"John Carter of Mars" Moving Ahead!

[Temis the Vorta]

Uh-oh. Does Disney have a Conan The Barbarian on its hands?

Hollywood is in a tizzy over the early tracking which just came online this morning for Walt Disney Studios‘ John Carter opening March 9th. “Not good. 2 unaided, 53 aware, 27 definitely interested, 3 first choice,” a senior exec at a rival studio emails me. Another writes me, ”It just came out. Women of all ages have flat out rejected the film. The tracking for John Carter is shocking for a film that cost over $250 million. This could be the biggest writeoff of all time.” I’m hearing figures in the neighborhood of $100 million. And the studio isn’t even trying to spin reports of the 3D pic’s bloated budget any more.

Doesn't suprise me...I just can't buy the kid from Friday Night Lights as John Carter, Civil War veteran.

Plus, for those not familiar with ERB's sci fi series (and that's most folks), "John Carter" is just a dull sounding name, like for an accountant. If they needed to shorten it, they should have kept the "Warlord of Mars" part.

 

[JD]

Hmm, that's not sounding too good. Although the marketing for it so far has kind sucked. Outside of the geek media sites, I haven't really seen alot of mainstream stuff for, other than the super bowl ad.

 

[Harvey]

I'd be very surprised if it opened to Conan: The Barbarian numbers. Disney's advertising push will simply be too great for that to happen. If it's as silly as trailers have made it look so far, though, I could see a big drop off after the opening weekend. Considering the cost, that could be bad news for Disney.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

If I wasn't familiar with the origins of the space opera genre (and few people are), I'd look at it and think, "Star Wars knockoff?" Since Lucas has given Star Wars knockoffs a bad name, that's not what you want to communicate to folks.

 

[Harvey]

It looks more like an attempt to cash in on the success of Avatar than rip-off Star Wars to me. The advertising I've seen has been selling it as a planetary romance, not a space opera.

 

[JD]

Yeah, I was kinda wishing that they would have promoted the pedigree of the story a little more. Basically, just say yeah this is similar to all of those other movies, but that's because all of those movies are based on this story.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

It looks more like an attempt to cash in on the success of Avatar than rip-off Star Wars to me. The advertising I've seen has been selling it as a planetary romance, not a space opera.

The look is more reminiscent of Star Wars, what with the desert arenas and big, slavering monsters...AOTC in particular...not a great image to elicit.

If they wanted to rip off Avatar, they needed a lush, colorful landscape - jungle or maybe underwater coral reef. Of course, ripping off anything is not the goal here, but the audiences won't know that.

 

[Harvey]

Well, it's surely an adaptation of a decades-old work of pulp fiction, but I'd be surprised the huge success of Avatar wasn't something executives at Disney thought the property could capitalize upon.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Yep, but I don't think they should count on audiences to get the connection, just based on the imagery. They might connect it with any number of sci fi extravaganzas, maybe even Trek XI. That had a big monster in it chasing Kirk...

 

[RJDiogenes]

It's bewildering to me that they're calling it John Carter. Historically, Warlord of Mars has been the marketable title of choice. But even John Carter of Mars would have been better, just for the contrast.

 

[Harvey]

Yeah, simply calling the movie John Carter doesn't make much sense to me, either. It suggests nothing of the grand scope of the story, nor does it convey anything of particular specificity to the audience. It's not even a dynamic sounding name!

 

[AvBaur]

I'm afraid it's not going to do very well, too. It's a shame though, because after seeing one of the more recent trailers on the big screen, hearing very good early word of mouth, and reading that long-ass interview with Andrew Stanton on AICN, I'm really looking forward to the movie (and its planned sequels) quite a bit.

The title is certainly a mistake. It just doesn't say anything about the movie and doesn't sond interesting at all to someone unfamiliar with the source material. Also, I don't think it was the best choice to build all the trailers around the white ape arena fight, which to most people just looks like a ripoff of Attack of the Clones of all things.

 

[Warped9]

I don't care what's being said. I'm still keeping my eye on it when it's released.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

From what I've heard the movie itself is pretty good. It's just the marketing that sucks. I've already saved it on Netflix, sight (and reviews) unseen.

 

[Technobuilder]

Guess I'm going to see this knowing almost nothing about the original property its based on as well as next to nothing about the production of the film thus far.

It's just that I've been hearing the name "John Carter of Mars" for literally a decade+ and at this point, I just want to see the damn thing.

Hope it's good.

 

[Enterprise is Great]

Anyone know why they're just calling it John Carter? it doesn't really scream blockbuster. Besides someone might think it's about Noah Wyle's character from ER.

 

[AvBaur]

Apparently, the marketing folks at Disney think people don't wanna see movies with "mars" in the title after Mars Needs Moms flopped.

The director says it's because John Carter doesn't "earn" the "of Mars" moniker until the end of the movie, but that sounds like bs to me.

 

[Gov Kodos]

Apparently, the marketing folks at Disney think people don't wanna see movies with "mars" in the title after Mars Needs Moms flopped.

The director says it's because John Carter doesn't "earn" the "of Mars" moniker until the end of the movie, but that sounds like bs to me.

Sad and believable that marketers would reduce peoples' reactions to such simplicity. Well, I'm going anyway.

 

[Warped9]

Apparently, the marketing folks at Disney think people don't wanna see movies with "mars" in the title after Mars Needs Moms flopped.

The director says it's because John Carter doesn't "earn" the "of Mars" moniker until the end of the movie, but that sounds like bs to me.

Sad and believable that marketers would reduce peoples' reactions to such simplicity. Well, I'm going anyway.

Agreed. Typical overthink. I'm also still going.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

On a related note, ERB, Inc. is using Dynamite Entertainment for trademark infringement for their adaptations and expansions of Burroughs' public domain works.