I don’t think telling a good story and basing a movie on pre-existing IP are mutually exclusive though. Marvel was already a recognizable and marketable brand when Marvel Studios was founded and went into production on Iron Man. Barbie is based on a famous and recognizable IP, but only cost a (relatively) modest $145…

I see. Well, I don’t dispute that the box office hasn’t rebounded yet, but when I claimed that it was trending in that direction, you said that the numbers suggest last year was the anomaly, not 2024. That’s only the case if you only look at YTD. For example, the YTD box office revenue for 2021 was $542 million,…

That’s fair. My argument would be that if you’re not going to spend two or three hundred million dollars on spectacle, you have to deliver something else audiences want to see. And I think that for the most part, the majority of people do want to see a good yarn up on screen. Just look at Pixar or Marvel Studios, two…

Could you elaborate? I was replying to your claim that the box office wasn’t rebounding, but each year since 2020 grossed significantly more than the previous year. Despite this, I don’t think that the box office will reach pre-pandemic levels anytime soon. You can see how 2023 was a far more modest increase compared…

But the box office has been rebounding. The proof is in box office revenue.

Just two weeks ago, AVC was writing as if they were anticipating Furiosa to be a monster hit so big, other studios were steering clear of it.

A movie doesn’t take an entire weekend. I’ve gone to the theater while on short trips for movies I really wanted to see too.

The very fact that you’re calling him Thor suggests Chris Hemsworth isn’t the movie star with household name recognition some people insist he is. It’s like whenever Christopher Reeve would appear in anything after ‘78 and people would say, “Hey, Superman’s in a new movie!” and then didn’t go see it.

Where are you getting six Mad Max movies from? Fury Road was only the fourth.

RE: the VFX, I think the logic is that as long as VFX workers aren’t unionized, it’s cheaper to push them around. It’s certainly more flexible, and lets them spend less on building practical sets, props, etc. It lets them schedule fewer days of production, because they’re not spending an entire day on getting one…

I understand studios investing in recognizable names even when the movies themselves don’t make much money at the box office. The money is in merchandise. What I don’t get is why they keep pumping this much money into producing them. They should shrink the budgets and focus on making the story good, and then dump as…

That, plus the police investigation sounds botched as hell. 

Well, Hollywood can make anything into the end of the world, but two thoughts come to mind. The first is that if millions of people’s jobs were destroyed all at once, the backlash would be so intense and so swift, we’d force politicians to respond. Our modern legislative system seems to only pass large bills during a…

The review is claiming that movie is proselytizing AI uncritically in any shape and form.

Then you have the confounding sentiments that AI, in any shape or form, is beneficial to humanity.

I have no idea if this movie will be any good. From the trailer, it looks like another legacyquel bashing viewers over the head with nostalgia. But unlike most legasequels, it looks like they both brought a lot of people back and those people have the same energy, including Murphy. So I’m tentatively looking forward…

Fuck yeah, break ‘em up.

Some questions have no answers.

We don’t even have the Herb to blame anymore and the writing is still shoddy.

Wait, what?