Perhaps the respective general publics just preferred Kirk and Spock to Picard and Data.
JJ Abrams is pissed over leaked photos
- Thread starter 1bulma1
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They liked "Generations", "First Contact" and even "Insurrection" well enough to win opening weekend and put bums on every seat on premiere night.
You're still not making the case that fans were responsible for Nemesis going down the tubes. I'd be interested in it, if you could actually make the case that fans hold that much power, as I'm sure many readers in the forum would. It would run contrary to a lot of conventional wisdom propagated here.
Primarily, the fact that so many agree that the movie was awful makes it hard to buy into the narrative that, had fans not "bad-mouthed" the unseen film during production as you say, the film that was released would have somehow done significantly better.
Primarily, the fact that so many agree that the movie was awful makes it hard to buy into the narrative that, had fans not "bad-mouthed" the unseen film during production as you say, the film that was released would have somehow done significantly better.
Also, you seemed to offer up what supposedly happened to Nemesis as if it were part of the rationale for the STXII NDA's. That's something else I have a hard time buying, beyond the question of whether pre-release bad-mouthing had anything to do with box-office performance, either on opening night or in total.
I'm not necessarily trying to make such a case. I said it was the inability of the producers to keep the story and all versions of the script of "Nemesis" secret. Everything - absolutely everything - had been spoilerized, like no previous ST film, before release.
Many, many films sink due to bad word of mouth in the months before their release. That's why film distributors sometimes bump a US film's international release to circumvent poor reviews from the US. It's not unique to Star Trek films. No studio wants 18 months of negativity before a film comes out. Had "Nemesis" been a more watertight production, audiences may have had more curiosity and went to see the movie on opening night, like the previous nine Star Trek movies.
Then don't buy it.
I won't. It makes more sense that the NDA is simply a standard operating procedure to protect a 9-figure investment, period.
And that's where you kind of loose the rest of us: "bad word of mouth" mainly only existed in the trek fan internet community. Outside of the TrekBBS/TNZ/Trektoday circuit, most of the people who went to see the movie only knew the basics: that it involved Romulans and an android other than Data (we all assumed it was Lore). More detailed information surely existed, but I don't personally know anyone who was actively looking for it, nor do I know anyone who refrained from seeing the film because of it.
That's the point about the fans not having that much influence; the general audience doesn't care what the fans think and doesn't bother to consult them even if they know something everyone else doesn't.
There is nothing wrong with us knowing a few details here and there about the movie. I never said we had to know everthing. Just a few scattered details.
We know scattered details. Who is in it. That there will be someone from first season TOS. I think there was a factlet about more relationship development with Spock, though I may be wrong there. And then there's the space barge, quite a big and chunky detail.
"Did you hear?! ST:XII is gonna have a SPACE BARGE!!!!"
"Did you hear?! ST:XII is gonna have a SPACE BARGE!!!!"
Yeah, stop right there.
"I wonder what's going on here?"
There's publicity they can't buy.
And Bad Robot's promo/marketing arm seems pretty adept at keeping things balanced just at that point for months at a time.
The point I was trying to make is we have one picture of a guy in a balck t-shirt fighting Spock, causing people to ask "I wonder what's going on here?" As you say, this is good publicity, and yet Abrams is getting upset over shit all.
"Oh, Wormie. All we know is that Abrams is upset. We don't know why. It could be something unrelated to the leaked photos or the movie."
Yes, it could be. It could be any number of things. We don't know for sure, and this is an extension of the problem. Abrams won't give a definitive answer to anything, not even why he's upset.
Call me old fashioned, but I liked the good old days when something concrete about a movie was known. Oh wait, that's not the good old days, that's every other fucking movie that gets made ever.
If JJ hasn't done anything wrong, then he's got nothing to hide.
AmIright?
...
Naaaah!
While I'm loath to jump into bed with 'Legion too quickly, I have to agree that I'm enjoying the mystery and reluctant reveal we're getting with this next film. Face it, we're still fourteen months away from release; by this time next year, we'll know a lot about this movie, regardless of Abrams' best efforts at secrecy.
So it's a game of espionage between the production and its fans. Let's enjoy it!
AmIright?
...
Naaaah!
While I'm loath to jump into bed with 'Legion too quickly, I have to agree that I'm enjoying the mystery and reluctant reveal we're getting with this next film. Face it, we're still fourteen months away from release; by this time next year, we'll know a lot about this movie, regardless of Abrams' best efforts at secrecy.
So it's a game of espionage between the production and its fans. Let's enjoy it!
Leave the crackers in the kitchen.
Let him buy you a drink first, at least.
I disagree. I had a lot of people assuming I was "done with Star Trek" in the months leading up to "Nemesis". Word was out that "even diehard Trekkies" were proclaiming the movie would be "a dud".
Months and months of Internet moaning and bitching had permeated beyond the inner circle.
Yea, plus, I'm sure every die hard like us posters here, has at least 3 or 4 friends that ask our opinion or plot knowledge of SciFi movies because they are more casual fans and trust our "expertise". So, that can really spread bad word of mouth quickly.
The buzz was bad going in, but he movie still opened with similar numbers to "Insurrection" and TFF. But its second weekend gross was almost half of what the other two grossed, and it got worse from there.
I don't think spoilage before that movie is what hurt its box office total. Maybe a little more the opening weekend, but after that -- eh. By then, the movie was standing on its merits, or lack of them. (Maybe I was part of the problem. I knew all the bad buzz, and to this day it's the only Trek movie I've never seen.)
I don't think spoilage will affect the box office one way or another, anyway. If Abram's thinks secrecy helps, sobeit. I'll defer to his expertise.
No one except Trekkies paid any attention at all to Nemesis.
Seriously?
I think not. Movies would be marketed in an entirely different way if that were true.
Seriously?
I think not. Movies would be marketed in an entirely different way if that were true.
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