John Carter may be largest Flop in History

Disney is projecting a $200 million loss on the film, and their shares have dropped over 35 cents in the last week alone. That would beat the previous record, Mars Needs Moms, by 90 million dollars.

My question is: why? The movie isn't bad by any stretch of the imagination. Sure, it isn't a great movie, but I mean, how could it be a bigger flop than the mess that was Mars Needs Moms, The Adventures Of Pluto Nash, and Speed Racer? What the hell American movie audience, what the hell...

(Note: this is meant to be a discussion concerning why John Carter ended up a flop. To discuss the movie in general, there's a different thread you can check out).

I'd imagine it's because audiences were wary of another Avatar, or are burnt out on Disney adventures of this type in general.

I've got two guns pointed west and a broken compass.

Terrible marketing. Not just bad, but really, really, really bad. The name alone made me reluctant to watch the film.

Fight. Struggle. Endure. Suffer. LIVE.

I imagine it was because Seinfeld Is Unfunny.

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Flop? Ye cats! Way to make me hate you even more, movie goers. This just might be a new low for you guys.

What's worse? The fact that critics are ignoring the fact that this is based on the book series that created all of the sci fi cliches that the film is getting knocked around for. They are pompous assholes at their worst. And I'll chalk this up to a bad case of Did Not Do The Research to the point of absolute frustration. The only thing that really seems to throw fans off is the lack of nudity, but I thought it was an excellent reincarnation of Barsoom. Sure, there's plenty of liberty taken in order to create an exciting popcorn thrilling serial kind of ride, but I'm sure Rice anticipated that. I mean, it's not like he gave much of a reason for Carter to be on Mars. It was all on the Rule of Cool and no one should be ashamed to admit that!

And to think! The Lorax is still selling like hot cakes and 21 Street is bringing in the big bucks. There's no accounting for taste OR intelligence here.

edited 19th Mar '12 9:32:52 PM by GREGTHECAT

http://www.longcriercat.deviantart.com I'm thirsty. Got any ink? Resident Pen Ward antagonist.

Or audiences recognize both franchises and accept that one of those movies is getting good reviews...

Actually, nah, moviegoers are stupid.

I've got two guns pointed west and a broken compass.

First off, it really should have been "John Carter of Mars"; just calling it "John Carter" tells you virtually nothing about the film. Second, the marketing was abysmal.

I don't think we can really lay the blame for this at the critics' door; audiences have flocked to films that critics have largely despised lots of times

Just a note, though: It's not really not much of a defense to keep bringing up how John Carter predates all the other space opera franchises out there. It's still up to the filmmakers to give the audience, if not something they haven't seen before, at least something creatively and entertainingly executed in such a way as to make them not mind that they've seen it before. Personally, I think John Carter does this, and, really, so do most of the people who actually have seen it. The movie's only a "flop" because it was so expensive to make. It probably will ultimately, through international release and dvd rentals/sales, at least break even (after all, Waterworld did...eventually; it even made a small profit).

I feel really bad for Andrew Stanton. To think that he is the same guy who made Finding Nemo and WALL-E. He really shouldn't be blamed, as it was both the poor marketing and the overly negative critics that did this movie in. While Brad Bird succeeded in making the transition from animation to live-acion, Stanton didn't.

>>reads thread title

:O

I can't believe the movie flopped that badly. I'm not terribly interested in seeing it, but it can't be that bad of a movie, could it?

I liked it better when Questionable Casting was called WTH Casting Agency

Its actually a fairly good film (I give it a B+), but the problem is it cost $500 million dollars to make. The film would have done well if its budget were a bit more reasonable.

No, it cost 250M. The 500M is the estimate of how much it has to gross to make back its budget ( given that the studio only gets part of the take ).

And, that budget really is the reason its such a huge flop. If it only cost 150M to make, then we'd be looking at it breaking even, at least.

Home of CBR Rumbles-in-Exile: rumbles.fr.yuku.com

...i don't think this movie was that' much of a flop. it was still at least 2 at the box office, and i see it still made some money. this is cowboys and aliens all over again

The problem seems to be that it's dull. The worst thing a movie can be is dull. If it's a certain kind of bad it can get away with it, but dull? Beige, boring, neither here-or-there, leaves-no-impression dull? That's the kiss of death.

I haven't seen it personally, because I don't want to. I don't want to because any trailer for it I've stumbled across just looks like a generic gladiator-looking guy fights generic CGI monsters in a generic brown setting. I guess the original books helped set up most of this stuff in the public consciousness but throwing hundreds of millions of dollars at it just to get special effects that don't really look that impressive in todays world isn't going to make it any less generic and repetitive.

And let us pray that come it may (As come it will for a' that)

If you enjoy 1930s serials, you'll get a real kick out of the film. I don't know, it kept my interest, but then again I don't have the attention span of a gnat and appreciate ridiculously implausible retro futurism stories, so that might explain my love for the film.

http://www.longcriercat.deviantart.com I'm thirsty. Got any ink? Resident Pen Ward antagonist.

Star Wars was wonderful because it was something people hadn't ever seen before, because its special effects and visuals were impressive for its era, because its icons (Star Destroyers, Darth Vader, the Falcon) managed to tap into something in the viewer psyche, because it had one of the best soundtracks of all time, and because Harrison Ford was a great actor. Among other things. These days, it's so iconic that minor matters like outdated special effects and the question of whether the majority of the acting is actually any good have ceased to matter. It's loved because it's Star Wars. It's hard to precisely quantify what makes something iconic.

Avatar did get tons of flak for being cliché, but got away with it because the 3D was spectacular. It was divided into two halves: "Ooh, pretty!" and "Ooh, explosions!" And in those categories, it was pretty hard to top - so any space opera coming after it will have to focus on surpassing it in areas like characterization and plot originality, or else have something truly unique to offer in the area of visuals.

It doesn't matter how many times you say "John Carter was first!" A movie based on a fairly niche source (I'd never have heard of the original book if not for these forums), with a premise that feels ridiculous (there's sentient life on Mars, and a Confederate soldier is magically transported there), with advertising that gives the sense that it's mainly action fluff, and which doesn't offer depth of characterization or originality of plot, is unlikely to do well either critically or at the box office.

edited 20th Mar '12 1:44:46 PM by WarriorEowyn

Does John Carter look like it cost so much to make? Based on the trailers I've seen, I don't understand where they dumped all the money. It doesn't look very impressive.

I think that's the big problem this movie is having. I've barely seen any advertising, and what little I have seen triggered only a "meh, whatever" reaction.

edited 20th Mar '12 2:59:21 PM by Accela

I've heard its mostly Stanton's fault. He didn't really know what he was doing, and so while the final result was IMO good, it cost a lot more than it should have.

Home of CBR Rumbles-in-Exile: rumbles.fr.yuku.com

Speed Racer was such a big flop? ... awww...

John Carter is actually sliding up the scale in Canada, according to Empire and Cineplex, who basically have 'duopoly' on movie theatres. This may be one of those movies with abysmal local sales but high international sales.

Not Three Laws compliant.

I thought it was absolutely delightful, but then I think pulp sci-fi is the bestest, the more retro the better... gotta be the marketing that's the problem. It makes the movie look so... dumb. ME MAN IN LOINCLOTH. ME FIGHT MONSTERS. YOU WATCH.

i. hear. a. sound.

I also blame the marketing. I hadn't heard about this film until a month or so before it came out when I was looking up something about Pixar's directors on Wikipedia. No, really.

And, quite honestly, I'm not interested in the film at all. It's sad that it's likely going to be Disney's largest flop, but nothing about it impressed me in the trailers, and, dare I say - they looked kind of boring. I had no idea what it was that I was watching. My friends loved it so I'm considering a trip to the theaters but with the movies coming out soon, I dunno, we'll see.

edited 20th Mar '12 7:51:16 PM by HidingGames

Also this movie had a trouble production which also inflated the total cost for the movie.

Also known as Achillesforever6 of Lordkat.com fame

That was certainly one of the problems. I heard that they had actually made the entire movie under a different director using makeup instead of CGI, the Disney execs hated it and decided to redo the mess with computer animation, but they rolled the costs for both films on the same production studio. So in reality, the movie only costs a reasonable 100 million or so to make, but they made it twice.

Yikes. Not even Tangled was that big a problem.

I must admit that the advertising didn't really wow me. And the fact that I heard the romance compared to Attack Of The Clones definitely sunk my enthusiasm.

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Never heard that one myself; as I understood it, Disney didn't even get moving on this one, as in actually putting it into production, until Stanton was up to direct it. Most of the other directors associated in it before production actually started - Conron and Favreau - aren't exactly CGI-shy.