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Post by Cybermortis on Oct 26, 2019 6:40:54 GMT
Part of the deal to acquire Marvel stipulated that while Disney would own them, they would basically continue to manage themselves. Coupled with this is that Marvel Comics and Marvel film were two different parts of the same company and run without reference to the other.
Comics are a tiny industry and frankly Disney never had any real interest in it nor it seems paid any attention to what was going on until recently.
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Post by mrfatso on Oct 26, 2019 8:01:48 GMT
Considering Disney are setting up their own streaming service that needs content both new and old I do not see them having a reason to open their archive to other companies.
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Post by the light works on Oct 26, 2019 13:32:08 GMT
meanwhile, the "final" trailer dropped. on Carrie Fisher's birthday - which casual fans wouldn't know without being told. release date is coming in December, and I may get so lucky as to see it on opening day or I may not. It's not something I am planning my life around, although I am eager to see how the story ends up ending. I'd still rather have seen Lucas' story arc, but that's life. it was never fine cinema, and I'm okay with that. I also don't care to all that much of a degree whether any comic property is successful or not or whether Hasbro or Disney controls a given fragment of a franchise developed for the purpose of selling toys. what I do care about is various studios wanting me to pay individual subscriptions to watch their shows, and I care about that to the point of not paying. I care a little bit whether the Disney parks shut down, since I would like to go to one, again, bu to me, there is a reason why they call it "entertainment."
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Post by ironhold on Oct 26, 2019 23:07:18 GMT
When I say "open the archives", I mean "monetize the vast quantities of older TV shows, movies, and music recordings that they're just sitting on".
Take, for example, that season of Transformers. If Disney had cranked out a series boxed set when the live-action movies were still hot properties, they'd have made money hand over fist as even casual fans of the franchise were buying up whatever they could get their hands on. Instead, they only authorized limited releases in the UK and Australia via third parties long after the live-action movies had lost their luster.
Haim Saban only clawed back the company name itself, the Power Rangers franchise, and the Digimon franchise. Everything else Saban is in Disney's hands. But aside from a few random shows like "Bobby's World", they've let it all sit in the depths of their archives even though a number of shows - like the English dub of "Mon Colle Knights" - have active cult followings that would pay good money even for digital.
If Disney was to drop every single thing in their archives onto Disney+, then they'd have the gratitude of several under-served communities happy to have beloved niche titles back in circulation.
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Post by the light works on Oct 27, 2019 13:33:45 GMT
When I say "open the archives", I mean "monetize the vast quantities of older TV shows, movies, and music recordings that they're just sitting on". Take, for example, that season of Transformers. If Disney had cranked out a series boxed set when the live-action movies were still hot properties, they'd have made money hand over fist as even casual fans of the franchise were buying up whatever they could get their hands on. Instead, they only authorized limited releases in the UK and Australia via third parties long after the live-action movies had lost their luster. Haim Saban only clawed back the company name itself, the Power Rangers franchise, and the Digimon franchise. Everything else Saban is in Disney's hands. But aside from a few random shows like "Bobby's World", they've let it all sit in the depths of their archives even though a number of shows - like the English dub of "Mon Colle Knights" - have active cult followings that would pay good money even for digital. If Disney was to drop every single thing in their archives onto Disney+, then they'd have the gratitude of several under-served communities happy to have beloved niche titles back in circulation. they'd also have a minor blip in their income stream and then those communities would all have all the copies they wanted, and the value would essentially drop to zero. or in the worst case, the followings would realize how bad those toy ad shows actually are, and lose interest in them. |
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Post by Cybermortis on Oct 27, 2019 19:25:40 GMT
Those communities would introduce those series to others, who in turn would buy some of the products on offer and potentially grow a big enough following to warrant bringing back those IP's.
Failing that just shoving them onto a streaming platform wouldn't exactly hurt. It bolsters the number of shows, it will bring in some subscribers and you never have to reveal how many people are actually watching.
Disney has a problem, like most other big companies, of pushing for short term gains at the expense of long term growth. While some of this is likely related to the debt they are in, meaning they just don't have the money to 'invest' in things that don't think will show an instant return. They should, probably, remember that Star Trek was actually a slow burn in terms of success. It took the better part of a decade for it to reach a point where it could support a major film, and that through syndication not first run viewing. (Not that Paramount planned that). The point is that even though Paramount didn't want Star Trek and intended to cancel it, they funded the last season so they would have something to release on the syndication market. Taking the view that it would at least make some money over time, which with other such properties didn't have to be individually big earners as collectively they would prove to be a fairly stable low key money maker.
Another way of looking at it is Netflix; People tend not to get Netflix for one series, but because they have a lot of things on there people can browse through. Which is to say that individual series or films don't need to do well as people subscribe for everything. This is as opposed to say CBS All Access which tried to sell their platform off one series - Star Trek Discovery. Regardless of what you think of that show common sense should have told them that people wouldn't flock in droves to their platform for one show or franchise. Disney might find the same is true for Disney+ which is being promoted with two IP's. Star Wars and the MCU. This automatically limits the potential customer base as, correctly or not, that is all the platform is likely to be assumed to be offering. And only a small number of potential customers are going to be interested in those properties or interested enough to want to subscribe or stick around.
Again, CBS AA is a good example of this as their Subscription numbers did rise when Discovery first aired. But over a year later when season 2 came out the Subscription numbers were exactly the same, even with CBS counting 'paused subscribers' (That is those who cancelled their subscriptions). Put simply not enough people were interested in Trek to want to subscribe, and those who did simply didn't find enough beyond Trek to convince them to stay once the show was done.
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Post by the light works on Oct 28, 2019 2:00:12 GMT
Those communities would introduce those series to others, who in turn would buy some of the products on offer and potentially grow a big enough following to warrant bringing back those IP's. Failing that just shoving them onto a streaming platform wouldn't exactly hurt. It bolsters the number of shows, it will bring in some subscribers and you never have to reveal how many people are actually watching. Disney has a problem, like most other big companies, of pushing for short term gains at the expense of long term growth. While some of this is likely related to the debt they are in, meaning they just don't have the money to 'invest' in things that don't think will show an instant return. They should, probably, remember that Star Trek was actually a slow burn in terms of success. It took the better part of a decade for it to reach a point where it could support a major film, and that through syndication not first run viewing. (Not that Paramount planned that). The point is that even though Paramount didn't want Star Trek and intended to cancel it, they funded the last season so they would have something to release on the syndication market. Taking the view that it would at least make some money over time, which with other such properties didn't have to be individually big earners as collectively they would prove to be a fairly stable low key money maker. Another way of looking at it is Netflix; People tend not to get Netflix for one series, but because they have a lot of things on there people can browse through. Which is to say that individual series or films don't need to do well as people subscribe for everything. This is as opposed to say CBS All Access which tried to sell their platform off one series - Star Trek Discovery. Regardless of what you think of that show common sense should have told them that people wouldn't flock (in droves to their platform for one show or franchise. Disney might find the same is true for Disney+ which is being promoted with two IP's. Star Wars and the MCU. This automatically limits the potential customer base as, correctly or not, that is all the platform is likely to be assumed to be offering. And only a small number of potential customers are going to be interested in those properties or interested enough to want to subscribe or stick around. Again, CBS AA is a good example of this as their Subscription numbers did rise when Discovery first aired. But over a year later when season 2 came out the Subscription numbers were exactly the same, even with CBS counting 'paused subscribers' (That is those who cancelled their subscriptions). Put simply not enough people were interested in Trek to want to subscribe, and those who did simply didn't find enough beyond Trek to convince them to stay once the show was done. when I was young, one of the itinerant salesmen that visited my parents was selling fancy sweatshirts. they had a shirt collar sewn in, and a nice garden seen printed on them. my parents decided to give them a try, and bought a small order of them. they sold very well, so they got another small order. those went almost as fast, so they got a third order. but at that point, everybody who wanted one already had it; and they ended up giving them away. (as gifts to family and friends) the moral of the story is "Know the size of your market" |
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Post by Cybermortis on Oct 29, 2019 2:56:02 GMT
The size of the potential market is some 330 million in the US alone.
Assuming only half of those are potential costumers for whatever reason, that is 150 million potential subscribers to a streaming platform or some $750 million PER MONTH on a $5 per month plan.
Even half that many subscribers would bring in $4.5 BILLION per year if you can convince them to subscribe to your service and stay there - that's around 6,000,000 times the amount of profit Force Awakens brought in.
Anything that might result in people subscribing, and sticking around, is worth it especially when the majority of that stuff is in effect free having already been paid for.
Then you have merchandise sales on top of that...
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Post by the light works on Oct 29, 2019 3:58:59 GMT
The size of the potential market is some 330 million in the US alone. Assuming only half of those are potential costumers for whatever reason, that is 150 million potential subscribers to a streaming platform or some $750 million PER MONTH on a $5 per month plan. Even half that many subscribers would bring in $4.5 BILLION per year if you can convince them to subscribe to your service and stay there - that's around 6,000,000 times the amount of profit Force Awakens brought in. Anything that might result in people subscribing, and sticking around, is worth it especially when the majority of that stuff is in effect free having already been paid for. Then you have merchandise sales on top of that... you are assuming that as many as half of the population of the US will become fans. keep in mind that only 18% of US residents subscribe to netflix. you are assuming that 2½ times as many people will decide to subscribe to a disney specific service. |
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Post by the light works on Oct 29, 2019 15:05:42 GMT
the second trailer for the madalorian has dropped. it looks good. not good enough to pay for a single studio streaming service, but good.
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Post by wvengineer on Oct 29, 2019 16:44:35 GMT
DB Weiss and David Benioff, Were head writers for Game of Thrones. They left that show to go ork on Star Wars. Many people felt they rushed the last two seasons of GoT and heavily tarnished the show.* Well, they have given up on Star Wars to go write for Netflix. So does this show that Disney is more cautious on the SW property? The trilogy that they were supposed to write is now off the table? Or are they that fleeting that they jump at any opportunity that sounds good, regardless of the mess they leave behind? www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/movies/story/2019-10-29/game-of-thrones-creators-david-benioff-d-b-weiss-star-wars* Note that both show creator George R. R. Martin and HBO both wanted an addition 1 to 2 seasons to wrap up the show, but Weiss and Benioff insisted on doing it in one truncated season. |
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Post by the light works on Oct 29, 2019 16:48:25 GMT
DB Weiss and David Benioff, Were head writers for Game of Thrones. They left that show to go ork on Star Wars. Many people felt they rushed the last two seasons of GoT and heavily tarnished the show.* Well, they have given up on Star Wars to go write for Netflix. So does this show that Disney is more cautious on the SW property? The trilogy that they were supposed to write is now off the table? Or are they that fleeting that they jump at any opportunity that sounds good, regardless of the mess they leave behind? www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/movies/story/2019-10-29/game-of-thrones-creators-david-benioff-d-b-weiss-star-wars* Note that both show creator George R. R. Martin and HBO both wanted an addition 1 to 2 seasons to wrap up the show, but Weiss and Benioff insisted on doing it in one truncated season. it does kind of make them look like job hoppers, doesn't it? |
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Post by Cybermortis on Oct 29, 2019 20:22:44 GMT
I suspect that the two of them were out of the door as soon as the reactions to GoT's last season came in. But for a number of reasons Disney didn't want to reveal that right away, most likely they intended to reveal it post Episode IX as part of a restructure of Lucasfilm. Then they were probably alerted to this; metro.co.uk/2019/10/28/jason-momoas-audition-not-knowing-game-thrones-writers-spill-biggest-interview-since-finale-10998872/Rather than have to deal with question as to why they would continue to hire these two for the rest of the year, and be seen as caving to customers, they opted to release the information as soon as possible. |
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Post by the light works on Oct 29, 2019 21:23:44 GMT
I suspect that the two of them were out of the door as soon as the reactions to GoT's last season came in. But for a number of reasons Disney didn't want to reveal that right away, most likely they intended to reveal it post Episode IX as part of a restructure of Lucasfilm. Then they were probably alerted to this; metro.co.uk/2019/10/28/jason-momoas-audition-not-knowing-game-thrones-writers-spill-biggest-interview-since-finale-10998872/Rather than have to deal with question as to why they would continue to hire these two for the rest of the year, and be seen as caving to customers, they opted to release the information as soon as possible. that says one of two things. either writing TV shows is so simple even a neophyte can do it; or there's something fishy about that article. |
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Post by wvengineer on Oct 30, 2019 12:24:23 GMT
I suspect that the two of them were out of the door as soon as the reactions to GoT's last season came in. But for a number of reasons Disney didn't want to reveal that right away, most likely they intended to reveal it post Episode IX as part of a restructure of Lucasfilm. Then they were probably alerted to this; metro.co.uk/2019/10/28/jason-momoas-audition-not-knowing-game-thrones-writers-spill-biggest-interview-since-finale-10998872/Rather than have to deal with question as to why they would continue to hire these two for the rest of the year, and be seen as caving to customers, they opted to release the information as soon as possible. that says one of two things. either writing TV shows is so simple even a neophyte can do it; or there's something fishy about that article. On one hand it does explain a lot. Once they ran out of material for George RR Martin, the series started during downward. The further they got, and the less they were relying on notes from the creator, the more the overall series broke down. From nonsensical pot lines, to characters doing things way outside of their established characters, to long running plot points that were completely abandoned. Their incompitence shows. However, it brings up the question of why would HBO entrust a series of this magnitude and cost to two complete novices? From the start Game of Thrones was the most expensive TV show made with over $500 Million invested in it by the end. That is a **** ton of money to be entrusting to two nobodies. |
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Post by the light works on Oct 30, 2019 14:11:25 GMT
that says one of two things. either writing TV shows is so simple even a neophyte can do it; or there's something fishy about that article. On one hand it does explain a lot. Once they ran out of material for George RR Martin, the series started during downward. The further they got, and the less they were relying on notes from the creator, the more the overall series broke down. From nonsensical pot lines, to characters doing things way outside of their established characters, to long running plot points that were completely abandoned. Their incompitence shows. However, it brings up the question of why would HBO entrust a series of this magnitude and cost to two complete novices? From the start Game of Thrones was the most expensive TV show made with over $500 Million invested in it by the end. That is a **** ton of money to be entrusting to two nobodies. reading between the lines, it seems there is a chance HBO did not expect it to take off like it did. based on that theory, one could assume they tossed someone's longshot pet project to a couple cheap newbies so they didn't waste a whole lot of money on a non starter. |
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Post by ironhold on Nov 11, 2019 19:38:17 GMT
More people have reached out to Doomcock with details of the test screenings.
They agree that the test screenings turned out poorly, opening the likelihood that someone is potentially going to get fired once it's all over and raising the prospect that the film may indeed be delayed until next May.
Edit - still watching it, and there is a *lot* of cursing as things go along.
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Post by the light works on Nov 12, 2019 2:02:21 GMT
here's a thing. a couple of friends of mine just took delivery of a son, who they named Haydon. thing is, dad's name is Christian.
and despite them being geeks it took me pointing out what that made him.
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Post by Cybermortis on Nov 12, 2019 3:26:47 GMT
More people have reached out to Doomcock with details of the test screenings. They agree that the test screenings turned out poorly, opening the likelihood that someone is potentially going to get fired once it's all over and raising the prospect that the film may indeed be delayed until next May. Edit - still watching it, and there is a *lot* of cursing as things go along.
It is unlikely that Disney will delay the film, in part because that would further increase the already absurd costs but also because that would mean having to admit that they messed up. And for Disney image is everything...although that might not be working as intended*.
As things stand it is highly likely that heads are going to roll. Doomcock said that the reshoots have cost Disney an additional '$300 million', although I find that unlikely and think he either misspoke or his source did as this would mean the film cost something like $500 million to make. As it stands even at a $300 million production figure** then, based on the Box office cut for Solo and the audience split between the domestic and overseas tickets***, the film is going to need to gross around $1.3 Billion globally just to breakeven. And that's without adding on marketing costs****. While this isn't exactly impossible it does mean that Disney isn't likely to make any money on the film. Indeed the recent statement that all Star Wars films are being placed on Hiatus for the time being seems to imply that Disney doesn't expect this to be a success. *Bob Iger had to talk to the Disney Shareholders last week, many of whom were asking about the Star Wars franchise. What is interesting is not so much the questions, but WHO was asking them; Major investment firms and bankers. As I've noted before Disney can lie as much as it wants to the general public, but big companies are less likely to be taken in for any length of time and it seems they are not longer accepting the PR guff Disney is churning out. Likewise media outlets who have been towing the Disney line are starting to be less supportive and questioning if Episode IX might not do that well. Another thing of possible interest is that Iger refused to divulge, even to shareholders, how many people had actually signed up for Disney+. Which might not be a great sign for the platform, or Disney.
**This is a 'base' figure assuming that the original production budget was some $200 million and the reshoots have added another $100 million to that. If the amount of reshoots is, however, anything close to those of Solo then the actual production costs could easily be in the $400 million range.
***For Solo Lucasfilm was getting 60% of the North American box Office, with my estimate being roughly 30% of the overseas box office talkings. These are the figures I used to calculate how much money Solo had earned, or lost as it turned out, as around $88 million about a week before Disney itself had to admit to that figure. (Which, btw, didn't include marketing costs). The Domestic/Overseas box office split for Solo was 55% North America and 45% Overseas. Just to note that Awakens had the exact opposite split with 45% Domestic and 55% overseas. ****As of late I have started to wonder about some of the rumors we've been hearing from behind the scenes, and specifically the one about Kennedy being called in to get chewed out by Iger in front of all the other Studio heads after Solo. This always seemed a bit off to me; Why would you humiliate a studio head in that way over a single film? Unless it WASN'T the first Star Wars film to lose money, just the first who's losses Disney couldn't hide. Looking at the situation, starting with conflicting information as to the actual budget and the amount they may have spent on marketing...Well it could be that Last Jedi cost Disney money as well. This would make far more sense overall, not just with the rumored dressing down but also with Iger basically stepping in and taking over himself afterwards.
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Post by ironhold on Nov 12, 2019 4:50:54 GMT
In the worst-case scenario that this film does get pushed back to Force Friday, I've already got a "retro" review of the Star Wars Holiday Special ready to go as a replacement for it. This way, my readers will still get some Star Wars with their Christmas.
And I agree that whenever a studio gets tight-lipped with how much something cost, there's a good chance that that answer is "probably too much".
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