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captveg wrote: Wed May 20, 2020 9:14 pm

Nasir007 wrote: Wed May 20, 2020 8:22 pmI am amazed this makes business sense.

Gotta look at it from AT&T's perspective. They didn't pay for Justice League's production. To them it was simply another movie in the library of their purchase of Time Warner.

So now they have the HBO Max launch, which they are investing $100 millions + into. A-level streaming series like The Crown and The Mandalorian cost $10m+ an episode to produce. So, for the price of 2-3 episodes of an A-level streaming show (the reported $20-30m to bring Snyder's JL across the finish line), they get to release a $300m+ produced film that already has a built in audience that has been literally begging to see it, plus all the free advertisement that has created.

This is a grotesque exaggeration right? The movie failed. Nobody was clamoring for it. The Snyder Cut troll community was a niche movement, barely this side of Qanon if you ask me.

This isn't Mad Max we are talking about. This is an awful unwatchable movie that on the evidence of Snyder's previous Director's cut, might be worse.

And even if the 300mil+ wasn't an upfront cost, you could definitely portion out a cost they paid for it in the acquisition.

Not denying that there was some business logic to it. If there hadn't been, we wouldn't be here. But I think it has to be more than a built-in audience.

I think more than anything, it kinda shows that streaming content is so fungible. There is no penalty for being bad or awful. There is little sense of merit or distinction to go around. If people have to fill an evening or a meal or a workout or bus ride, literally anything will do.

Excellent news, not for what is sure to be a larger turd than the original cut of Justice League, but because there is now hope that our own very niche online community can pressure Warner into releasing Frank Perry's cut of The Last Summer!

So.

Let's do that.

jazzo wrote: Wed May 20, 2020 10:11 pm Excellent news, not for what is sure to be a larger turd than the original cut of Justice League, but because there is now hope that our own very niche online community can pressure Warner into releasing Frank Perry's cut of The Last Summer!

So.

Let's do that.

Guillermo del Toro tried to shame WB into putting out The Devils on Blu-Ray by drumming up publicity on Twitter, but it didn't amount to anything.

Nasir007 wrote: Wed May 20, 2020 9:59 pm

captveg wrote: Wed May 20, 2020 9:14 pm

Nasir007 wrote: Wed May 20, 2020 8:22 pmI am amazed this makes business sense.

Gotta look at it from AT&T's perspective. They didn't pay for Justice League's production. To them it was simply another movie in the library of their purchase of Time Warner.

So now they have the HBO Max launch, which they are investing $100 millions + into. A-level streaming series like The Crown and The Mandalorian cost $10m+ an episode to produce. So, for the price of 2-3 episodes of an A-level streaming show (the reported $20-30m to bring Snyder's JL across the finish line), they get to release a $300m+ produced film that already has a built in audience that has been literally begging to see it, plus all the free advertisement that has created.

This is a grotesque exaggeration right? The movie failed. Nobody was clamoring for it. The Snyder Cut troll community was a niche movement, barely this side of Qanon if you ask me.

This isn't Mad Max we are talking about. This is an awful unwatchable movie that on the evidence of Snyder's previous Director's cut, might be worse.

And even if the 300mil+ wasn't an upfront cost, you could definitely portion out a cost they paid for it in the acquisition.

Not denying that there was some business logic to it. If there hadn't been, we wouldn't be here. But I think it has to be more than a built-in audience.

I think more than anything, it kinda shows that streaming content is so fungible. There is no penalty for being bad or awful. There is little sense of merit or distinction to go around. If people have to fill an evening or a meal or a workout or bus ride, literally anything will do.

The movie sure did fail, but AT&T had nothing to do with that, in their view. Especially since it's not just a longer cut like BvS was. That was still the same movie - a better, more appropriately paced version of that movie, IMO, but still the same movie, with both cuts delivered by Snyder for different market purposes. JL is a different thing - a Frankenstein of a film that has the most basic skeleton of Snyder's film, but with massive alternate takes and added content to it he had nothing to do with, while also excising a lot of story that Snyder had intended to be there. It's like if the Love Conquers All Brazil was widdled down even further to 30 minutes, then had another film's shoot add 60 more minutes of new content as well to bring it to the 90 minute runtime. Plus color timed wrong; plus a new score commissioned. (Not a comparison of the quality of Brazil with any of Snyder's films; as much as I love MoS it's not even in Brazil's ballpark, so let's not take it down that road).

I'm not expecting it to be Mad Max. I'm expecting it to be a JL film I can watch alongside MoS and BvS and enjoy, matching those films stylistically and thematically (the theatrical cut of JL goes out of its way to ignore those films aside from the most basic plot threads, pleasing neither those who like those films, nor appealing to those who wanted to completely disregard those films). I don't think that's much too much to ask if AT&T is willing to foot the bill as they are doing here. It doesn't have to be one of the greatest film of the decade or anything for me to want to see it and possibly enjoy it.

I don't think JL factored much into AT&T spending $85b for Time Warner. The DC IP in general, absolutely. One failed movie? Just another item on the list of assets, even if it was a high profile failure.

Part of my point about the streaming content was indeed that if it is either niche and/or bad it doesn't draw much attention in the end (certainly not to the level of a theatrical tentpole failure) and mostly disappears into the vast crowd of content. As you said -"fungible". It likely won't remain in that state forever as the competition for viewers escalates, but it's there at this time. No one bats much of an eye at the shows that don't get larger acceptance and/or get poor reviews. Netflix has dozens of such content, from Sense8 to The Get Down.

beamish14 wrote: Wed May 20, 2020 10:19 pm

jazzo wrote: Wed May 20, 2020 10:11 pm Excellent news, not for what is sure to be a larger turd than the original cut of Justice League, but because there is now hope that our own very niche online community can pressure Warner into releasing Frank Perry's cut of The Last Summer!

So.

Let's do that.

Guillermo del Toro tried to shame WB into putting out The Devils on Blu-Ray by drumming up publicity on Twitter, but it didn't amount to anything.

Sadly, it doesn't have the DC branding to appeal to the general populous, and it has been unseen by so many for so long that the traction for this effort went by the wayside. I'd give up every single one of Snyders DC films for a Criterion Blu-ray of The Devils if that would somehow magically make it come to fruition. This world doesn't grasp truly culturally valuable priorities!

In less appetizing news, the first official teaser for the Snyder Cut was also released today (in 1.66:1?), along with the info that the roughly 214-minute long film will be split into 4 1-hour episodes and released as a miniseries.

The trailer definitely isn't as wide as 1.66:1. I understand Snyder has ditched that ratio for the film and is instead using the full height of the 4-perf Super35 framing, to imitate the 1.44:1 IMAX ratio, despite the film not using IMAX cameras for any scenes.

In other words, he's releasing it open matte.

I appreciate the Se7en vibe Reeves is going for with The Batman. The film looks great.

ZSJL is great to see being itself again. It's nice to have the film back to what it was intended to be, aside from the necessity to release it in four parts. A necessary compromise to get this version of the film finished, but at least the non-segmented full film version will be available to view afterwards.

WW84 still looks quite good. The delays have taken a bit of the wind out of its sails as it has all the delayed films, but the vibrancy of it still shines through.

Gunn's The Suicide Squad looks bonkers in the best way. Just an all-out chaotic madhouse with mostly z-grade characters, but not in the Birds of Prey way. Maybe he'll be the first one to take this corner of the DC Films IP and make a film I enjoy.

Promising news all around for The Flash, Black Adam and Shazam! Fury of the Gods.

Chances are not all of these films will be great (or even good), but as of this moment they all have my interest.

Everyone, we still need to split off some of the discussions here into dedicated threads, so please refrain from talking about more than one of these films in each post you make so that we can move them (eventually)

Sorry about that. I thought it would be more efficient to sum up my response to the DC Fandome movie news in one post, but guess it had the opposite effect in that context!

No worries, if anything it was a good catalyst to remind me that we needed to say something about it for everyone!

I've never liked a DC movie (other than Nolan's), I've never liked a Snyder movie, I dislike superheroes in general, and I never saw the theatrical cut of Justice League. But I am going to watch this and am actually looking forward to it. Why? I do not know.

TheKieslowskiHaze wrote: Mon Feb 01, 2021 5:33 pm I've never liked a DC movie (other than Nolan's), I've never liked a Snyder movie, I dislike superheroes in general, and I never saw the theatrical cut of Justice League. But I am going to watch this and am actually looking forward to it. Why? I do not know.

I think at some level there's a desire from a lot of people to see if it can somehow be an improvement over the hot mess that was released in 2017. Given this is essentially a four hour film made possible by fan demand though I'm unsure how much magic is really possible here. The film at some level feels like both an olive branch to Snyder and a marketing ploy for HBO Max and I'm unsure just what to make of that.

I mean best case scenario it's....better?

I've already set aside the time to watch this in one shot on the 18th. I like BvS more than most people, but the theatrical Justice League was absolutely terrible. So for WB to go the lengths they have (I've read of an $70 million spent once you include promotion), this can only mean one of two things: 1. JL-tSC will be significantly better, or 2. WB execs are irredeemable morons and should be fired immediately.

Either way, I gotta know!

I'm interested in this as well, but before I take the dive into watching such a long film, I need to know whether it's required viewing to see the earlier films in this new DC universe first (I've only seen the first Wonder Woman)

therewillbeblus wrote: Mon Feb 01, 2021 7:47 pm I'm interested in this as well, but before I take the dive into watching such a long film, I need to know whether it's required viewing to see the earlier films in this new DC universe first (I've only seen the first Wonder Woman)

They're very decisive films so I take no responsibility if you hate them, but yes you should probably watch Man of Steel and Batman v Superman, just because MoS sets up BvS, and BvS sets up JL.

But I guess you could also just read the wikipedia synopses as well.

(god this post makes me seem like a DC fanboy, haha)

Thank you for outing yourself in service!

willoneill wrote:

therewillbeblus wrote: Mon Feb 01, 2021 7:47 pm I'm interested in this as well, but before I take the dive into watching such a long film, I need to know whether it's required viewing to see the earlier films in this new DC universe first (I've only seen the first Wonder Woman)

They're very decisive films so I take no responsibility if you hate them, but yes you should probably watch Man of Steel and Batman v Superman, just because MoS sets up BvS, and BvS sets up JL.

But I guess you could also just read the wikipedia synopses as well.

(god this post makes me seem like a DC fanboy, haha)

The poor devil’s setting himself up for four hours of Snyder, and you load another five on him first? Oh, the humanity.

5 and a half actually since it's best to watch BvS Ultimate Cut, though it still remains vastly flawed.
But at least, no need to watch the awful dud that is Aquaman or the totally forgettable Shazam.

But...I'm just supposed to go into Man of Steel unprepared???

Wait, I've seen Man of Steel and just blocked its awfulness from memory- I even got one of those promotional baseball hats at the screening since it was the opening of one of those De Lux theatres in my town... anyways, I'm no Snyder fan but Sucker Punch was a committed vision I admired, and I've mentioned elsewhere to open mouths that I find his Dawn of the Dead remake to be great and far superior to the original, though it's definitely helped by a killer cast

I watched a bunch of youtube videos ragging on Batman vs. Superman both before and after I saw the movie. Of all of those collected media experiences, I think the movie itself was the most disposable experience. You could literally just watch people responding to these movies in all these various ways and understand all you need to in order to appreciate whatever could possibly be appreciated in a 4-hr. Zack Snyder Justice League movie. And it would be a lot funnier and more interesting than watching BvS.

The only thing I really found I disagreed with in all the videos I saw is that most of the people making these videos thought that the Batman they saw on screen fighting KG-Beast and other goons was a cool take on Batman. It was not.

As an unapologetic fan of Man of Steel (love it) and Batman v Superman (Ultimate Cut) (really like it), chances are if you do not like those movies you will not like Zack Snyder's Justice League. This isn't to be confused with disliking the 2017 theatrical Justice League, which is a radically altered film from what Snyder shot in 2016 (100% redone visual effects and score, 80% reshot scenes from summer 2017 under Whedon).

I honestly don't know why those who dislike MoS and BvS would even bother with ZSJL, but good luck to you. Can't say you weren't warned.

As for myself, I expect to finally get a JL film that actually feels like a Snyder film, and feels in line with what I enjoy from the previous two films.