Wait, they named Cap4 "Brave New World" and failed to actually address totalitarianism?

[cashew]

So...let me get this straight: Some brilliant egg-head at MCU studios decided to name the fourth Captain America movie after Huxley's late-stage capitalist dystopian novel and went the route of government conspiracy instead of mega-corporate hostile takeover of the state apparatus?

Like...seriously?

Wow. What a wasted opportunity.

OTOH, I guess no one really wants to see their superhero movie reflecting the reality they live in and be reminded of the fact that superheroes don't exist IRL and you can't punch fascism into submission when your fellow countrymen are overwhelmingly rallying behind it.

But still. What a waste.

Comments

[tanithryudo]

LOL, there is a reason Cap4 has ~50% rotten score in rotten tomatoes.

Sounds like it would've been better off as a Hulk movie or Falcon movie.

[cashew]

Yeah, I mean I don't think there's anything that can really save a Hulk movie. I think the Hulk concept just doesn't really work for the modern movie-goer. I think the Jekyll-Hyde concept and the monster romance angle have all been made kind of obsolete unless the movie is willing to actually make Hulk the victim rather than the hero, in which case...y'know, it's not why people ware watching a superhero movie.

As for a Falcon movie, yes, Falcon!Cap doesn't have nearly enough attention. The whole point of Falcon!Cap is supposed to be a form of AA fantasy, the power fantasy where minority represents American instead of stereotypical White Man. But they didn't exactly lean into that aspect either.

Anyway, haven't actually watched the movie yet, but the trailer was already raising warning flags.

[tanithryudo]

I had so much fun watching reviews on it (and other sucky movies like the recent Condor Heroes and Creation of the Gods 2) on bilibil. Youtube even has reviews lambasting Cap4. It'll certainly cure you of any urge at going to see the movie / MCU in general these days.

[cashew]

I feel like movies in general have been a let down on the whole in recent years. MCU in specific just kind of killed everything with End Game by ret-conning Steve Rogers' entire character.

Meanwhile, just (┬┬﹏┬┬) emotions when it comes to Chinese movies in general because they all suck so hard. Except 哪吒2, which is getting good reviews. While I love animation, geebus we need live action movies to not suck so hard. I mean, yeah, censorship, but, again, then why 哪吒2 is able to not suck? Like blaming censorship only goes so far, most of the problem is script writers are ass.

[tanithryudo]

More likely to be a problem with the industry. Isn't it usually the case that bad movies are often suspected of washing money? Also, it seems like idols (and their backers) tend to have the ability to warp movies/shows to favor them, uncaring of what it does to the plot. (This also happens in US industry too...like with Patrick Stewart and the TNG movies.)

Cartoons are less likely to fall in to this bucket because there's less leeway to wash money and there are no (human) idols involved.

[cashew]

Sometimes I wonder how much of this is driven by the idol and how much of it is driven by media execs who have zero conception of artistic merit and can only see dollar signs (or yuan signs) when it comes to a hot actor. Like, I doubt Patrick Stewart demanded in his contract that TNG franchise has to go in whatever direction to satisfy some kind of ego boost. More like the production logistics wanted to rely on the star power to pull in more audience and forgot that the only reason the stars even have that power is because of the quality of the script supporting said star.

And I won't say cartoons are any less prone to the money washing (you still have to hire voice actors and CG artists, etc.). I just feel like there might be a little more not-giving-a-shit when it comes to cartoons because the adults in the room are treating it as a "kiddie" product and that lack of seriousness ends up allowing creative minds to take a slightly more advanced position in the creation process. (Mind, a lot of cartoons are still suck, but it's in a sweet spot of "not serious" media and not so funds-suckingly-huge like a lot of AAA videogame investment that the only concern is how to make money back. So there ends up being room to be "arty"...)

[tanithryudo]

With regards to Patrick Stewart specifically, I know that during TNG Insurrection, he demanded to add action hero-y role/scenes (I dunno, I guess to play out a mid-life crisis or something?). Later on Nemesis being completely centered around him (and the villain also played by him) is also a pretty clear sign of his impact on the script.

Though, I think the other problem with the TNG movies was that they didn't start off with a good script, and then start filming the movie. But that because of the worth of the IP, the corporate side scheduled the filming of the movie, and then set about looking for a script. In that case, it would be much easier for the core actors to impact a script that probably was still a tentative or WIP at the time.

With CN movies/idols, I don't know if the same could apply. On the one hand, the Condor Heros trilogy and Investiture of the Gods all have primary written sources, as well as previous adaptations. So it's not like there isn't at least a baseline for any script. But the end result still manages to be completely horrible in addition to going off script (and off-history).

With regards to idols, yeah, we can definitely see the impact. Not going to talk about the star in Condor, but the main female actress is supposedly also a newbie with big industry backing, and thus why she's cast as Huang Rong in a role that most reviewers say is completely unsuited to her and ruins the characterization of HR. While Creation of the Gods didn't have existing big stars, one of the criticisms is that the director is using the movie to raise certain actors/actresses (and also related to his/their political stances). And because of that, the overall plot and previous characterizations are sacrificed in order to raise his new "stars" to the pedestal.

> And I won't say cartoons are any less prone to the money washing (you still have to hire voice actors and CG artists, etc.).

Eh...Voice actors are cheap unless you hire big name actors do to the voices. Then CG art isn't cheap or easy, especially nowadays the 3D kind. You should watch some of the behind the scenes interviews from the various animation studios that helped produce Ne Zha 2.

SFX/CGI in general is also something where the audience can actually *see* if the money has been spent on the visuals. It's why the horrible meme with Creation 2's glowing blue guy is being mocked by everyone and part of why CotG2 is being accused of washing money.

[cashew]

RE: money washing - CG is part of the reason why animation can still be used for money washing, precisely because it's costly. Money washing (or better known as money laundering in the West) is the process of turning illegal money into legal money, by spending the illegal money on production then bring in legal money through revenue. It's less concerned with making the cost back precisely because the money was ill-gotten in the first place.

Now I know the accusation is often levied at shitty production for seemingly not caring about making the money back due to the heavy investment, but that's mostly describing what seems to be an incomprehensible scenario where investors seem happy to pour billions into a project without worrying about producing a quality product that can actually sell. This explanation presumes the investors have enough artistic vision to recognize the stuff they produce is crap, which isn't an assumption I share. I mentioned that animation is just as prone to the money laundering because there are just as many high investment animation flops and by the money laundering logic, those products are just as likely money laundering projects, yet seem to get no such accusations.

I honestly think the real problem has less to do with the actors being demanding or directors trying to push their personal favorites and everything to do with a revenue-driven model, where the intention isn't to make a good product but just a product that produces profit. If audiences are willing to keep watching crap, then production companies will just keep producing crap. It doesn't matter if reviews are crap if the movies keep making back their cost.

I mean given the rave reviews Creation of the Gods got initially, I think the lack of audience discernment and government subsidies to domestic film production regardless of artistic merit is the real culprit (at least in Chinese film industry).

[tanithryudo]

> everything to do with a revenue-driven model

Hm... But as last year's low spending on movies have shown, does that model work in the long term? After all, people also have the option to not watch shitty movies at all and just spend the money on, like, food or something.

> I mean given the rave reviews Creation of the Gods got initially

I figure most of those (at least in CN) are paid reviews. The ones outside CN are because foreigners don't know better and at least by pure Hollywood standards, CotG2 isn't...horrible.

[cashew]

But as last year's low spending on movies have shown, does that model work in the long term?

I mean how many, numerically, movies are made at a loss? How many made a profit? Crush the production cost low enough and even a moderate box office can make the money back, especially when you work in cost of purchasing rights to broadcast said movies in theaters and, more importantly, the right to add said movie to subscription services' libraries. A movie just has to exist to boost the library size so the subscription service can sell their subscriptions regardless of the quality. If subscribers keep purchasing based on how many movies are in the library rather than how good the library quality is (which is the majority of these subscribers), then there will always be a market for low quality movies.

Like, there are so, so many crappy movies made in Hollywood with the intention of not making money in the box office but rather to serve as filler movies for TV stations to put on air during low-demand time slots to generate ad revenue.

And no one can say how long this type of revenue driven decision making can last, seeing as MCU seems to keep pushing out complete crap for going on four years now but still has the funds to keep going. The narrative of movie industry is dying has been going on for at least a decade at this point, yet movie expense have only gone up despite meh box office sales.

I figure most of those (at least in CN) are paid reviews.

I mean, at this point, it's practically a cottage industry to either praise or criticize crappy movies. I suspect there are some behind the scene deals being made to make all this spin into more money. The movie isn't even important anymore, the eyeballs from looking up praise/criticism of whatever big name movie probably makes more money than the movie itself.