{"id":1426,"date":"2017-08-25T22:45:42","date_gmt":"2017-08-26T02:45:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/?p=1426"},"modified":"2017-08-25T22:45:42","modified_gmt":"2017-08-26T02:45:42","slug":"summer-2017-when-the-blockbuster-formula-ran-out-of-gas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2017\/08\/25\/summer-2017-when-the-blockbuster-formula-ran-out-of-gas\/","title":{"rendered":"Summer 2017 \u2013 When the Blockbuster Formula Ran Out of Gas"},"content":{"rendered":"

What do most of the Twilight Zone episodes, the third season of Star Trek and Transformers VI (or whatever number they\u2019re up to this year) have in common? They were no good, nobody wanted to see them and they were written by hacks. Sure, there were a few good Zone episodes and also a few of the Trek episodes were fun or interesting. What I think you\u2019ll notice with these is that the episode was written by somebody creative. The rest of the dreck in these categories was ground out by talentless hacks who couldn\u2019t even spell the word plot let alone write one. And that brings us back to Transformers XX or whatever it is. Great Caesar\u2019s Ghost!<\/p>\n

Is the business really that bad? Is there no other way to fund and produce movies than to pile sequel onto sequel? How many times can Sylvester Stallone climb into the ring or jump out of a crashing helicopter? How many times can that stupid alien ravage human colonies before somebody gets around to inventing industrial strength Raid for aliens and drop it on their ugly butts?<\/p>\n

As even Deadpool himself said (before his upcoming sequel of course), and I paraphrase, how many times can Liam Neeson let his daughter be Taken before we assume he\u2019s just a not a very good father. Wasn\u2019t Godfather III enough to prove that even the best stories can\u2019t be endlessly resuscitated without being turned into crap?<\/p>\n

But you notice, TV is able to make some pretty good stuff. I\u2019ve just finished Justified<\/a> and I\u2019d put that up against anything I\u2019ve seen in the theater in the last five years. Why the disparity? First of all, Justified was adapted from the works of Elmore Leonard whose stories have time and again translated well into movies. Whereas with these endless sequel franchises, I assume they are assembled from some formula that is somehow supposed to capture the original flavor of the first episode but without the high price of the original screenwriter. Apparently, they\u2019ll pay tens of millions to get Bruce Willis or Jamie Foxx and millions more to CGI the explosions but they\u2019ll settle for the story line to be written by the corporate lawyers who put the financial deal together for the studios.<\/p>\n

I think I read that because of the cable fees TV is actually able to monetize their quality shows pretty successfully whereas on the big screen only a giant blockbuster success is lucrative enough to even attract sufficient funding to get made. And that means Terminator 30 gets made before something well written and entertaining like possibly a faithful version of one of Heinlein\u2019s juveniles. I imagine that Citizen of the Galaxy or Farmer in the Sky in the hands of a good screenwriter and director would be very entertaining and very commercial.<\/p>\n

Okay, I know what you\u2019re thinking, \u201cFocus Photog, focus. What\u2019s your point? Bring this back around to the title. Bring it home.\u201d
\nFine, I will. Hollywood is dead. Long live TV. Except for some extraordinary slam dunks like \u201cThe Lord of the Rings\u201d or \u201cHarry Potter\u201d Hollywood is too paralyzed by the fear of losing gobs of money to try and put a quality product together from quality components. And that\u2019s why I don\u2019t feel deprived when I skip whole decades at the theater. There\u2019s nothing there. Even the occasional stand out ends up being barely acceptable. I remember hearing raves about Gravity. When I finally rented it, I was puzzled what all the fuss was about. Okay would be a generous appraisal. The same with \u201cThe Martian.\u201d Adequate would cover it.
\nAnd it couldn\u2019t happen to a nicer set of people. If DiCaprio and Depp start only making seven figures instead of eight I certainly won\u2019t cry. When they\u2019re replaced by AI \u2013 CGI maybe the stories won\u2019t be as insulting to the dirt people. What a concept!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What do most of the Twilight Zone episodes, the third season of Star Trek and Transformers VI (or whatever number they\u2019re up to this year)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[239,237,240,1],"tags":[336,92,335,235,337],"class_list":["post-1426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-reviews","category-reviews","category-tv-reviews","category-uncategorized","tag-hacks","tag-heinlein","tag-hollywood","tag-justified","tag-tv"],"yoast_head":"\nSummer 2017 \u2013 When the Blockbuster Formula Ran Out of Gas - Orion's Cold Fire<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2017\/08\/25\/summer-2017-when-the-blockbuster-formula-ran-out-of-gas\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Summer 2017 \u2013 When the Blockbuster Formula Ran Out of Gas - 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