Moderator: Vympel
Not really.
ROI for blockbusters is never as high as people think, because of hidden cost. Marketing is rarely factored in, and for a big movie like Star Wars, the marketing budget can easily run up to 200 million. Also, movies don't get all the money back from the box office. Half of it goes to the cinemas themselves, so a movie that earns a billion worldwide might only see 500 million for the studio.
A consistent pattern of declining box office can suggest audience are becoming less invested in Star Wars as a franchise. Meaning it will be harder and harder for a Star Wars movie to make money off the brand name alone.The Romulan Republic wrote: ↑2019-12-29 10:23am While there is something faintly ridiculous about claiming a billion dollar movie which turned a profit is a failure, and in any case popularity is not an indication of quality (ie, appeal to popularity fallacy), it is significant for a couple of reasons:
First, while box office numbers are not a measure of quality, they are the measure a lot of Disney execs and shareholders are likely to care most about. There can be little doubt that the lower box office numbers of TLJ and especially Solo were a factor in driving this about-face by Disney (albeit a poorly-considered one, given that Solo, a film seemingly designed to pander to OT fans flopped hard, while TLJ's lower numbers were roughly in-line with the pattern of the prior two trilogies, in which the second film always grossed significantly less than the first). So if Rise of Skywalker underperforms, that might make Disney reevaluate their approach (although given their track record so far, they'll probably just blame its failure on a continuing backlash to TLJ, and double-down on OT fanboy pandering).
Its particularly significant if Rise of Skywalker performs below TLJ, as the pattern in the prior trilogies was "First film is a massive box office hit, second is much less profitable, the third does better than the second but not as well as the first". The panic over TLJ's numbers, and claims that they proved the film was a failure, were therefore highly questionable, because TLJ was simply fitting the same pattern as Empire Strikes Back, and it was ludicrous of Disney to expect every film to have numbers on par with TFA's. But Rise of Skywalker performing lower than TLJ (which it grossing under a billion worldwide definitely would be) would be bucking the pattern, and a possible sign of an overall decline/loss of audience enthusiasm, rather than just the usual fluctuations within a given trilogy.
The other reason is that TLJ's lower box office numbers were (falsely) used as "proof" of the film's failure, and I'm not above a little retaliatory gloating at ROS's expense.
Maybe in the days of monoculture, but we're well past that.
Tell that to the investors.
Uh, what? Get some in this thread and I'll gladly do so, I guess?
Though frankly the idea of this being the "big finale to the SW saga" feels like something that crept in with the marketing of the third film and the sequel trilogy was not actually written to be anything of the sort in the first two installments.
Eh, Twitter makes it easy enough to ensure that you can build your watercooler conversations out of whoever actually is watching.
Disney has an agreement to take about 65% of ticket sales with theaters for ROS.
65% applies to US and Canada only. Studios usually takes back 40 percent of earnings from non-US/Canada countries.MKSheppard wrote: ↑2019-12-29 03:11pmDisney has an agreement to take about 65% of ticket sales with theaters for ROS.
ROS cost about $300M to make. Figure in about $150M in marketing for a total cost of $450M.
Thus, Disney needs to take in about $700M to break even.
They imposed it upon themselves, by wanting to make Ep 9 into a big epic conclusion to everything, despite the fact that there wasn't sufficient build-up in the previous 2 films.Vendetta wrote: ↑2019-12-29 01:26pm Though frankly the idea of this being the "big finale to the SW saga" feels like something that crept in with the marketing of the third film and the sequel trilogy was not actually written to be anything of the sort in the first two installments.
And that's because, well, Return of the Jedi already was that. The saga got nice and neatly wrapped up and all the personal journeys of the characters were concluded.
That's why this was a movie of blatant asspulls of OT elements just so it could be the "even bigger finale" to the thing that already had a big finale. Because it wasn't following a thread that led to this point, it was pretending that thread had always been there.
http://www.hawes.com/1991/1991.htmVendetta wrote: ↑2019-12-29 07:00amNo, they really don't. Most people in the actual human world are not even aware that there are any Star Wars novels. They're a niche within a niche (one particular fandom within SFF, where SFF is a relative minnow compared to the big beasts of fiction publishing genres, Crime and Romance, both of which shift roughly 3-4x the numbers SFF does as a whole).
Better quality? At best one in four of those books are any good. I love a few of those characters, and ideas, but even the ones I liked have just as many flaws as they do strengths.
Same way the authors of those novels did? Given that they consistently told better stories than the movies some people seem convinced are inherently better because they were 'more popular' (read: better advertised) you're not making a good case that Lucas and Disney's "Keeping track of continuity is HARD, man" policy produces a better product
Mara I interpreted that Palpatine knew she would fail but sent her to make the point to Vader that he knew and she got fantastic development in the first trilogy (going from hating Luke to being forced to work with him to realizing that not only was he NOT the monster she thought he was but that her master was the villain, and that the regime she served and the things she did were evil.) You can get a LOT out of that, and it's also made clear Palpy had a ton of hands roaming around. Mara was never that special.Adam Reynolds wrote: ↑2019-12-29 07:48pmBetter quality? At best one in four of those books are any good. I love a few of those characters, and ideas, but even the ones I liked have just as many flaws as they do strengths.
Zahn's ideas about The Force are inherently flawed(and Mara Jade makes Vader less awesome), Allston's Wraith Squadron series was extremely minimalist, and Karpyshyn Darth Bane trilogy struggles to work with a variety of sources that would have been better left ignored(which will also be a larger problem for the new canon with films making equally bad decisions). Luceno's best works were in the PT era, and were all but decanonized by the Clone Wars series even before Disney.
"Minimalist"? You have seen the Sequel Trilogy movies, right? You can't get much more minimalist than that...
A decade or so ago when I was analysing the Last Airbender, the rule of thumb was the revenue must be at least twice the budgeting cost to break even. This is due to cost to market the film, the cinema's cut etc. These days I hear quoted around 2.5 - 3 times the cost of the film in all countries except China. In China (according to Forbe's Scott Mendelson), the studio only gets 25%. However China doesn't seem to be a big contributor to ROS revenue, so we can largely say their contribution isn't going to skewer this rule of thumb for the break even point.
Got it. So when they go to make a hundred million dollar film with the old continuity, should films come with a reading list? Or do you just film it in some way that doesn't contradict them? Also, best hope that no actors get old/quit/die!Ralin wrote: ↑2019-12-30 12:10amSame way the authors of those novels did? Given that they consistently told better stories than the movies some people seem convinced are inherently better because they were 'more popular' (read: better advertised) you're not making a good case that Lucas and Disney's "Keeping track of continuity is HARD, man" policy produces a better product
I suppose you don't. But who cares? Lucas didn't make any sequels, after all, and he wrote the rules of the canon system so that any film he made would trump any novel. He wasn't beholden to any other writer, because he was the owner of the franchise. And yet when we did get to hear what his ideas for a sequel film would be about, it turned out he wouldn't focus on galactic politics for once and instead turn his focus on the small-- literally, explore the implications of Midichlorians and other microcosmic entities that influence the Force and its direction. An idea that actually wouldn't have to disrupt too much of the existing canon. And if those ideas sound silly to you, then maybe you can see my point when I say "who cares?" Even Lucas didn't think anyone wanted to see that movie, and I for one actually think it would have been interesting if only because it was so different in scope. It would simply have depended on his ability to pull off the idea. We didn't need sequels (at least not ones focusing on the galactic scale); the Skywalker saga was completed with RotJ, and the best of the novel stories could more accurately be called the New Republic saga and the Solo saga as they follow Han and Leia's kids more than anything.
So, when they go make a hundred million dollar film in the old continuity, should the films come with a viewing list? Or do you just film it so it doesn't contradict the old movies? Best hope no actors get old/quit/die!
It's also an admission of sorts that try as they might, the jobbers working on Disney Star Wars just don't know how to create interesting characters (especially not the villains), nor do they know how to construct a story or keep continuity with the established setting. Abrams had to make the good guys unbelievably retarded in TFA so they could be wiped out in one shot because he couldn't tell a story in a restored republic trying to fight a fascist insurgency if his life depended on it. I don't know what the fuck Johnson was trying to accomplish, unless he wants to be Richard Lester and spoof the series from within, like the Musketeer movies or Robin and Marian -in which case he really dropped the ball because a spoof should be at least kinda funny.Vendetta wrote: ↑2019-12-29 01:26pmThough frankly the idea of this being the "big finale to the SW saga" feels like something that crept in with the marketing of the third film and the sequel trilogy was not actually written to be anything of the sort in the first two installments.
And that's because, well, Return of the Jedi already was that. The saga got nice and neatly wrapped up and all the personal journeys of the characters were concluded.
That's why this was a movie of blatant asspulls of OT elements just so it could be the "even bigger finale" to the thing that already had a big finale. Because it wasn't following a thread that led to this point, it was pretending that thread had always been there.
Marvel stepped into the void and took over. Star Wars is just another label now.Gandalf wrote: ↑2019-12-29 11:37amMaybe in the days of monoculture, but we're well past that.
Eh, Twitter makes it easy enough to ensure that you can build your watercooler conversations out of whoever actually is watching.
It's not like Disney hasn't made a few cultural-event franchises and movies in recent years, after all.
