Yeah, I know Trek has a niche audience, but given how many poor sequels outgross their predecessors and Star Trek II's positive reputation, I remember being surprised after reading the box-office totals for the old Trek films. Some have said that if TWOK had been considered a failure back in 1982 we wouldn't have gotten TNG. But it seems that the film was only modistly successful, and that resulted in rather limited budgets for the subsequent movies. It seems hard to believe that TMP sold more tickets in the United States than any Trek film until the reboot. What factors (if any) do you think limited TWOK's financial success?
Why wasn't TWOK more commercially successful?
- Thread starter Captain Worf
- Start date
TMP got a lot of the general audience intrigued about a "reunion movie", but on the scale of "2001". The first "Star Wars" movie ran for over fourteen months in the cinemas, and suddenly here was yet another SF blockbuster. Here Down Under, TMP ran in city cinemas for over six months, then began a tour of suburbs and country towns.
By the time ST II came along, films were opening in more cinemas, but for shorter runs.
It was the blockbuster business of ST IV that caused Paramount to seek a new weekly ST series.
But highly profitable, since its budget was tiny compared to TMP, had no carry-over of debt from "Phase II", and reused so many sets, models, and stock footage from TMP. It was also produced by the television arm of Paramount, with a lesser-known director, and was originally intended to be a telemovie, with potential for an international feature release in cinemas, just like "Duel", "Battlestar Galactica" "Buck Rogers" and "Mission Galactica: The Cylon Attack".
Sure. Why spend more, when less equals more reliable profit ratios?
Yes, yet apparently STIV still sold fewer tickets (at least in the US) than TMP, even though it is considered a success while TMP was considered somewhat of a disappointment. Is this just because Trek IV had a smaller budget? Were the expectations for TMP just very inflated by the success of Star Wars?
TMP came out ten years after TOS ended. There was a lot of build up and people were interested. And at $2.50 for a ticket (with $1 matinees), a lot of us saw TMP over and over and over. At TWOK, I didn't notice as many repeat fans seeing the movie over and over.
The answer is pretty simple. You guys see what movies came out in 1982? Look at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_in_film
TWOK did very well, in a year with an insane number of excellent hits.
The 1980s fucking rocked!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_in_film
TWOK did very well, in a year with an insane number of excellent hits.
The 1980s fucking rocked!
You ain't kiddin'. Poltergeist, The Thing, Blade Runner, E.T. and I know there's a buttload I'm not naming. One hell of a summer.
Indeed they did
I have never heard of TWOK being considered a modest success on any level, especially commercially (given the film's shoestring budget mentioned by Therin above, it would have been smiles all round at Paramount when the TWOK receipts started flowing in).
Let's be honest, apart from the competition, the only thing that might have held back TWOK's box office in comparison to the first film were non-Trekkies who went into TMP expecting another Star Wars, and afterwards probably vowed to never go near Trek again.
the premise of this thread is wrong. As others have pointed out, the budget for TWOK was about a quarter of the budget for TMP, so TWOK was much more profitable.
TWOK was a very solid hit overall. Imagine if this had been the first Trek film. It probably would've crossed the $100 million mark.
TWOK was a very solid hit overall. Imagine if this had been the first Trek film. It probably would've crossed the $100 million mark.
why? I was assuming they went with the same plot as TWOK.
TMP was expensive due to the phase II stuff and the fact that it was basically a big special effects showcase. TWOK by nature of the plot didn't rely heavily on special effects so I don't see how it would've ran to TMP levels of budget.
TMP was expensive due to the phase II stuff and the fact that it was basically a big special effects showcase. TWOK by nature of the plot didn't rely heavily on special effects so I don't see how it would've ran to TMP levels of budget.
Because all of the sets and models would've been done from scratch and charged to TWOK's budget.
Well, do you count the Phase II work towards the TWOK budget like it was counted against TMP's budget?
Plus TWOK does lift several effects shots directly from TMP... the drydock effects, the going to warp effect and the Klingons from the Kobayashi Maru scenario.
No one will ever know except the accountants at Paramount.
Yeah, 1982 was an amazing movie summer. For a Star Trek movie to hold up against the competition as TWOK did it had to be pretty popular.
At that time a movie that really grabbed people could count on more repeat business too. The home video revolution was still in early days, and folks had no expectation that they could pick up a film on tape or disc a couple of months after they saw it at the theater.
At that time a movie that really grabbed people could count on more repeat business too. The home video revolution was still in early days, and folks had no expectation that they could pick up a film on tape or disc a couple of months after they saw it at the theater.
And it's worth noting that both "Blade Runner" and "The Thing" underperformed at the box office. "Khan" did much better by comparison, but "E.T" and "Poltergeist" were the big blockbuster hits that summer.
(Despite being well-regarded now, "The Thing" was actually seen as a flop back in 1982. And "Blade Runner" was nowhere near a hit.)
That's a modern phenomenon. Used to be that except for James Bond, sequels did less than well than their predecessors. Look at any of the major franchises before 2000 or so, and you'll see declining box office, whether we're talking Planet of the Apes or Star Wars.
Then there are movies like Porky's which piled up more than 100 million dollars in box office...
In part, this was a self-fulfilling prophecy. Sequels were seen as lesser goods, cashing in on earlier hits, so studios put less time and money into them.
The Apes films are a perfect example. Fox assumed that each film would do worse than the one before so they kept cutting the budget with each successive film--until finally they couldn't afford to keep making them.
The idea of spending more money on a sequel is a relatively new concept.
Yeah, the old rule of thumb was that a sequel would do about sixty percent of the business of the previous film and they budgeted accordingly.
TWOK was no failure, in fact, It kept the movie series alive.
Originally there was Phase II, which was scrapped late in the pre-production.
Then the "SF movie" run began, Star Wars, CETK, and so on. Each studio looked to see what SF they had "In the pipeline" and greenlighted it. For example, Alien came about due to this.
Since they had a lot of Phase II stuff already built, they decided to make a new Star Trek Movie, this was a hit, but still a semi-disappointment as the cost of the movie production was quite high.
They decided to make a sequel, using a lot of the same sets, some of the same special effects, and put it to a lesser known director, and other costs where lower.
Since the movie was entertaining, it did quite well, and thus it found a sweet spot. Film costs not that great, and while not a blockbuster, doing more then enough to pay the bills. In fact, the massive seccess of first contact ruined the series, as they threw more money at it and Nemesis killed the franchise. Thus they "rebooted"
Originally there was Phase II, which was scrapped late in the pre-production.
Then the "SF movie" run began, Star Wars, CETK, and so on. Each studio looked to see what SF they had "In the pipeline" and greenlighted it. For example, Alien came about due to this.
Since they had a lot of Phase II stuff already built, they decided to make a new Star Trek Movie, this was a hit, but still a semi-disappointment as the cost of the movie production was quite high.
They decided to make a sequel, using a lot of the same sets, some of the same special effects, and put it to a lesser known director, and other costs where lower.
Since the movie was entertaining, it did quite well, and thus it found a sweet spot. Film costs not that great, and while not a blockbuster, doing more then enough to pay the bills. In fact, the massive seccess of first contact ruined the series, as they threw more money at it and Nemesis killed the franchise. Thus they "rebooted"
