Has ComicCon Jumped The Shark?
I read the New York Times today, oh boy…
I have been saying this for a couple of years. And studios responded that as much of a pain and an expense as ComicCon is for them, it still is relatively cheap in a world of TV-driven marketing.
But with the exception of Kick-Ass, which would have sold without ComicCon, but may well have gotten a better deal out of Lionsgate because of ComicCon, there is not a single film that can realistically point to its fortunes being seriously improved by ComicCon. The only remotely viable connective tissue for another film would be District 9, which launched at ComicCon, but was marketed really well by Sony and if helped, was mostly helped because it encouraged the studio to push harder.
And as the NYT piece points out, there is some danger in San Diego. You can be given the bum’s rush by the geeks… fairly or unfairly.
Of course, it speaks to the weirdness of it all that there was a lot of negativity about Avatar from the media at ComicCon… which ended up meaning nothing. Fox and Cameron took the film to the people a couple of months later in preview clips screenings and while the geek press remained cynical, the paying audience started revving the engine.
So, NYT counts WB, Disney/Marvel/DreamWorks, and The Weinsteins out for this year.
Let’s check the facts!
Warners has Contagion, A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas, and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows in the ComicCon wheelhouse the rest of this year.
Soderbergh ain’t going to do ComicCon without a gun to his head, the original Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle launched at ComicCon and then disappointed New Line at the box office, and doing Sherlock Holmes 2 has to be 100% contingent on Robert Downey, Jr showing up… and if he was willing to go to San Diego, would it be okay with Disney/Marvel, which apparently is not going with Avengers (and may have Downey working… no idea what their schedule is).
The Need The Star problem is even bigger for WB’s 2012 movies. PJ would shoot something for The Hobbit, greeting the audience, but there is no footage going out this early, Christopher Nolan is in production and is not going or sending people. And it’s too early for anything to come in from Dark Shadows. That leaves Clash of the Titans 2.
You can’t go to San Diego with Clash of the Titans 2 and little or nothing from what may well be the biggest 1-2 punch in one year in the history of any studio (Disney’s Alice/Toy Story 3 combo is the high bar now), not to mention no Downey and no Depp/Burton. It would be a fiasco.
So Warners not going this year makes sense.
Disney/Marvel did Avengers last year. They don’t have any effects footage to show. Nothing else matters. And Captain America still won’t be in theaters and even though he will be in Avengers, this movie isn’t their distribution product.
If DreamWorks/Disney takes Fright Night down there and doesn’t show the whole movie, they will get clobbered for “hiding it.” And they can’t take Real Steel down there without a bigger chunk of footage than they floated at CinemaCon AND Hugh Jackman. And would they really get anything out of ComicCon 3 months before release?
And all Weinstein has to take, if they took something, would be Apollo 18. I wouldn’t be shocked to see a “suprrise” screening at a San Diego theater out of the convention center.
So I am not shocked by the call by any of these studios.
The piece makes Scott Pilgrim vs The World the lynchpin of “what’s wrong with ComicCon,” but doesn’t Universal going back with Cowboys & Aliens negate that?
ComicCon has always offered plenty of excitement that turned unhappy…
2006 – Snakes on a Plane
2007 – Beowulf
2008 – Star Wars: The Clone Wars
2009 – Jennifer’s Body
2010 – Machete/Scott Pilgrim/Let Me In
I’m sure someone who spends more time at ComicCon each July could make a lot longer list.
Of course, the event gets the benefit of massive marketing by studios as well. Some people are crazy enough to point to Iron Man as having had something to do with their ComicCon event 10 months earlier. Or The Dark Knight. Oy.
If the Rise of the Planet of the Apes footage is great, it will be great on the internet… and people will come. The only positive is that a month before opening, Fox can basically launch their release campaign in a room with their core audience. This makes some sense as a simple marketing play… direct mail in one room. The only risk is a universal distaste for whatever they show. Unlike Avatar, there is no time to rebound if it went that way. So Fox must be happy with the footage.
All Sony has to do – or likely will do – is to trot out Amazing Garfield, Stone, Rhys Ifans, and maybe Irrfan Khan, Sally Field, and Martin Sheen… outside shot, Dennis Leary to M.C… and show a few shots… maybe a suit… a logo… maybe a tease with a glimpse of Andrew and Emma swinging somewhere… and they are done. Home run.
And on Tintin, Paramount will test out a 3D trailer that will be released within a week of the event. (I am guessing. Haven’t asked anyone over there.) Jamie Bell and Simon Pegg show up. And they fight to get Daniel Craig to do a second panel he doesn’t want to do… and if he does, Steven comes. And if Craig won’t do it, maybe Steven doesn’t come. Or maybe he comes to fill in the flash gap. And PJ will send a tape from his set in NZ.
Like every other publicity or marketing opportunity, ComicCon is just a tool. It was probably overvalued – as in “if they are going, we have to be there too or we might miss out.” – in the last 8-10 years. It was undervalued before that. But the press’ imagination about what it was and how valuable it may have been or may be has always been skewed.
It’s really simple. How much will it cost? Is an intensive marketing event for 20,000 of your pre-sold base worth that amount? Do you have the goods to give them or are you going to get backlash?
If you have the goods and the price is right, great. If not, not.
There is one more cost that should be accounted for and is the tipping point for a lot of this… is getting your talent to do this worth what they will later turn down because you got them to do this?
As long as the event could be made to seem as it had enough juice that it could get your film to the next level, it was the Golden Globes to a lot of talent. They didn’t wanna… but they felt obliged if they wanted the big opening. Now, there is some real doubt whether this will move a marketing campaign much… so now it’s just another awards season appearance.
So if DreamWorks isn’t 100% sure that Daniel Craig will do the heavy lifting on Tintin in November/December with Dragon Tattoo also coming out that month, they may push him to do the ComicCon appearance now, taking what they can get. Conversely, if they think he can be talked into doing work for Tintin in the winter, they may pass on this event, keeping themselves in his good graces. Or some variation on those notions. It gets very political. But Universal can push Craig hard on ComicCon. that this is a part of the release strategy. Same with Fox and James Franco, where he is likely to be very wary of Oscar smack talk from the crowd. But he’ll do it because he kinda has to. But if he does get hurt by some audience smart ass, it could cost Fox some 1-on1s or some other bigger event appearance in the weeks to come.
Maybe it will become the Cannes of genre flicks. We can call it ComicCannes.
I think that it would be in the studios and SDCC’s best interest to allow the panels to be viewed online (maybe not live but on a one day delay).
It wouldn’t effect SDCC in the least as they will still get their 130K attendance and the studios have everything to gain by allowing millions more to see panel and whatever footage they have ready justifying the expense.
WB wants the DC relaunch to be the talk of the entire con, so a pullback isn’t surprising.
But If nothing for TDKR pops up, I’ll be stunned. They are in deep production already. Suit work is already underway. Pittsburgh shoots will be finishing by SDCC.
RDJ will be in New Mexico, as will the entire Avengers before east coast exteriors start in August.
I’d expect surprises.
And would they really get anything out of ComicCon 3 months before release?
We decided that we would not.
How has The Clone Wars turned unhappy? The series and the merchandise is still going strong, last time I looked and went into a Toys R Us.
Also, Jennifer’s Body wasn’t even an official Comic-Con event. It was off-site for press only. Ditto Machete.
“I think that it would be in the studios and SDCC’s best interest to allow the panels to be viewed online (maybe not live but on a one day delay).”
I think some of them did last year.
I wonder how much of this bowing out is due to a knowledge that the thing’s gonna be overrun by Twilight fans for maybe the last time, and most of them don’t care about anything else.
Yeah The Clone Wars is a huge success and any thoughts to the contrary simply do not resemble any form of truth. Also, if this were an article bad mouthing siff. The fury from David would go on for days. Seriously it’s just another example of geek hating Poland and it’s really sad this doesn’t seem to end from him.
I’m guessing that David was referring to the Clone Wars movie. I’m a big fan of the show, but the movie was pretty weak, and the boxoffice was not impressive.
Yes isn’t DP specifically referring to how CC has influenced box office performance?
The DC reboot is going to be an epic failure, with regards to the comic books. Since this is just a play to relaunch all the titles for films, the honchos probably don’t care that they will lose hordes of comic book fans (myself included), who will never buy another DC title. Geoff Johns is just doing his masters’ bidding I suppose, but to reboot all franchises and essentially wipe out years of storylines, is a slap in the face to the real fans. This will probably fall on deaf ears in these parts, but it needed to be said IMO.
JSP/IO… what the HELL does SIFF have to do with ComicCon?
Seriously, man. Completely different animals.
And I have written the pieces about Sundance jumping the shark and wondering whether the schizophrenia in Toronto is healthy and whether Cannes is a waste of money for American news organizations.
So make a real argument.
And read what I wrote without the angst colored glasses. ComicCon has value… just not the value that the hype suggested in the last few years. Why is that “geek hating?”
And Luke… are you suggesting that ComicCon has been a win for every studio spending $500k plus to drag talent down there? If anyone can do a list of the misses, it’s you. Your turf, much more than mine.
Again David with your coverage it’s all about You. You love siff, have stated as much, and would probably never treat it with such disdain as you do comiccon.
You are also a known dismisser of geeks and geek properties. Not like that is new but your dismissing of the earning potential off Woody Allen is :).
I appreciate that DC is not putting in any sort of SuperFriends / Justice League easter-eggs in their movies. At least right now.
But catching part of I Am Legend the other day on TV made me wonder if they’ll try to resurrect Batman vs. Superman.
As disinterested I am in the upcoming Green Lantern movie, I would be more excited about a Green Lantern/Green Arrow film than a Batman/Superman movie.
I want to see a Green Lantern/Green Acres movie.
JSP/IO – Your inability to distinguish between my personal preferences and my professional analysis is kinda fucked up. But you are hardly alone in this.
When I get cut off in traffic in LA, this is what I think… there are so many cars here, if each person does just one stupid thing a month, we’re all going to see a lot of stupid things done everytime we get on a street.
Same with geek/comic book movies. You don’t see me bemoaning how many are made. I like them when they are good. I love them when they are great. But they do dominate the scene… so when 60% of them are shit, that’s a better average than any other genre, arthouse included.
Am I getting this idea through to you?
Or are you just being a myopic goof?
Of course, I love SIFF… as much for all the things it isn’t as the things it is. If it got bigger and dumber, I would mourn for it.
I want to see a Green Lantern/Green Acres movie.
“Vhy Misteh Jorden, I haave the perfect broosch to go wiv vour wing”
Yeah, Dave hates SDCC. I should have realized that when he used to open panels at the Con by screaming “I hate you all”
Aris – I don’t know how this will go. On one side, you’ve got god’s gift to himself, Morrison, running his mouth about how this is equal to rewriting genesis and on the other, you’ve got DC suits sending out missives about how this isn’t a reboot but just a relaunch. When the two sides cannot match messages, watch out. IMO, it’s Zero Hour meets Heroes Reborn. When the book sales don’t change, they’ll find something external to blame.
Anyone here going to SDCC this year besides me?
“I repeat Sturgeon’s Revelation, which was wrung out of me after twenty years of wearying defense of science fiction against attacks of people who used the worst examples of the field for ammunition, and whose conclusion was that ninety percent of SF is crud.
“Using the same standards that categorize 90% of science fiction as trash, crud, or crap, it can be argued that 90% of film, literature, consumer goods, etc. are crap. In other words, the claim (or fact) that 90% of science fiction is crap is ultimately uninformative, because science fiction conforms to the same trends of quality as all other artforms.”
“And Luke… are you suggesting that ComicCon has been a win for every studio spending $500k plus to drag talent down there? If anyone can do a list of the misses, it’s you. Your turf, much more than mine.”
Not at all, David. Just thought that list was poorly chosen, since half of them weren’t even official Comic-Con events. Comedy has always been a massive gamble there, with HAMLET 2 the most notable waste of a spend that I’ve noticed.
The big mistake I think SCOTT PILGRIM made was showing the entire movie for free multiple times to the only folks guaranteed to pay for tickets if they had to.
Soderbergh ain’t going to do ComicCon without a gun to his head…
Gun in place, apparently.
Apparently.
Wouldn’t be surprised if the money for another project is being tied to how this one does commercially.