Discuss the Ghostbusters movie that was released in 2016.
#4831478
I read all of the emails I could find relating to the project, it's interesting to say the least how it all went down, and some avenues not taken are kind of disappointing. Even after Feig came on board there are some surprise casting decisions that unfortunately did not go anywhere.

Basically in late 2013 Ivan Reitman sent Sony the latest draft of GHOSTBUSTERS: ALIVE AGAIN. Reitman had Jonah Hill interested, and was trying to court others like Bri Larson, Zach Galifianakis, Charlie Day, Jesse Eisenberg, Sacha Baron Cohen, Rebel Wilson, Aziz Ansari, Aubrey Plaza, etc etc. The initial response was "well it's the best version so far", but overall luke warm, then within a few emails the Sony people start taking apart the script amongst each other, with Reitman popping in once or twice eager to get feedback.

The script is not available, as far as I can tell, so I have no idea if it was good or not, but Jonah Hill apparently passed on it before Christmas without Reitman even knowing, and Hill appeared to be Reitman's sure thing. The details on the script are sparse, I just know that Ray and Egon (or Egan as someone refers to him, surly a typo but I LOLed when I saw it) are dead and now ghosts, though it is not clear if they died before or after the movie starts. There is a girl buster or two, and seems to contain your typical romantic comedy vibe between a couple of them, which the executives agreed seemed out of place or forced.

As an interesting note, Lizzy Caplan very much wanted to be in the movie. Her agent contacts Sony a couple of times to let this be known.

Into the new year, 2014, Sony wants Reitman out as director. They want to encourage him to take a position as producer as they think he will have less power, though it is clear that if they could have it their way they would just fire him completely. They refer to him as old and dated.

On February 22nd they discuss how they need to convince him to step down without upsetting him, as he has the right to block the film from being made and if he feels slighted he can do so at any point.. Harold Ramis dies two days later.

It is unclear if Sony approached Reitman about stepping down, or if Reitman came to this decision on his own, though based on the desires of Sony and Reitman's eventual departure, I am going to assuming they, and the death of Ramis, wore him down. I think the phrase "Ivan done" in a March 7th email implies they talked to him and he conceded. It at the very least makes it clear they knew he was stepping down, and they start scrambling to make a short list for who they want to approach for director. Sony people even wrote some of Reitman's departure press release. The following day Reitman gets wind that Sony has already started contacting other directors to take his place. He thinks this is disrespectful because he had just gone public with his departure, and he was grooming Chris Miller & Phil Lord for the position.

At this point a few directors write in to ask for the job. Most notably would be Zombieland director Ruben Fleischer. Sony seems to think Fleischer can do it, but are still gunning for Chris Miller & Phil Lord. Jake Kasden asks for a sit down, as does Todd Phillips. They also debate if they want to bring up the idea of directing to Brad Bird, but seem to opt out of that idea. Additionally, Nick Stoller, Jared Hess, Michael Dowse, and Craig Gillespie show interest. A CCA agent suggests they look into Jason Bateman, and Seth Rogan throws out the idea of contacting Gore Verbinski. Ruben Fleischer still ain't afraid of no ghosts, and they even considered approaching Max Landis in regards to his treatment that was posted online. They also considered doing a hard R-rated Ghostbusters with Rogan and co., though it would appear their Untitled Christmas movie was preventing them from committing.

Though Feig's name was on the March 7th short list, he was interested in an all-female superhero movie codenamed "Glass Ceiling", which may have actually been a female version of Spiderman. Feig started shooting Spy with Melissa McCarthy around this time and was unavailable to commit to any project. It wasn't until Feig was on his way to Comicon in July 2014 that he asked to read the old GB script. Feig already has his own take on it, and wants to write and direct, and hopefully cast Melissa McCarthy, Emma Stone, Kristen Wiig, and Amy Schemer. Sony seems pretty excited, even wanting to run down to SDCC to speak with him that night. A couple of weeks later Reitman agrees to bring on Feig.

Someone leaks the news of the Feig talks and Sony isn't too happy about it. Feig comments on the backlash.

There is a bit of a back and forth between Sony, Reitman, and Feig about Feig's payment and credit. Reitman does not want Feig to have a producer’s credit as it would interfere with his, and he is also upset that Lee Eisenberg & Gene Stupnitsky were blocked out of the writing room, given the work they have done on the script thus far. Sony is worried that it will get back to Reitman that they initially told Feig they were willing to give him Reitman's producing position. Feig makes it clear that if he is signed on, he does not want Reitman around.

Though nothing but hearsay and conjecture, it is said that Dan Aykroyd is not mad about the direction the studio is taking, and thinks it might be "fun", but a later email confirms he was initially upset, but willing to embraced the new direction.

In late August 2014, things start to get interesting. It is unclear exactly how this came about, or what fueled them to contact Sony, but Joe Russo and Channing Tatum let it be known that they want to develop their own Ghostbusters for Tatum and Chris Pratt. Russo wants the Feig film to live under the umbrella of theirs, creating the expanded universe, and is opened to having Feig direct both films. Sony is excited by this news, and while there is some worry that expanding the universe will interfere with Feig's plans, they consider Feig a director for hire and are not terribly concerned about upsetting him. Despite appearing that they want the Tatum/Pratt film more than the Feig version, they worry that it may be too late as they are "very far down the road with Feig and it would be quite uncomfortable for us to try to slow things down to let them get ahead.", but they confirm they want the Feig version to be under the umbrella of the Tatum universe.

In September the living GBs got together for a reunion photo, and Amy Pascal was present. She had Feig send her a quick write up of his vision to pitch to the boys, which is about an executed inmate becoming a powerful ghost after lightning strikes the electric chair. The majority of the film will be the origin story, with the official formation of the Ghostbusters not taking place until the end of the film. The Ghostbusters will be under the umbrella of the government, and a secret organization.

Not long after, Reitman starts having second thoughts on Feig's vision, most notably the reboot aspect. He wants the film to acknowledge the originals, to exist in the same universe. Pascal does not seem interested in this, though producer Michael De Luca thinks linking the film's to the originals makes more sense under the expanded universe.

In October 2014, Ryan Gosling approaches Sony to say he wants to be in Ghostbusters. Sony seems pretty thrilled by the idea, and forwards it to Feig, who has been in talks with Gosling himself. There is some talk about having Gosling star opposite of Emma Stone, a reunion of sorts. Stone wants to do it, and she is everyone's, including Feig's, first choice for lead. It is not clear why this did not work out.

Reitman becomes increasingly concerned over the use of the word "reboot". Feig is to announce his version later that day, and Reitman wants to block the use of the word "reboot" from the official announcement. He also feels like he is being cast as an antagonist to Feig, which he does not appreciate. To calm him, Pascal suggests Reitman head a branding company to act as a hub for everything Ghostbusters related. Presumably this becomes Ghost Crops. Despite Reitman’s efforts, it is too late to stop the announcement, and Feig tweets about the Ghostbusters reboot later that day. Reitman is pissed, and Pascal tries to blame the wording on the media.

Pascal convinces Reitman that she is having a meeting with Feig about presumably turning the direction of the film away from a reboot, but it appears the meeting is to hear out what Feig and the rest of the crew want to do without Reitman being there to interrupt.

Towards the end of October, Feig, Pascal, and Reitman have had a sit down meeting and Reitman has conceded to Feig's vision. Reitman has agreed that he will offer his advice, but they do not have to listen to anything he suggests, nor will he stand in their way.

By mid-November, Reitman appears to have had a change of heart, and the producers and Sony people scramble to get a meeting with him ASAP. Presumably they are trying to work out a deal with Ivan involving Ghost Corps.

Screenwriter Drew Pearce had been signed onto Sony as part of what I interpret to be a blind script deal (note on that below), and apparently due to Russo’s eagerness to get Tatum busters going, Pearce has already fleshed out a story. Russo says it is awesome, but within the hour Pascal has expressed worry about Feig finding out, and upset they are moving so quickly. The studio and producers agree to slow it down a bit until they are further in it with Feig, presumably until he is too far into it to back out.

So I am not super hip on Hollywood lingo, but as far as I can tell, a blind script deal is just when someone is hired by a studio to write a script, but neither party knows exactly what that script is just yet. Maybe the studio is worried that since they’ve hired Pearce, should Feig find out he could see it as Sony hiring a new scriptwriter, whereas the rest of the Tatum/Russo thing comes off more as Sony being solicited by them. But that interpretation is thrown off a little with the context of a future email, where Pearce is uncomfortable with a blind as he is close with Ghostbusters script writer Katie Dippold (in this context I am having trouble understanding the relevance of a blind as I’ve defined above). Additionally, Russo wants to know what will happen should Feig reject the idea of an expanded universe. Producer Doug Belgrad lays it out to Pascal; It’s not Feig’s decision. Pascal, still panicked, tells them to shut it down.

There are some random emails scattered about that for whatever reason do not always pop up in the search, or in chronological order. The last one, for example, I only found by searching for "Reitman", even though it contains the word "Ghostbusters" in it. So there may be more to find, and often times they just use "GB", but I'll leave that search to someone else for now.
#4831483
I personally would have rather seen a movie with Channing Tatum, Chris Pratt, Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling... and Reitman's first choices were awesome! I'm assuming the secret Christmas movie was The Interview... that was a complete train wreck for Sony...
#4831485
No idea why Stone and Gosling did not work out. At first I thought maybe she got booked for Inferno instead, which was her and the studios second choice for her, but that didn't happen, and as far as I can tell she has nothing booked for a while now.

Found evidence that they were interested in Pratt and James Gunn before approaching Feig, but it is not clear if they even asked them.
#4831487
Thanks so much for posting this timeline! I have been combing through the emails myself and considered doing something like this but I really couldn't figure out the best way to get it organized. I know how much work this took, so thanks THROWING CHICKEN!

I took a few things away from all of this. First off, Hollywood seems like the worst. No wonder it took them 25 years to figure out how to get a new Ghostbusters movie out there. It is pretty evident that they were not happy with the Etan Cohen scripts and they were moving away from wanting Ivan on as a director big time. I would love to get a chance to read Alive Again, as it does seem to have a few interesting ideas in there. Hopefully that will see the light of day eventually.

Though I have been a pretty big supporter of what Feig is doing with the franchise, some of the other ideas being tossed around were definitely interesting. I really like ZombieLand a lot and I think Ruben would have done something fun with Ghostbusters. I was really surprised about the Seth Rogen stuff as letting Ghostbusters become a hard R comedy would have been a first as far as major franchises go. I think it could have been great though and with the way they are talking about this expanded universe, I wouldn't be surprised if we see something like that eventually.

I am VERY HAPPY that Todd Phillips has nothing to do with this. Old School and Hangover are great, but the last two Hangover's were not good, and I would be very nervous with him handling GB's.

Phil Lord and Chris Miller on the other hand...let's just hope they end up directing Tatum Busters.

As far as casting goes, Ryan Gosling could still turn up in this thing, either with Feig or the Tatum-Busters. I was pretty confident that Emma Stone was going to end up in this movie and I find it curious that it didn't work out. I know she's close with Bill Murray these days, maybe he got in her ear? (probably not but you never know) Lizzie Caplan would have been a good casting choice for the reboot but I don't think she would be any better than Kate McKinnon. Assuming that Wiig and McCarthy were always going to be a part of this film, the only wildcard in my opinion is Leslie Jones. She is funny on SNL but unproven on film. I hope she knocks it out of the park, we will know soon enough.

I think the likely scenario right now is that Paul Feig's movie will do very well and will be a good launching pad for the expanded films. Even though Paul keeps saying that his has nothing to do with the other ones, if it does well, Sony is going to figure out how to connect the dots.
#4831488
Well the thing that troubles me is the reboot aspect. I get the impression that the Tatum film wants to be connected with the originals, while Feig does not, and while the Tatum film is the one that wants to build the expanded universe, they seem forced to work within the confines of Feig, who does not seem to want to compromise. While I am sure the script for Alive Again wasn't very good (forget what the studio thinks, Reitman could not get his actors to sign on to it), Reitman was right in championing the sequel over reboot aspect, and it's a shame that he eventually stopped caring.
#4831489
I am sure there are more emails to add. If someone finds one worth adding let me know. I found some with Jonah Hill from as early as November 2013 where he was flattered to be asked to take part.

Also I was kind of shocked by how Reitman was treated. I kind of expected Aykroyd to be the one hold out, I did not expect to see Reitman, little by little have the power stripped out of his hands.
#4831490
There's only so much pressure Reitman can take, especially since Sony is trying so hard to push him away... I'm pretty sure Harold Ramis' death was the biggest deciding factor for Reitman to start slowly stepping back, but Sony is definitely doing their best to rush the process...
#4831491
I think the reason that the reboot aspect doesn't bother me is because I accepted a long time ago that Bill was done with Ghostbusters. When Harold dies though, it just felt like that really closed the book on the first two films. I just didn't want to see a half hearted new team of Ghostbusters with Dan and Ernie cameos.

My prediction for now is that the reboot is going to surprise some people and others will dismiss it without seeing it at all, and that's okay. Feig has a track record of success and Spy is getting rave reviews and tons of buzz. In some ways, the success of the reboot could be the thing that opens the door to more films which may or may not be connected to gb1 and 2.

I do feel bad for Reitman though. You could tell he was loosing his grip on the franchise and there was little that could be done at that point.
#4831492
I'll be honest, I've enjoyed Feig's past movies, I just don't think it's fitting for the Ghostbusters, and also the fact that all of his movies are essentially the same... The trailer for Spy alone made me cringe thinking that he will most likely be making Ghostbusters in the same fashion as all of his past movies, and it's becoming quite old, especially Melissa McCarthy, and the amount of "F-bombs" dropped in the trailer alone was cringe-worthy... I can definitely see Kristin Wiig delivering, but I don't know what to expect from Kate and Leslie... Kate is funny in SNL with her impersonations, but I can't judge her yet since I've never seen her play something completely her own... I really don't like Leslie Jones, her comedy just comes off as rude and unfunny... I'm crossing my fingers hoping that McCarthy can deliver something new, because I know she's capable of it, but I think Feig will want her to play the same character she's always played in his movies, and that's just sad...

Ultimately, the emails still make me believe that Feig is delusional, and maybe even confused, Sony is evil, and Reitman is fed-up... and I don't even know what Aykroyd is thinking...
#4831507
I think I read that Stone was out because she committed to a lengthy run of Cabaret that ran through filming

And I read Gosling was interested in being a leader of an opposing team (like Ron and the Ghost Smashers from the comics) which doesn't seem to exist in the reboot
#4832285
Thanks ThrowingChicken. That write-up was very illuminating.

I won't lie. This sounds like a lot of people running around like chickens with their heads cut off. This is the sort of thing that can happen with too many people with too many ideas and too many diifferent wants and needs all trying to somehow work together in a cohesive way when no one has an actual vision for what they want this to be, besides "successful."

Basically, they could make a lot of their problems go away by scrapping the "shared universe" idea and letting the movies be stand-alone adventures. They won't do that though, because shared universes are "the thing."

I predict the shared-universe pushback is coming our way, maybe sooner then we thought it was (interesting piece about the worrying way Justice Legue is being handled: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/s ... ce=twitter) and we'll just have to see who's left standing at the end of it. We might get a fun movie, but I predict this "shared universe" just won't happen unless something seriously changes.
#4832464
Seems like Pascal's effort to shut Tatumbusters down were not strong enough. 15 days after she resigned as Sony CEO, Reitman told Deadline everything about Ghostcorps and the male reboot. Plus, on his Twitter profile, Drew Pearce was answering every kind of Gb questions. He didn't confirmed or denied anything...but surely he said he's writing a script for a Gb movie.
#4832483
Raystantz Italy wrote:Seems like Pascal's effort to shut Tatumbusters down were not strong enough. 15 days after she resigned as Sony CEO, Reitman told Deadline everything about Ghostcorps and the male reboot. Plus, on his Twitter profile, Drew Pearce was answering every kind of Gb questions. He didn't confirmed or denied anything...but surely he said he's writing a script for a Gb movie.

Hey Raystanz Italy, I wanted to know what your opinion on the basic outline of the reboot was. I personally didn't really enjoy reading the outline so I can't imagine the actual film to be much better. Of course they have not started to film yet so anything could change on paper. As the story stands do you think the film has a shot at being good or do you feel it will fail, and if it fails do you think it will hurt the Tatumbusters shot at going into production? Just wanted to hear another fans thoughts. :):):)
#4832510
From what I saw the "original and funny origin story" that Feig is directing is only a poor and lame rehash of the first movie. I don't think it will fail and i don't think it will be a huge success that will help the franchise. It will be another Robocop 2014. But they want an expanded universe so Tatumbusters will be in production no matter what happens to Feigbusters. I hope it will be a sequel a la Jurassic World.
#4832538
Raystantz Italy wrote:But they want an expanded universe so Tatumbusters will be in production no matter what happens to Feigbusters. I hope it will be a sequel a la Jurassic World.
I'm less enthusiastic about the idea of making it a sequel just for the sake of making it a sequel. I hope someone finds an actual STORY they want want to tell, rather then just re-telling the origin.

What we are starting to see with the DC thing and even (to a smaller extent) Marvel is that the "expanded universe" thing can backfire, because it requires people who are not creatives to make creative decisions. It turns feature films into $150+ million dollar episodes, with studio suits in the role of Showrunners. That's how you get things like five screenwriters competing against each-other to write the first act of "Wonder Woman" or the Aquaman screenwriter who finished his draft, only to be told "the rules of the universe have changed" and his work was no longer usable. One thing that's not in doubt is NO ONE has any idea what they want this universe to be.

Even Marvel is starting to show it's cracks. "Agents of Shield" had to deal with Shield being destroyed in the second Captain America movie, which lead to confusing plot-lines about SHIELD splinter-groups, cloning... and the demands the 'expanded universe' put on Joss Whedon became so intense that finally he had to throw up his hands and leave his dream job to the Russo Brothers. We don't know why Edgar Wright left either, since Ant Man had been his passion project from the beginning, but the signs are pointing towards Marvel's behemoth possibly becoming just too big to hold together.

Sony doesn't even have DC's level of guidance. They want an expanded universe but don't have a single person working on figuring out a direction for it. Its a recipe for disaster.
#4832541
M.Thunder wrote:
Raystantz Italy wrote:But they want an expanded universe so Tatumbusters will be in production no matter what happens to Feigbusters. I hope it will be a sequel a la Jurassic World.
I'm less enthusiastic about the idea of making it a sequel just for the sake of making it a sequel. I hope someone finds an actual STORY they want want to tell, rather then just re-telling the origin.

What we are starting to see with the DC thing and even (to a smaller extent) Marvel is that the "expanded universe" thing can backfire, because it requires people who are not creatives to make creative decisions. It turns feature films into $150+ million dollar episodes, with studio suits in the role of Showrunners. That's how you get things like five screenwriters competing against each-other to write the first act of "Wonder Woman" or the Aquaman screenwriter who finished his draft, only to be told "the rules of the universe have changed" and his work was no longer usable. One thing that's not in doubt is NO ONE has any idea what they want this universe to be.

Even Marvel is starting to show it's cracks. "Agents of Shield" had to deal with Shield being destroyed in the second Captain America movie, which lead to confusing plot-lines about SHIELD splinter-groups, cloning... and the demands the 'expanded universe' put on Joss Whedon became so intense that finally he had to throw up his hands and leave his dream job to the Russo Brothers. We don't know why Edgar Wright left either, since Ant Man had been his passion project from the beginning, but the signs are pointing towards Marvel's behemoth possibly becoming just too big to hold together.

Sony doesn't even have DC's level of guidance. They want an expanded universe but don't have a single person working on figuring out a direction for it. Its a recipe for disaster.

I agree with you there. Judging from the leaked emails they really have a hard time communicating with one another. You would think with one of there biggest franchises they would want to have a well thought out plan rather than throwing things at the wall to see what sticks. I still can't believe they are seriously considering an MIB 22 Jump Street crossover. What is going on?
#4832605
I'm starting to see it as a sort of funny "What if?". A different version that will never surpass or delete our beloved original. Something that the filmakers are making for their fun.
It's like Marvel starts making House of M or Earth X movies.
#4832839
philmorgan81 wrote: I still can't believe they are seriously considering an MIB 22 Jump Street crossover. What is going on?
Money, profit specifically, is what is going on.

They are not necessarily worried about the "quality" of a movie. They want to make money. MIB3 made 3 times it's budget at the box office and 22 Jump Street 5 times its budget. For a movie to break even, they typically have to make 2 times their budget at the box office (since theater's get 50% of the ticket sale).

I'd go see it lol. It's enough of a ridiculous gimmick that would get me into a threater. Kinda like going to a carnival and paying to see a "bearded lady" or "world's largest rat" or some other sideshow attraction.
#4832867
I do get the impression that Sony does care about the quality they are putting out, I just question if they are out of touch. They refer to the Harry Potter movies as "original", many of them seem to think the last two Spider-man films were sequels to the Raimi ones, and they are so desperate to keep arbitrary deadlines that they don't slow down enough to properly fit the pieces together. If they would stop to take a breath they might actually be able to pull everything together.

Consider this: By the time Ghostbusters comes out, Disney will have already delivered one Star Wars sequel, with two more coming less than a year later, and they will all be in-universe. But for whatever reason Sony can't figure out how to tie one movie to an already existing franchise.
#4832883
I definitely think that ThrowingChicken is correct in saying that Sony is a bit out of touch. I think the root of the issue with Ghostbusters 3 is that we had Dan Aykroyd and Ivan Reitman spending about 5 years trying to crack a story, bringing in screenwriters to mold and revise scripts, that from what as been reported, were all basically the same. Ghostbusters are long gone, nobody remembers them, new group comes in, passing the torch etc.

We would be in a much different position right now if a creative mind outside of Aykroyd and Reitman would have taken control and moved forward with a new vision. (I think that we all can agree that the best thing that could have happened in the Star Wars universe was getting away from George Lucas and passing it over to JJ Abrams and Kathleen Kennedy.)

Now Paul Feig is coming into this with great intentions and a different vision. It might not be what a lot of people were expecting or hoping for, but it is different. I think the Bill Murray factor weighed heavily on all of this. They wanted Bill for so long and it was always a pipe dream. If the script was out of this world, Lord and Miller would be doing it, no doubt in my mind.
#4833067
Paul Fieg is a wildly talented guy with a great track record. The cast he's assembled contains some of the funniest people working today... of either gender. The movie he's got in mind is probably going to be good... but I think he was sincere when he said his inspiration was to remake the first movie with funny women in the lead roles.... and that was it. He wasn't thinking about a giant media-spanning universe, just one funny movie with his favorite actors in it. That's what he signed on for.

Meanwhile Sony was emailing each-other about how this is going to be "our Marvel" and how it can have TV shows, action figures, spin-off movies and sequels... a whole expanded universe. Except just one thing is missing: an actual vision for that universe. What are the rules? Who inhabits this world? How do they all fit together? What's the tone we are going for?

This is the problem with Marvel's machine making 7 billion dollars worldwide. When Marvel revealed it's Avengers-centric plan, nobody really believed it could be done. Now the pendulum has turned the other way and Sony, Warner Brothers, and everyone else believes that if your studio ISN'T working on a giant inter-connected cinematic universe, you are leaving money on the table, you are making a mistake, you NEED this.

And they ignore that we've been making movies for 100+ years now and so far, the only people who have successfully implemented the Marvel plan... is Marvel. And even then, it's not clear how much staying power Marvel's world is going to have. Eventually we are going to reach superhero over-saturation, and when we do, the backlash will be powerful and unforgiving.

This too will pass. I'd like to believe Marvel themselves will survive and get to keep making the films they seem to genuinely love making, and we know there is always going to be a market for a big colorful superhero action movie, but with the tv shows and the Netflix shows and the features all going through different producers, there's a very real danger of things flying off the rails.

In a way this was why I loved "Daredevil" so much. I'd almost forgotten how great it was to just ignore the bigger world and focus on one hero for a while. We already know they can scale up, can they scale DOWN when they have to to survive the lean times without throwing everything out and rebooting the whole thing? Keeping the universe grounded is a must if it's going to have staying power.

Who's willing to bet nobody at Sony, in their urgency to have their own movie universe, is thinking like this?
#4833070
M.Thunder wrote:Paul Fieg is a wildly talented guy with a great track record. The cast he's assembled contains some of the funniest people working today... of either gender. The movie he's got in mind is probably going to be good... but I think he was sincere when he said his inspiration was to remake the first movie with funny women in the lead roles.... and that was it. He wasn't thinking about a giant media-spanning universe, just one funny movie with his favorite actors in it. That's what he signed on for.

Meanwhile Sony was emailing each-other about how this is going to be "our Marvel" and how it can have TV shows, action figures, spin-off movies and sequels... a whole expanded universe. Except just one thing is missing: an actual vision for that universe. What are the rules? Who inhabits this world? How do they all fit together? What's the tone we are going for?

This is the problem with Marvel's machine making 7 billion dollars worldwide. When Marvel revealed it's Avengers-centric plan, nobody really believed it could be done. Now the pendulum has turned the other way and Sony, Warner Brothers, and everyone else believes that if your studio ISN'T working on a giant inter-connected cinematic universe, you are leaving money on the table, you are making a mistake, you NEED this.

And they ignore that we've been making movies for 100+ years now and so far, the only people who have successfully implemented the Marvel plan... is Marvel. And even then, it's not clear how much staying power Marvel's world is going to have. Eventually we are going to reach superhero over-saturation, and when we do, the backlash will be powerful and unforgiving.

This too will pass. I'd like to believe Marvel themselves will survive and get to keep making the films they seem to genuinely love making, and we know there is always going to be a market for a big colorful superhero action movie, but with the tv shows and the Netflix shows and the features all going through different producers, there's a very real danger of things flying off the rails.

In a way this was why I loved "Daredevil" so much. I'd almost forgotten how great it was to just ignore the bigger world and focus on one hero for a while. We already know they can scale up, can they scale DOWN when they have to to survive the lean times without throwing everything out and rebooting the whole thing? Keeping the universe grounded is a must if it's going to have staying power.

Who's willing to bet nobody at Sony, in their urgency to have their own movie universe, is thinking like this?
I agree with you there. Yeah didn't Kevin Feig map out the Mavel universe in phases? Yeah I think they are starting phase 3 or something right now. I don't think Sony has anyone that has that kind of plan. :):):)
#4833074
Feig promised to make an "original and very funny movie". From the premise who was leaked some weeks ago, his movie is just a lameand loosy remake of the first movie with poor nods to the original movies to keep the fanbase calm and away from his throat (the gbs are shown a firehouse but they can't afford it; they have a white hearse, their first bust is a green fat mafia ghost , at the end they battle a giant ghost. How original!!!!) He promised new and original carachters to avoid any comparison with the Fab Four....and yet we have an Egon (Mc Kinnon who builded a PKE meter) a Ray (Mc Carthy who believe and love working in the paranormal field), a Peter (Wiig who is embarrassed by his past work on ghosts) and a Winston (Jones, who is the everyday man and does the heavy work. And she's black like Ernie Hudson). So: no original story and no original carachters. This movie will be funny to watch but not strong enough to relaunch a franchise. Reitman know this and formed Ghost corps to revitalize GB the way he always wanted to, before Pascal and Sony took his baby away from his hands.

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