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D&D Movie Moves Forward With Deal With Former Marvel Exec Jeremy Latcham
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<blockquote data-quote="Chaosmancer" data-source="post: 7987514" data-attributes="member: 6801228"><p>I don't disagree with your point, but there are some big differences here. </p><p></p><p>First off, copying GotG is nothing like what Universal tried to do. GotG could easily have worked as a stand alone movie with no cinematic universe. Now, I haven't seen the Mummy from this attempt, but I did hear about it, and I think that there is a good lesson to be learned from it.</p><p></p><p>You should make stand alone movies that have the potential to tie-in with a Universe, not what Mummy reportedly did, which was throw a whole bunch at audiences assuming they would be okay not understanding until later movies came out. Actually, a good example of an MCU movie that Mummy was trying to emulate would be Captain Marvel. See, Captain Marvel has a lot of elements that were not explained in the movie (Nick Fury, SHIELD, the Tesseract) but that was fine because those elements were defined in previous movies that the audience was expected to have seen. The Mummy took the Captain Marvel approach without doing the homework, and I agree, the DnD movie shouldn't do that. </p><p></p><p></p><p>Now, Suicide squad is a much more apt thing to look at, and I think actually, it holds some very important lessons. </p><p></p><p>Suicide Squad had a lot of issues, but a big one that actually applies to the making of a movie like GotG or DnD is that the cast was actually too big. We had Deadshot, Quinn, Katana, Captain Boomerang, Diablo, Killer Croc, Enchantress, Flag, Slipknot just as members of the squad, ignoring Enchantress' Brother, Waller, and Joker. That is 9 members, plus three other important named characters.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Look at the Guardians. Starlord, Gamora, Rocket, Groot, Drax. Five people. More villains actually, with Ronin, Nebula, Yandu, and the Collector. But their entire named cast is actually the same size as the Suicide Squad team. </p><p></p><p>Now, second point, what do we actually know about these characters? Guardians gives us Quinn's story. That is actually our focus throughout most of the movie. What do we know about Gamora? Her dad is Thanos and she doesn't like him. She gets a bit of focus towards the end as a love interest, but not a lot. No flashbacks. Rocket? He is a racoon, was experimented on. No flashbacks. Groot? Plant thing, we don't even know how he and Rocket met. Drax? Ronin killed his family and he is out for revenge. We actually meet him the latest, after everyone else is in jail. But the story progresses pretty evenly. We start with Quinn, get Quinn's story, then Gamora shows up, along with Rocket and Groot, and they start fighting with minimal backstory and the rest of the movie just proceeds with the current action, not with telling us who they were. </p><p></p><p>Now, it has been a minute since I've seen suicide squad, but I remember it starts with Waller telling us there will be a team. Then, what do they do? They proceed to give us flashbacks and backstories for everyone. Deadshot was an assassin for hire, he has a daughter he loves very much, he was taken out by batman. Harley Quinn was the lover of the Joker, here are scenes of them together, she was taken out by batman. Here is Diablo's story and flahsbacks of his power and what he can do. Here is Captain Boomerang and the scene of him being taken out by the Flash, here is Killer Croc and his story. Here is Sorceress and Flag and their whole story. Each character is given far more screen time and instead of helping, it hurts the story by bogging it down. </p><p></p><p>And, think about this. Let us list off the locations of Guardians. </p><p>The planet Quinn gets the stone on, The Nova planet, the Jail station, Knowhere, and then back to Nova Planet for a big climatic battle. </p><p></p><p>What were the locations for Suicide Squad?</p><p>The Jail. The city where everything else happens. </p><p></p><p>While with the Guardians you can think of at least one set of actions or important events with each location, can you do that for suicide squad in the same way? Does anything actually important happen in the jail other than flashbacks? </p><p></p><p></p><p>And this ties in with what the biggest problem was. Suicide told you what the story was. Guardians told a story. They showed these characters and didn't do a bunch of flashbacks or big focuses on their backstories except where it was important to the plot. Suicide squad deluged you with the backstories of half a dozen characters before you even knew what the plot was. </p><p></p><p>So, the DnD movie should actually look to both movies. One as an example that worked well, one that worked poorly, and try to learn from them</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Chaosmancer, post: 7987514, member: 6801228"] I don't disagree with your point, but there are some big differences here. First off, copying GotG is nothing like what Universal tried to do. GotG could easily have worked as a stand alone movie with no cinematic universe. Now, I haven't seen the Mummy from this attempt, but I did hear about it, and I think that there is a good lesson to be learned from it. You should make stand alone movies that have the potential to tie-in with a Universe, not what Mummy reportedly did, which was throw a whole bunch at audiences assuming they would be okay not understanding until later movies came out. Actually, a good example of an MCU movie that Mummy was trying to emulate would be Captain Marvel. See, Captain Marvel has a lot of elements that were not explained in the movie (Nick Fury, SHIELD, the Tesseract) but that was fine because those elements were defined in previous movies that the audience was expected to have seen. The Mummy took the Captain Marvel approach without doing the homework, and I agree, the DnD movie shouldn't do that. Now, Suicide squad is a much more apt thing to look at, and I think actually, it holds some very important lessons. Suicide Squad had a lot of issues, but a big one that actually applies to the making of a movie like GotG or DnD is that the cast was actually too big. We had Deadshot, Quinn, Katana, Captain Boomerang, Diablo, Killer Croc, Enchantress, Flag, Slipknot just as members of the squad, ignoring Enchantress' Brother, Waller, and Joker. That is 9 members, plus three other important named characters. Look at the Guardians. Starlord, Gamora, Rocket, Groot, Drax. Five people. More villains actually, with Ronin, Nebula, Yandu, and the Collector. But their entire named cast is actually the same size as the Suicide Squad team. Now, second point, what do we actually know about these characters? Guardians gives us Quinn's story. That is actually our focus throughout most of the movie. What do we know about Gamora? Her dad is Thanos and she doesn't like him. She gets a bit of focus towards the end as a love interest, but not a lot. No flashbacks. Rocket? He is a racoon, was experimented on. No flashbacks. Groot? Plant thing, we don't even know how he and Rocket met. Drax? Ronin killed his family and he is out for revenge. We actually meet him the latest, after everyone else is in jail. But the story progresses pretty evenly. We start with Quinn, get Quinn's story, then Gamora shows up, along with Rocket and Groot, and they start fighting with minimal backstory and the rest of the movie just proceeds with the current action, not with telling us who they were. Now, it has been a minute since I've seen suicide squad, but I remember it starts with Waller telling us there will be a team. Then, what do they do? They proceed to give us flashbacks and backstories for everyone. Deadshot was an assassin for hire, he has a daughter he loves very much, he was taken out by batman. Harley Quinn was the lover of the Joker, here are scenes of them together, she was taken out by batman. Here is Diablo's story and flahsbacks of his power and what he can do. Here is Captain Boomerang and the scene of him being taken out by the Flash, here is Killer Croc and his story. Here is Sorceress and Flag and their whole story. Each character is given far more screen time and instead of helping, it hurts the story by bogging it down. And, think about this. Let us list off the locations of Guardians. The planet Quinn gets the stone on, The Nova planet, the Jail station, Knowhere, and then back to Nova Planet for a big climatic battle. What were the locations for Suicide Squad? The Jail. The city where everything else happens. While with the Guardians you can think of at least one set of actions or important events with each location, can you do that for suicide squad in the same way? Does anything actually important happen in the jail other than flashbacks? And this ties in with what the biggest problem was. Suicide told you what the story was. Guardians told a story. They showed these characters and didn't do a bunch of flashbacks or big focuses on their backstories except where it was important to the plot. Suicide squad deluged you with the backstories of half a dozen characters before you even knew what the plot was. So, the DnD movie should actually look to both movies. One as an example that worked well, one that worked poorly, and try to learn from them [/QUOTE]
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