.
And Disney won't learn a thing (Score:4, Insightful)
Disney could view this as a moment to learn about franchise fatigue, how fans are getting sick of their injection of weird feminist politics into SW, how they need to focus on better writing and directing, etc.
Instead I guarantee you that Kathleen Kennedy will spin this as "People aren't interested in seeing movies with white male heroes anymore."
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Disney could view this as a moment to learn about franchise fatigue, how fans are getting sick of their injection of weird feminist politics into SW, how they need to focus on better writing and directing, etc.
Instead I guarantee you that Kathleen Kennedy will spin this as "People aren't interested in seeing movies with white male heroes anymore."
I think people will tolerate the leftist/feminist slant. For the most part people do it every day. What I think has irritated people is the actors themselves and their constant preaching. I really don't give a shit what Mark Hamil thinks. He's a dancing monkey. He performs. I don't care what the dancing monkey thinks of the world. Shut up and dance monkey.
Simply a movie no one asked for (Score:2)
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When it comes down to it, no one really cared how Han became the Han we saw in the Star Wars Universe
Back when we only had three movies (and it was good) Han's backstory was literally the most-speculated theme in Star Wars, IIRC. Certainly my own experience bears this out. Some people lamented the lack of a Wookie movie, but most wanted to know how Han became so knowledgeable about the empire.
Whatever (Score:2)
I saw it, and I was entertained.
When you continue to milk the cash cow.... (Score:2)
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Or the milk turns sour and causes vomiting.
How to make good space movie (Score:3, Insightful)
Dont place SJW politics all over plot.
Trust in fans and what they liked to buy with past movies.
Dont add SJW emotions to movie that is to be fun for all.
Make sure script and speaking fits in with what fans expect given past history of movies.
Action figures... (Score:2)
But how much of that revenue will be made up for in sales of the "Donald Glover as Lando Calrissian" action figure?
Hollywood accounting (Score:2)
Why was Deadpool 2 and Solo released back to back? (Score:2)
Something had to give, and it was Solo
Disappointed in Actor (Score:2)
I haven't seen the new Solo movie yet but I have to admit I wasn't full of enthusiasm for it because Han Solo was played by an actor who really didn't seem to fit the role well. I think the portrayal in the Trailers hurt the movie the most. And it's not impossible to find good match-ups, I remember watching the Chronicles of Young Indiana Jones when I was younger and that actor was a good match up compared to older Indiana Jones.
Interesting (Score:3)
The fans concerns and complaints after The Last Jedi was met with derision by Kennedy and her crew, who dismissed the long time fans in favor of what they believed was a brave new world of political activism, that even though set in a Universe far far away, and long long ago, this universe emulates far left Social Justice warrior identity politics of the US and GB today. Weird. So fans en masse neglected to go.
Soylo even had a few tricks up it's sleeves such as a droid with a sexual identity, social Justice warrior mindset, and with a terrible attitude. This character was so annoying that apparently audiences cheered when it was destroyed.
Then in a creepshow to end all creep shows, one of the Writers smugly bragged that one of the Characters, Lando was pansexual. https://www.usatoday.com/story... [usatoday.com]
Let that sink in a moment. A Star Wars Character that enjoys dipping his wick in little boys, little girls, dead people, Car exhausts, cows, sheeps, dogs, chickens.
Now I'm pretty liberal about this wick dipping business, but I'm old fashioned enough that I kinda think that humans should stick with other humans, and of an age where consent can be given. Just sayin'.
The problem you see, is that Social Justice Warriors are happy to complain about Start Wars - and everthing else it would appear - but if they even go to the movies, they don't do what has made LucasFilms and the Star Wars Franchise a mint in the past. And they don't buy the promotional items. Old School Star Wars fans, male and female, go to the movies often several times. They buy the promotional paraphernalia. They write the fanfics.
And what they do not want is 21st century far left identity politics. Star Wars is a couple hour escape from reality, not a couple hours of virtue signaling and destruction of the canon narrative. So they stayed away. All around the world.
Meanwhile,the people who made it flop apparently believe that the reason it flopped was because audiences are tired of White male characters. Apparently both racism and sexism is the new rule.
It's their money. But smart people trying to sell things should make things others want to buy. If Disney wants to make a movie called Queen of the Femniverse, shouwing white men being skewered and flayed alive, and women cheering and screaming in pleasure at the sight - well they can. It probably won't work. But its their money.
But it takes a willful act of stupidity to destroy a golden goose franchise in order to get rid of it's core audience.
Re:Yawn ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah... once you factor in BluRay sales, video service streaming fees, TV broadcast rights, and branded products (Toys, T-Shirts, etc) they'll still make a small fortune on this movie.
It's just going to take more time to become profitable than usual.
Re:Yawn ... (Score:4, Informative)
Don't know if you noticed but last jedi toys are still roting on the shelfs ...Walmart has tons toys r us has crap tons even youtube videos where 80% price cut they are still sitting ..gonna take a long time for 250 million+ loss
Re:Yawn ... (Score:5, Insightful)
gonna take a long time for 250 million+ loss
No worries, with current copyright laws, they have at least 95 years. And that's assuming Disney/Star Wars doesn't extend it again.
You have to appreciate the strange irony of calling a movie a failure if it's not profitable within a week of release yet having copyright laws that extend for many thousands of times longer than that.
We should change copyright laws to a max of 20 years or 5 years after profitability, whichever is shorter.
Branded products (Score:2)
and branded products (Toys, T-Shirts, etc) they'll still make a small fortune on this movie.
Actually, by significance, you should put this one first on the list.
Even more so as George Lucas himself came up with the idea of merchandising with the first movie in the series (he on purpose kept the right on merch for himself and that's how he became so much financially successful),
and as the franchise is currently owned by Disney who are (Jedi- ?) masters of the merchandising revenue.
Disney will end up making gobs of money, if only due to the giant flood of tie-in products on the shelves, but probably
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First world problems ....
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" even if only by the skin of it's teeth"
it's means it is. Why does this seem like such a baffling concept?
because it's?
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I'm smarter than you're.
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Pooping when you need to poop. Why does this seem like such a baffling concept?
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Of your examples, only "his" is singular, and even then there is no word "hi" => "his" as there is "it" => "its". It's a unique word and it is confusing as it seemingly breaks standard rules for singular possessives. It's also pronounced exactly the same with or without the apostrophe, so arguing about it is pedantic as hell. It's a frigging message board, not the NY Times.
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Really, you're going to claim that the use of "it's" made the text hard to understand? Interesting tactic.
Well, I don't concede that point. The text was no harder to understand because "it's" made no sense in the context. You could probably come up with an example of where using its vs it's causes confusion, but this is not one of those cases.
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Sorry, I used the wrong terminology. Apparently I was looking for "indefinite genitive".
Anyway, the point I was trying to make is:
That is its towel.
That is her towel.
That is his towel.
That is their towel.
People don't say:
That towel is its.
But they do say:
That towel is hers.
That towel is his.
That towel is theirs.
Re:Surprised (Score:4, Insightful)
Star Wars and Star Trek need to stop.
It isn't that these new movies are bad or worse then before. But Star Wares and Star Trek were stories, characters and a fictional universe of a different era.
Prequels are especially tricky. Because we are applying our 40+ years of change of culture, and applying it to a story set 20+ years before the first movie.
The 2018 idea of the Rogue Anti-Hero is different then the 1978 Rogue Anti-Hero. Then trying to place this Anti-hero in a story before his first appearance. Just makes the feel of the story inconsistent.
These characters are fictional characters, made primary to entertain us. They do this by exaggerating traits that we expect to see. In Episode IV we didn't watch Han Solo deal with the contract and payment negotiation with Obewan. Or the days of just handing around shipping goods, playing chess with Chewy. As far as we see it. Han is always on the edge of disaster.
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I think they're both examples of retrofuturism. Past visions of the future.
A lot of things from Star Wars and old SciFi just don't make any sense anymore. We have to actively ignore that a robot or AI could do a job much better, safer, and with less trouble than having humans do the job. Like a gunner on a Star Destroyer. Or a interpreter droid. In the 70's, droids were boxy clunky things. In RogueOne, no one blinked when a bot caught a grenade mid-air and casually tossed it back with perfect timing. Or
Re: Surprised (Score:2, Funny)
The Force aWakens
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In my view Glover was the highlight of the film. The first scene where he's introduced, all I could say was "Yup, there's Lando Calrissian".
Re: Go! Go! Go! SJWs!!! (Score:2)
Heart, brain and wallet.
They are as shoes and thieves not murderers.
Prison maybe.
Re: Being woke (Score:2)