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Are We Suffering Origin Story Fatigue?
brumgrunt writes "As more and more franchise movies look to cover the origin story of a character again and again, Den Of Geek wonders why film studios aren't looking a little harder for interesting stories to tell..."
I like to fill in the blanks with my imagination. I hate overzealous exposition. I am not saying that I dislike story development or lore, but I do not need or want everything spoonfed to me.
Hallowed are the Ori
All I know is if I have to sit through Peter Parker getting bit by a radioactive spider one more time, well, I'm just not going to do it. My understanding is that the next Spiderman movie is a reboot; here's hoping they "cut to the chase".
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Isn't that basically what it boils down to? A franchise has an established fan base, a successful film means that the formula works, the director / cast combination works etc. etc. Couple that with a PG13 rating and you've got a money maker. Sadly we're in the minority regarding spoon feeding, people like that - they like (at its most basic) being told what to do, to have a leader figure no matter how abstract that figure is. I find that there are few franchises that really require sequels, and even fewer require prequels - I'm quietly glad for example that District 9 and Cloverfield haven't been turned into giant cash cows. Cloverfield would be especially suited to an alternate telling of the story from a different character's perspective. Having said that Paranormal Activity 2 seemed to work really well, despite it being an obvious cash grab. I expect the third and fourth installments to be terrible though.
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Fun fact that doesn't seem to be mentioned here: Originally Slashdot was running from a box in Rob Malda's closet. The original hardware Slashdot was hosted on was auctioned (or raffled? Don't remember) off a few years ago. I'll have to see if I can dig up the source and add it to Wikipedia (and hope the deletionists don't see it)
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what we need to do is look into the origins of this counterproductive preoccupation to find out how it started
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Does this guy not understand how the movie business works? As soon as they find something that works, they keep doing it. They want to make money. As soon as one movie comes out that works, soon there will be a bunch of copycat movies. Like sports movies in the 90s. Or CGI movies in the previous decade.
But it's not like the movie industry is trying to push it on us, they are content agnostic (and money religious). The only reason they do it is because it makes money. When people stop going to see them, when the movies stop making money, then the studios stop making that kind of movie.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Surely you're not implying that almost all major motion pictures today are remakes, reboots, re-imaginings, sequels, and adaptations?!?!?
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It depends, I think the Magneto/Charles Xavier origins story can be quite interesting - far more so than Wolverine. Wolverine, while likable, is just another mutant. The X-Men universe centers around Magneto and Xavier and their backstories. Plus, the X-Men comic books have such complex and convoluted continuity issues, frankly a reboot to the beginning is needed to introduce them to a new generation. FWIW, I've never found the slutty psychic thing Emma Frost has going nearly as compelling as Charles Xavier. Then again, I think comic books hurt their own credibility when they portray female characters as they do.
Despite, my enthusiasm for the Magneto/Xavier origins, I don't have much hope that the movie will be pulled off well though. I hope I'm surprised.
The Spiderman reboot is completely unnecessary - especially with an Avengers movie coming out soon. It's overexposure. There are plenty of interesting characters from the Marvel universe to draw from.
The reason Hollywood produces stuff is because they think it will make money. Period. Any artistic value in film is purely coincidental. They've discovered that re-hashing the same old material is much cheaper and easier than doing something really new and innovative, and still sells well. Ergo they will do so whenever possible.
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Part of the reason we need/end up with origin stories is the film creators are trying to cater to a wider market.
If people didn't know who the X-Men were or how they came to be, they might not be interested in the movie. Targeting geeks who are already 'in the know' and not telling everyone else what is happening doesn't fill cinemas.
I guess the same goes for a Spider Man origins story, though in this case it's more of a "reboot" of the series to start from scratch, sell more tickets, and try to pay big name stars even less money. Which, one might argue is a little cynical and money-grasping.
Besides, it's not like the series reboot and fresh origin story hasn't been a staple of comics for quite some time -- it seems to me we've been through a fair number of incarnations of Spider Man and Iron Man (and Super Man and Bat Man) throughout the years.
As long as it's a good (enough) story, and has the requisite effects, fight scenes, car wrecks, and chicks in spandex ... well, they'll probably do fine. Den of Geek comes from a certain perspective of people who would want some more "hard core comic geek" movies -- but studio execs want to maximize the number of ticket buyers.
My sister in law or wife won't want to see some super hero movie that just jumps into the middle without an origin story.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Darth Vader was far more frightening until they showed us Anakin hitting on a girl twice his age and shouting, "Now this is Pod Racing" while attacking the Trade Federation control ship. Anakin became even more pathetic after we watched him turning into a creepy stalker teenager who used the Jedi mind trick to get Padme to like him. And the final insult - Anakin becomes a Dark Lord of the Sith so he won't get in trouble for cutting Mace Windu's hand off? Lame. Really, if Lucas had avoided giving us Vader backstory entirely, our own imaginations would have been more than sufficient at keeping Vader a truly frightening Dark Lord of the Sith, even after the helmet removal in Return of the Jedi.
James Bond never got an original story until 40 years after he was created, even then, it doesn't go into detail (2006 Casino Royale). Meaning we don't see him as a child, then at school, then in the Navy, then signing up for the MI6. We cut to the chase with his required double kill in the title sequence.
That should be good enough, and it is, its great in fact, especially when there are 25 EON Bond films. Spiderman gets 3, then they want to redo the origin story again, less than 10 years to the previous trilogy? What short attention spans we have.
Again, look at the Bond Franchise against the argument for a different actor requiring an origin story. We knew who Bond was, when Roger Moore, Dalton etc took over, just give us a new plot. The same can be done with Spiderman by carrying on from the third movie.
Jonathanjk.com
There's no money in creating new stories when people will pay to see what they already know, no matter how bad/bland it is.
Mostly, reboots are either to fix a franchise that became broken (e.g., Batman) or about not having enough money to continue paying the actors in a successful franchise. The relative failure of the third movie and the "origins" concept, plus the large cast means that for X-Men, the reboot is probably for both reasons,.
Even if the actors aren't too expensive, some just want to move on, and another thing the '90s Batman films showed was that you really need actor continuity (although audiences will generally overlook it even for a major part when the actor dies).
"Green Lantern" could be Hollywood's dream, as the comic book has Doctor Who-like reboots built in. So, you can change actors and change the whole tone of the movies, while still being "Green Lantern".
Actually, just about ALL movies lose money (according to their accountants), no matter how much they take in at the box office and in sales. Why? Because of something called Hollywood Accounting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_accounting
Don't kid yourself, studios don't take risks, and when they do it's why they employ a veritable army of people to minimize the risks.