TaranofPrydain wrote: ↑Mon May 12, 2025 2:49 am Sure, it's just barely pushed past $200 million worldwide, but that is still less than the film cost before reshoots. So it had lost a lot. Probably more than Disney is saying out loud.

Just to rub it in, here's how much money the direct-to-VHS Aladdin cheapquel The Return Of Jafar earned for the studio over three decades ago...

Disney just sent me the digital code, Ill check it out for laughs.

AndyDursin wrote: ↑Mon May 12, 2025 5:39 pm Disney just sent me the digital code, Ill check it out for laughs.

I can't wait for the review.

I'd be worried if I were Disney too. DAREDEVIL failed to recapture the magic, and THUNDERBOLTS has shown the cap for most Marvels is now $200 mil domestic -- if it gets there. Yet they are still spending a fortune on all of these movies, FF included, even though it looks lame.

AVENGERS is going cost a gazillion dollars too -- and the thing is, if FF is just "meh", it's not going to matter that they're bringing Downey back. They'll never hit the heights of ENDGAME with a THUNDERBOLTS and Anthony Mackie roster of Avengers taking on Downey in a different part. I'm sure they will throw in the mutants too so they can advertise X-MEN but it's all diminishing returns now -- that's going to cost a lot before it turns a profit.

AndyDursin wrote: ↑Sat May 17, 2025 2:13 pm AVENGERS is going cost a gazillion dollars too -- and the thing is, if FF is just "meh", it's not going to matter that they're bringing Downey back.

Out of curiosity, I looked up the three previous Fantastic Four movies on Wikipedia, and their combined box office barely squeaked past $800 million worldwide. And Disney thinks the new one will be a billion-grossing smash just because it's the first one with the official MCU branding...?

Maybe it's time to accept that these characters are just too silly to work in live-action. The pair of Tim Story movies leaned heavily into that goofy, Saturday Morning Cartoon vibe, and came across as lamer versions of The Incredibles, while the dire Fan4stic attempted to be a "gritty reimagining", and couldn't even scrape up $170 mil worldwide.

I don't know if the word is "silly" but it certainly takes "the right touch" to make a family-driven property like FANTASTIC FOUR work. It is one of the cornerstones of all Marvel comics and comics of the Golden Age, and even those two mediocre Fox movies still made a lot of money (not the "gritty" reboot which they basically tossed away before releasing it cut to pieces etc.).

The issue here -- and again I've already written this, as have so many others -- is the casting DOESN'T WORK. They are using a group of actors not known for projecting warmth/family appeal...in fact they project the opposite of what these characters usually entail. Vanessa Kirby is totally wrong. Pedro Pascal is totally wrong. The kid from STRANGER THINGS might have been great if they kept him wild and like the Johnny Storm of the comics -- but instead he looks, again, like a restrained/repressed version. It's just BAFFLING how wrong the casting is.

You add that in with altering the comics -- hello female Silver Surfer -- and that makes FF already a problematic sell.

Doomcock's video shows they're having all kinds of problems with FF and are, again, having to reshoot the ending. He also does an excellent job talking about why the Multiverse is an issue -- and he's so right. If you can just throw in "another version" of some dead character, and anyone can come back (hello RDJ) even if it's not as the same character, then what dramatic stakes are there? What's the point?

He seems to think this is all BS lead up to the resurrection, I'd imagine, of some of the major dead Marvel heroes -- which wouldn't surprise me at all since they've failed to cultivate anyone new that audiences care about. THUNDERBOLTS was supposed to do like $800 mil worldwide-- whoops!!

I've said it before, I'll say it again...Deadpool & Wolverine's success was a complete fluke, one predicated on Disney's poaching of the goodwill that Fox (the real Fox ) had spent two decades cultivating in their X-Men movies. When was the last time the MCU generated a new-to-movie-screens character who really broke out? Black Panther was probably the only post-Phase One character who really delivered, and the sad death of Chadwick Boseman meant that Disney couldn't even capitalize on that, dedicating the sequel to establishing his mousy kid sister as his replacement (as well as a sassy, black female teen Iron Man substitute, one whose forthcoming D+ series is essentially getting dumped with almost zero promo next month). The MCU Spider-Man films have all been big successes, but they were riding the coattails of the previous Sony movies, and even the lousy pair of Amazing ones with Andrew Garfield made over $700 million apiece, which is about $300 mil more than the last two MCU films will make. You think audiences are gonna squee with delight seeing "beloved" characters like Shang-Chi, chubby Muslim Capt. Marvel cosplayer and whoever walking out of transportation portals in the next Avengers? I was there for Infinity War on opening day, and every introduction of a Phase One character got wild cheers from a packed crowd. When I saw the last Captain America and Thunderbolts*/*New Avengers, there were MAYBE a half-dozen people in each screening, and only in the later did I hear a row of people laughing at every bad line. It honestly felt performative, like a kid in his mid-teens trying to remain excited about something that thrilled them at age 12 but simply having grown out of it, only continuing to watch out of some vague sense of completism.

Right, DEADPOOL worked because they let Reynolds make his movie. They didn't intervene, they didn't try to turn it into something else (about the only time they've done THAT since buying Marvel was the GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY and that was because the property was obscure/unknown to most people and it was OK to let James Gunn do whatever he wanted to it).

They knew they could print $$$ if they let Reynolds make a third one of those and it did -- but it's a one-off because it doesn't trickle down into any other part of the Marvel franchise. It doesn't suddenly make audiences care about THUNDERBOLTS or their Disney+ DAREDEVIL revival which sputtered and died.

They're setting this whole thing up so AVENGERS DOOMSDAY will be some massive all-star super-hero rally filled with appearances by dead/retired characters -- and they know they need Downey because they've bombed big-time with nearly everything they've been doing now for years (who asked for THREE ANT-MAN movies?!).

I don't know if you saw his other video on Marvel the other day but Disney is panicking -- which you would be if you throw millions at Downey to come back.

Our new Reed Richards, everyone...

AndyDursin wrote: ↑Tue May 20, 2025 12:12 pm I don't know if you saw his other video on Marvel the other day but Disney is panicking -- which you would be if you throw millions at Downey to come back.

Disney's problem is their refusal to diversify...ever since the early 2010s, when they snagged the Marvel, Star Wars and 20th Century Fox IPs, they've dedicated 95% of their big AND small-screen output to nothing but these $300 million tenpole movies and shows, but we're no longer in the era when these were guaranteed to pull in over a billion apiece to justify these bloated budgets. The D+ stuff is especially egregious, blowing over $200 mil a pop on garbage like She-Hulk and Secret Invasion. It's no wonder that stuff intended as D+ "content" like Moana 2 and Lilo & Stitch got bumped to full theatrical releases, because Disney realized you can't make MONEY spending that much on stuff people can sit home and watch for "free". In decades past, Disney might make a big, expensive summer comic book blockbuster hopeful like Dick Tracy or The Rocketeer, but they also released films like White Fang or The Santa Clause or The Mighty Ducks, small-to-medium-budget dramas, adventure or sports films that made solid profits and led to freshly-minted franchises in some cases. Now it's just regurgitating franchises that were decades old before they acquired them directly into the mouths of no-longer-eager fanboys, who have begun to choke on them. We need new stuff! That Daisy Ridley swimming movie from last year was really entertaining, and, back in the 90s or 2000s, would have been one of those well-reviewed "inspirational" Disney releases that quietly made $60 or $70 million, but they dumped it on about a hundred screens for a week. They no longer wish to cultivate audiences for good one-off movies that don't require months' work of "homework" of watching dozens of other movies and shows just to understand what's going on.

Heh, I just typed in the word "owned" on Google, and the top search suggestion was "...by Disney".

Getting back on topic...