[Gothos]

Abyss, on 14 April 2010 - 04:15 PM, said:

Serenity corrected much of what i thought Joss did wrong with Firefly, mostly in that stuff actually happened, as opposed to hours and hours of 'trust me, this will all be important in the second season!'. That said, the movie was still more for the Firefly fans than anyone else, and the audience was too niche to make it a success. The studio basically tossed it into theaters with minimal marketing to make back some $.

Serenity lacked a lot of what I loved about Firefly . Not enough brilliant dialogue and character interaction in that flick.

[Kanubis]

Firefly had what I expected from a series, Serenity had what I expected from a movie. 




I always thought Serenity needed the viewer to be familiar with Firefly, but I've since met a few people who went back and watched the series for the first time having seen Serenity first and loved it.

[Use Of Weapons]

I'm in that boat, I saw Serenity first. It was excellent, with a clarity and direction and urgency lacking in Joss's miniseries efforts. I've since watched Firefly, and it, too, is great, in different ways.

Joss's run on Astonishing has given me faith that Marvel trust him, and will let him run with their characters.

[Abyss]

Aptorian, on 15 April 2010 - 06:10 AM, said:

X-men was bad from the start. ....

'Waaaah it wasn't like the comic book' is not a valid criticism of a film. Both of the stories you ref took hundreds of pages and months of storytelling. Movies don't work that way. hence the utter fail of trying to work the Phoenix storyline into XM3.

Gothos, on 15 April 2010 - 07:29 AM, said:

Serenity lacked a lot of what I loved about Firefly . Not enough brilliant dialogue and character interaction in that flick.

Brilliant dialogue and character interaction work when you have 20 hours to work with. In 120 minutes you don't have the luxury of taking ages to establish your characters beyond a recognizeable archtype. Films with brilliant dialogue and character interaction generally work because the characters are instantly familiar to the audience.

Kanubis, on 15 April 2010 - 08:06 AM, said:

...I always thought Serenity needed the viewer to be familiar with Firefly, but I've since met a few people who went back and watched the series for the first time having seen Serenity first and loved it.

jitsukerr, on 15 April 2010 - 11:10 AM, said:

I'm in that boat, I saw Serenity first. It was excellent, with a clarity and direction and urgency lacking in Joss's miniseries efforts. I've since watched Firefly, and it, too, is great, in different ways.

Oh, there are people who came to the tv series via the film. Just not very many.

Quote

Joss's run on Astonishing has given me faith that Marvel trust him, and will let him run with their characters.

This, and only just this, gives me hope. Balanced by the concern that Joss will have to include three teenaged characters in order to make AVENGERS more his sort of thing.

- Abyss, awaits that BUCKY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER series.

[Morgoth]

I saw Serenity first and actually preferred it to the series. The min-series just lacked... momentum I guess, to steal a phrase from above.

When all is said and done, Firefly had about the same average plot progression of a typical Star Trek episode.

[Kanubis]

 

Abyss, on 15 April 2010 - 03:03 PM, said:

Brilliant dialogue and character interaction work when you have 20 hours to work with. In 120 minutes you don't have the luxury of taking ages to establish your characters beyond a recognizeable archtype. Films with brilliant dialogue and character interaction generally work because the characters are instantly familiar to the audience.

Funnily enough, this is always my first thought when people talk about taking MBotF to the big screen. A TV series might, just, work. If it had 20 seasons. A movie would simply be awful.

[Werthead]

I also saw Serenity first and later the TV series, as did the two friends I saw it with.

[Tiste Simeon]

Apt I still have your epic rants about Xmen 3 and Spiderman 3 somewhere, make me laugh a lot.

And I came to Firefly via Serenity.

[MTS]

Yeah well, I came to Serenity via Firefly.

*dares to be different*

[Aptorian]

Abyss, on 15 April 2010 - 03:03 PM, said:

Aptorian, on 15 April 2010 - 06:10 AM, said:

X-men was bad from the start. ....

'Waaaah it wasn't like the comic book' is not a valid criticism of a film.

Oh but it is. There is a difference between "starting over" and "dumbing down" the story.

Think of it like comparing Tim Burtons Batman with Chris Nolans. Burtons batman, while a very dark and weird story, was still not a very sophisticated story. It was a lot of crazy costumes and scenery and Nicholson stealing every scene. It was a cheesy superhero film. Nolans story on the other hand was all about what drives Batman. It's a psychological story about fear and anger and crime. If you'd taken away the costumes and gadgets you'd had a story about a psychopath going on a rampage and it would still be a great ride.

They could easily had done something similar with the X-men. Fuck Wolverine and his fanboys. And fuck that useless incarnation of Rogue they created to appeal to the teenage audience. What they should have done is made it "realistic". Have a real world scenario. People emerging with strange powers and strange deformities that are being exploited by governments and corporation and being hunted by the religious and the ignorant. Hundreds or thousands of strange people interned in camps. Then have Magnus and Xavier representing two factions fighting to save Mutant kind. Xavier through reason and patience. Magnus with anger, intimidation and an arrogance. Don't make it about the characters, make it about the cause. Make it about philosophy and rhetoric and let that be what they are fighting over. Not just some stupid doomsday machine.

Abyss, on 15 April 2010 - 03:03 PM, said:

Both of the stories you ref took hundreds of pages and months of storytelling. Movies don't work that way. hence the utter fail of trying to work the Phoenix storyline into XM3.

The Phoenix storyline could easily had worked. Unfortunately it was pushed into the background and instead it became, yet again, about Magneto playing the boogie man. It could have been about Phoenix going on a rampage becoming more and more destructive and unhinged whole the X-men continued, more and more desperatly to neutralise her, being pained by it, then finish it off with the Wolverine snikt snikt ending.

Tiste Simeon, on 15 April 2010 - 04:22 PM, said:

Apt I still have your epic rants about Xmen 3 and Spiderman 3 somewhere, make me laugh a lot.

And I came to Firefly via Serenity.

Re-post! I want to read it. Post it in the Hall of Fame if you can find it.

[wolf_2099]

Aptorian, on 14 April 2010 - 03:57 AM, said:

Morgoth, on 13 April 2010 - 11:10 PM, said:

Perhaps one of the few directors that makes me feel almost hopeful for the movie.

I wonder though, how they're going to finance the thing. Will they be promising sequels of the foundation movies in return for lower pay on the Avengers perhaps?

I mean, Samuel L. Jackson, Edward Northon, Robert Downy Jr., Chris Evans, and whomever they get to be the villain(s) wont come cheap as a package. Chris Hemsworth (Thor) might not be the cheapest of actors either as he seems to be on the rise.

The question really is whether they'll be able to afford making a proper movie out of it.

Well, first of all, there's the question if the actors will do it for cheap. This is an Avenger movie of all things. It's the comic book holy land. I imagine guys like Jackson and Downey Jr, especially wouldn't mind taking a paycut just to be in this film. They have both admitted to liking their characters and their roles very much.

Then there's that whole financial crises thing hitting Hollywood. I remember reading an article about the movie companies changing their MO. Some companies are now going to be offering fewer millions for a big star but instead they may offer a percentage of the films earnings. Which in the case of an Avengers movie, no matter how good or bad it gets, might mean a hell of a lot of cash.

The Avengers movie was written into the contracts for all those people when they signed on to do the single hero movies, so chances are they worked out the salary. They're on the hook for the Avengers movie or face a very large law suit, that's why they had all the movies on such a tight schedule, to make sure everyone was available at the proper times to film it.

Ensemble movies are always cheaper than having a single leading man, so there is a pay cut there, and you are right in the fact that the actors will be taking a smaller paycheck in the beginning in exchange for a small percentage of the gross. The Hollywood finance blogs covered this a while ago.

[Tiste Simeon]

It's on my other machine which is currently switched off and I am in bed. Will post it probably on the weekend. It was rather good.

[Tsundoku]

Aptorian, on 15 April 2010 - 08:06 PM, said:

Oh but it is. There is a difference between "starting over" and "dumbing down" the story.

Nolans story on the other hand was all about what drives Batman. It's a psychological story about fear and anger and crime. If you'd taken away the costumes and gadgets you'd had a story about a psychopath going on a rampage and it would still be a great ride.

True. A good story can stand on it's own minus any special effects or craziness. Think about some of the greatest films you have seen and what shines through is direction, script, character and so on. Generally when we exclaim in raptures about some action/CGI-fest we at least admit that this is the case.

Quote

They could easily had done something similar with the X-men. Fuck Wolverine and his fanboys. And fuck that useless incarnation of Rogue they created to appeal to the teenage audience. What they should have done is made it "realistic". Have a real world scenario. People emerging with strange powers and strange deformities that are being exploited by governments and corporation and being hunted by the religious and the ignorant. Hundreds or thousands of strange people interned in camps. Then have Magnus and Xavier representing two factions fighting to save Mutant kind. Xavier through reason and patience. Magnus with anger, intimidation and an arrogance. Don't make it about the characters, make it about the cause. Make it about philosophy and rhetoric and let that be what they are fighting over. Not just some stupid doomsday machine.

Ahhhh, but for whom are these sorts of movies made? Not purely for the fans - there aren't enough to help it make a profit. I give you instead the average western (Dare I say it? Yes I do - predominately American due to sheer market size) cineplex goer.
To whit "More flashy 'splodey, less talky-talky thinky-thinky".

Quote

The Phoenix storyline could easily had worked. Unfortunately it was pushed into the background and instead it became, yet again, about Magneto playing the boogie man. It could have been about Phoenix going on a rampage becoming more and more destructive and unhinged whole the X-men continued, more and more desperatly to neutralise her, being pained by it, then finish it off with the Wolverine snikt snikt ending.

Yes. Basically she just stood around doing nothing until it was time for some dissolving to be done. The way it was handled was absolute shite. I can confess to semi-enjoying it up until the half way mark, then sitting there going all Rain Man "Nononononononononononono ..." for the rest.

Back on topic:

I have some faith Joss can do it well enough because the back story will be done by the time they get together. All he needs is a decent script that does justice to the material, and to give him a reasonable amount of creative freedom. It wouldn't hurt to have an experienced CGI director on Joss' speed-dial, either.

This post has been edited by Sombra: 18 April 2010 - 05:26 AM

[dktorode]

Latest news is that Whedon might also be rewriting/touching-up the AVENGERS and the CAPTAIN AMERICA scripts...

[Abyss]

Aptorian, on 15 April 2010 - 08:06 PM, said:

Abyss, on 15 April 2010 - 03:03 PM, said:

Aptorian, on 15 April 2010 - 06:10 AM, said:

X-men was bad from the start. ....

'Waaaah it wasn't like the comic book' is not a valid criticism of a film.

Oh but it is. There is a difference between "starting over" and "dumbing down" the story. ....

Nope. The difference is between a 2 hour movie that must sell lunchboxes in order to keep its corporate overlords in four hundred dollar leather shoes hand woven by micronesian cybernetic spider monkeys, and a comic book that needs to sell to about 50 thousand people in order to justify its existance. And sell lunchboxes.

XMen has, in theory, years of 20something page installments to build via slow boil to a massive finish (to say nothing of Jean coming back six or seventeen times). Sure, the average comic is 15 minutes of your life, but The Phoenix Saga happened over YEARS. A single year of issues is 180 minutes of read time. The actual creation of the characters and build up to the whole thing goes back through the creation of the X-men, Scott and Jean's ongoing love thing, Wolverine's crush, the whole 'Sentinels in a satellite' thing, the Shi'ar Empire, the Hellfire Club, etc etc etc. Or put another way, over 500 minutes of read time.

Now condense that down to 120 market friendly minutes that will apeal to the masses who don't know who Jason Wyngard is or why he's relevant. You can't and if you triedyou'd either be making a movie for too small a group, OR planning it as part 1 of 12.

Any successful adaptation from hard medium to film has jettisoned most of the background, supporting cast, backstory, etc and focused in on one thing. It's not dumbing down to realize that you can't fit everything and the danger room sink into 2 hours and have it work.

Quote

Think of it like comparing Tim Burtons Batman with Chris Nolans...

You're comparing two movies there. Won't work. Both of those movies broke decades of Batman down into small digestible bits: Dude dresses up in bat-tights, hits people.

Compare either of those movies to, say, THE KILLING JOKE or THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS, and you've got a workable basis to judge how different mediums approach the same source material.

Which brings us to AVENGERS. In theory, Marvel is counting on a series of movies to establish the main characters and then a bigger event flic to unite them.

Each of the 'origin' movies so far has broken the character down into digestible bits and shown the audience the shiny...

HULK: Whimpy scientist gets mad, turns into Lou Ferrigno, hits stuff.

IRON MAN: Rich guy almost dies, builds supersuit, blows stuff up.

I'm curious to see how they appoach Cap and Thor in the remaining 'source' flics, because the root concepts are a bit more complicated... Cap would work as 'Whimpy soldier gets drugs, turns into hero, hits stuff' and not spend too much time on cryogenic freezing, dead nazis with skin conditions and truth/justice/the american way. If they spend too much time on 'he's a relic from the 40s' they're going to be in trouble. No one seeing this movie was alive in the 40s. Thor... comics to the contrary, 'Hercules' is a concept in the cutural groupthink, but 'Norse god of thunder with a really big hammer', not so much. If they break it down to 'Badass viking has superpowers, hits stuff', it MIGHT work.

And Joss better bring his A-game to tieing it all together or no amount of Samuel Jackson cool will save the movie.

[Ulrik]

I saw Iron Man 2 today and I clearly can see how Avengers might work. Every piece works, Tony isnt only chatting member of cast...I liked it. Tony has its role, but there is also Pepper, War Machine and especially Black Widow, who is pretty brilliant in her composition in movie. Not too much space, but she clearly showed what is capable of. So I can imagine Iron Man as one of many, Natascha, Thor, Cap...it really might work.

And no, I dont know who is after end titles, producer has order from highest bosses to not to show it...idiots...:/ I bet its Thor, but...I want to see him!

[Aptorian]

http://insidetrekker...lly-out-of.html

Quote

Edward Norton Officially Out of The Avengers! Replacement Announced at Comic-Con?

It's official. Edward Norton will not be returning to the role of Bruce Banner / Hulk in the upcoming The Avengers movie.

Marvel Studios President of Production Kevin Feige forwarded the following exclusive reply to HitFix from the set of Captain America: The First Avenger in London.

Feige said:

"We have made the decision to not bring Ed Norton back to portray the title role of Bruce Banner in the Avengers. Our decision is definitely not one based on monetary factors, but instead rooted in the need for an actor who embodies the creativity and collaborative spirit of our other talented cast members. The Avengers demands players who thrive working as part of an ensemble, as evidenced by Robert, Chris H, Chris E, Sam, Scarlett, and all of our talented casts. We are looking to announce a name actor who fulfills these requirements, and is passionate about the iconic role in the coming weeks."

I saw some fan replies all over the internet and many are in agreement that Marvel is making a huge mistake by letting Norton go.

Though I understand that Norton was rather difficult during the filming of The Incredible Hulk, I know he wanted the movie to be as good as possible, and that's what probably irked the studio. Marvel does not want to have an actor in a big group like The Avengers try to control production - which is understandable.

Still, Norton was absolutely great as Bruce Banner and I feel that his absence will be much missed in The Avengers Movie.

As for Norton's replacement, it's possible the studio will use this upcoming San Diego's Comic-Con International to make an announcement as to who will be cast in the role, possibly during the Thor and Captain America panel that will take place Saturday July 24th from 6h00pm-7h00pm in Hall H.

What do you think of this news, do you believe Marvel is making a mistake by dropping Edward Norton? and who would you rather see in the role of Bruce Banner?

Bring back Eric Bana. He did a better job in the first place.

This post has been edited by Aptorian: 11 July 2010 - 08:43 PM

[Abyss]

Norton was good but he's far from irreplaceable. And scuttlebutt has it he wanted Hulk-Weep-For-Injustice and not Hulk-SMASH-SHIT-BUT-GOOD.

[dktorode]

Who cares...we pay to see the Hulk, not Banner

This post has been edited by dktorode: 12 July 2010 - 08:22 AM

[Gothos]

I think I have a whole bunch of superhero movies to see. How could I miss Ed N. playing in one? Damn. That guy's golden, but I'm surprised to see him in a superhero flick. His previous career (American History X, Fight Club, 25th Hour) wouldn't hint at a non-very-serious film.