+“Why ‘Batman,’ Not ‘Star Wars,’ Was The Box Office Blockbuster That Ruined Hollywood” | Forbes | Scott Mendelson
“We’re now at a point where movie stars are only of value when they play popular characters, with the old-school star vehicle mostly having gone the way of the dinosaur. And the death of the star vehicle meant the death of the original blockbuster or at least a blockbuster where the IP wasn’t the primary selling point. What was unique in 1989, a big-budget adult-skewing comic book superhero movie directed by a wunderkind visionary and filled with “prestigious” adult movie stars, is now virtually the only path to success. The road from Batman to Jurassic Park to Harry Potter to Transformers to The Avengers is linear, with the most viable Hollywood product now being a PG-13 superhero movie technically based on kid-friendly IP but mostly targeted at nostalgic adults.“
–>I can’t remember the last movie I saw in the theater that wasn’t a sci-fi or superhero blockbuster. Conversely, tv for me is about drama that unfolds like a novel. (It’s possible that The Sopranos was for television drama what Batman was for blockbuster movies.) And I don’t watch any of the superhero shows on tv. I don’t need a Batman show without Batman (Gotham), a Superman show without Superman (Krypton), an Avengers show without the Avengers (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.), an X-Men show without the X-Men (Legion) or any of the spandex shows on The CW that have much more teenybopper romance than I need in my life. My sci-fi/superhero tv shows have to have more meat on them, like Preacher, American Gods, Umbrella Academy, Deadly Class, Westworld, Good Omens, Humans, Star Trek Discovery, and an amazing but canceled British gem called Utopia.
More articles of interest:
+“Why We Still Watch Independence Day” |Vanity Fair| K. Austin Collins
+“‘Endgame’ Nears All-Time Record, And The Age Of Disney Mega-Blockbusters Is Upon Us” | NPR | Bob Mondello
+“AI Turns Casting Director, Can Now Decide The Blockbuster Movie Cast” | Analytics India Magazine | Harshajit Sarmah
Where are your hammers for these nails?
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Image Source: Andrew Martin from Pixabay
