The Disney/Fox Deal: Questions and Consequences

Midnight's Edge has done a video on the Disney/Fox deal:

Would it really be a good idea to X-Men: Dark Phoenix? I mean, the video explicitly makes it clear that no one's canceling anything yet, but it says that Disney can do it if they want to. Should they? On one hand, the movie's probably in post-production by now, so axing it this late in the game might raise some eyebrows. On the other hand, The Dark Phoenix Saga is one of THE best-known X-Men stories and if Feige being a fan of the X-Men is true, Marvel Studios would probably want to go whole hog on it later on.

On the other other hand, if Dark Phoenix ends up becoming the last mainstream X-Men movie by Fox, would Feige let them have it serve as Fox's swan song?

...What do you guys think?

Doubtful. It's not like Disney owns Fox as of right now, estimates indicate it'll take anywhere from 12 to 18 months for the deal to be ironed out, and who knows what'll happen if the government decides to run interference.

Simply put, by the time Disney is actually in charge of Fox, or at least in any kind of position to do anything about the film slate, Dark Phoenix will already be out. Even if it wasn't, it doesn't make an awful lot of good business sense to cancel a project so far into production after all the money that's been put into it, because I doubt it's bad enough to be more damaging to the brand than X-3 or Origins Wolverine, and canceling anything of higher quality is likely going to come off as petty corporate bullcrap to a lot of people.

edited 17th Dec '17 9:03:37 AM by Khfan429

I think they should ensure that the movie wraps properly up and then reboot. The Phoenix saga is something which has to be earned anyway. They can try again 10 to 15 years down the line.

This whole thing of Disney owning Fox reminds me of Cloud Atlas where in the year 2144 all movies are called "disneys". Doesn't sound so silly now do does it?

Dark Phoenix seems like a final film so I guess it wouldn't be too disrespectful to end it there. I don't think there are any other movies that Fox needs to make for their X-men "universe".

edited 17th Dec '17 9:14:38 AM by 123tbones

x4 At the fastest, this deal will take over a year to finalize, during which time Fox isn't under Disney's control. And that's not even counting potential investigations which extend it.

Everything slated for next year is basically safe unless Fox decides to cancel it themselves, potentially everything in 2019 is safe, as well as anything that gets far enough into production before the deal is finalized. It will be a while before anything really happens no matter what. There's stuff Fox probably won't bother doing (like, they won't try and cram yet another Fantastic Four movie in there because...why would they) but mostly it's going to be business as usual for them. They might do a couple more TV co-productions with Disney or something like that though.

So if the movie you're interested in comes out in the next couple years, it's probably safe, and the higher profile stuff beyond that point is probably safe too. Like, Fox is probably going to make a point out of releasing Death on the Nile if they get it far enough into production and Avatar 2 is certainly going to happen. (If it's actually any good is another question entirely.)

'd I guess.

edited 17th Dec '17 9:17:43 AM by Zendervai

Plus, it won't even be the first Dark Phoenix movie, anyway.

Actually, related question:

Everyone has been saying that Fox has been wanting to get out of the movie business for awhile to begin with, but since when was that a thing?

I mean they could make another FF movie just to screw over Marvel for spite reasons.

But that would do nothing.

Fox: "Hey, we crapped out yet another terrible Fantastic Four movie in less than two years to spite Disney!"

Disney: Sticks the Fantastic Four in the MCU anyway. "I'm sorry, what were you saying?"

I would imagine that before rebooting X-Men Kevin Feige would help produce a final X-Men sequel to serve as a grand finale to the old franchise. If Dark Phoenix doesn’t bring closure and is successful. I think he would want that since X1 was the first film he ever worked on and it started his career at Marvel Studio. We really wouldn’t have the MCU without the Fox X-Men franchise so it deserves that much.

There are going to reboot considering Donner has been wanting the X-Men in the MCU for years. But I think also think she would want the old series to have conclusion first too.

Putting aside my fears of the increasing monopolization of the film industry (because there are frankly people out there who can put it into better terms then I can), am I the only one who thinks that bringing mutants into the MCU is kind of a bad idea?

I mean, the whole point of the X-Men is that they live in a society that fears and hates them. The MCU doesn't have a history of mutant prejudice that the Fox films have. Were the mutants in hiding and the prejudice occurs after they're revealed to the world? If so, that's pretty much the same damn story that Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. pulled with the Inhumans. At the least the wave of AOS had an in-story explanation on why there was a sudden influx of Inhumans that caught the public's attention, how are you going to explain how the thousands if not million mutants avoided detection through the many years they've been active?

Pretending that the X-Men films are in continuity with the MCU is a continuity headache because the X-Men films can barely keep the continuity in their own films straight. You think it's a headache figuring out why the Avengers never stepped up to stop the Hand's shenanigans? How about trying to explain why SHIELD never lifted a finger to stop Apocalypse or Magneto? Or that there are two Quicksilvers now?

The only way a potential crossover can work in my mind would be to set both series in two separate universes and have them interact through reality-bending hijinks. Like say, Thanos screws around with the Infinity Gauntlet and opens a portal to the X-Men universe, allowing the two universes to interact. It doesn't mess up the more strict continuity of the MCU and allows for the crossovers people want while they ignore the increasing consolidation of all our entertainment to the Mouse House.

But who-hoo, all our toys are in one box I guess...

edited 17th Dec '17 2:01:12 PM by chasemaddigan

In the comics, isn't it that mutants used to be incredibly rare and unknown to the general populace, until the radiation released by atomic testing caused their numbers to drastically increase?

Or they could just a DOFP-like movie and change history a bit.

Here is the thing: the film industry has never been less monopolized than nowadays. That is because the barrier to creating a movie and getting it distributed has never been lower. You have nowadays more possible channels, more sources of revenue and more options to put together an independent production. And there have never been as many movies released. The only reason why Disney gets so much of the box office is because they create the best/most popular product, NOT because they are the only game in town.

Plus, a monopoly actually means that the consumer is forced to use that product and no other. Nobody's life is dependent on watching a movie.

Oh, btw, get used to more and more theatres closing down in the next years. And not because of the Disney deal. But because weather we like it or not, streaming will take away at least part of their revenue.

edited 17th Dec '17 3:53:36 PM by Swanpride

The FCC and FTC should easily block the deal for obvious competition reasons.

Unlikely, since there's a lot of people in the FCC who would want a cut of the Disney/Fox pie, now that Trump is in charge.

I mean, if there's one highly immoral and corrupt government that would rather profit from this instead of trying to block it, it's gotta be this one.

Also, even if that wasn't the case, I reeeeaaaaally doubt that Disney ain't prepared to deal with the FCC.

Here are the reasons what the deal will go through: 1. Disney doesn't buy Fox at a whole but specific assets of it. They will have made sure that they won't run into trouble with those assets. 2. Even if there is something objectionable about the deal, Trump and his Republican cronies will hardly want to upset their favourite propaganda outlet. 3. And should there be some fuss over an aspect of the deal after all. Disney and Fox can always take whatever is objectionable out of the deal and adjust.

My personal view is that all empires fall... even Disney

That's poetic but doesn't actually mean anything.

Meaningless Meaningful Words

It's true though...remember how powerful MGM used to be?

Yes, and by the time Ted Turner bought MGM it had long, long since been in decline from its glory days.

And let's not forget how MGM bought United Artists, perhaps the last major acquisition of one studio by another - but, of course, UA was never really that much of a major studio and it was pretty much fucked after the Heavens Gate debacle. For that reason, of course, nobody was asking to have hearings about it, nobody was talking about antitrust laws in relation to the buyout....

But it's hardly comparable to this, really. Fox is still holding its own really well at the box office.

edited 18th Dec '17 6:56:12 PM by Aldo930

I think everyone was expecting Sony to do this, because of their string of not-exactly-failures-but-not-exactly-successes.

Fox was an outside bet. Universal and Warner Bros are doing well enough that this sort of sale would never be considered, and Paramount has a Chinese company holding a major stake in it, so that would be a block there.

Eh, I only care about public domain stuff, if they would fix that I wouldn't really care what disney does with monopoly, probably because I don't watch movies much anyway outside of netflix these days

I'd be surprised if Warner Bros. continued selling the Batman TV show on home video even after a major rival of theirs gets the rights to it. Unless Disney is willing to sell the rights to the series (which is unlikely; sorry The Fantastic Four (1967) fanboys, but I see no trade coming), I don't see WB wanting to continue selling the series on home video if a major rival is profiting off a property WB owns the underlying rights to.

edited 20th Dec '17 12:43:57 PM by Mario1995