Mark Millar has made a living out of creating buzz for his projects. He claimed Eminem was a lock to play Wesley Gibson in the Wanted movie. The Kick-Ass film was in production before the second issue hit the stands, and the rights to Nemesis were sold before anyone saw a single panel. The returns have been undoubtedly diminishing- Wanted wasn’t the blockbuster they thought it would be, Kick-Ass bombed and that Nemesis movie… any day now... Right? Now, those aren’t necessarily Millar’s fault, but one starts to wonder what will happen when you peel back all the layers of hype and hyperbole, are there good stories here? Before we tackle that question lets give Millar some credit- the guy is prolific. In the past year he released a sequel to Kick-Ass, the seven issue Superior, the forthcoming Jupiter’s Children and now he’s released two new series’ on the same bloody day- Secret Service with Dave Gibbons and Super Crooks with Leinil Yu. I hope to get you a review of Secret Service in the next week or so, but today it’s all about the Crooks of the super variety. Super Crooks hinges on an idea that you either buy, or you don’t. It's a very meta concept that posits the idea that there really aren’t any superheroes outside of the USA. As the book states- “Have you ever heard of Captain Spain?” You see, our band of lovable Super Crooks are sick of getting defeated time and again by the overwhelming amount of superheroes here in the states, and who, quite frankly, take their job way too seriously. So what’s a Super Crook to do? Head to Europe and rob it blind before the superheroes catch on. Millar is known to borrow a bit of an idea, a famous face or even a persona, and I’m not knocking him for that, this time he seems squarely influenced by Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean’s 11. Actually, it’s more like Ocean’s 11 and 12. Hell, there’s even a part for Carl Reiner. Millar’s books are always high concept enough to pique your interest, and Super Crooks is no different. It’s fun, it’s breezy, Leinil Yu’s art is phenomenal, but how deep this book actually is remains to be seen. I dig that the book feels more like Casino than capes, and the scene in Vegas was definitely a highlight. I hope Millar really uses Spain to his full advantage in the rest of the series, there’s a vibe and a flavor to be had that we don’t see very often in comics. Millar has warranted me picking up the second issue, he’s piqued my interest enough, but whether he can make it as effortless as Clooney, Pitt and Cheadle is definitely another story.
Well you sold me on AGP. I was head over heels for Rising Stars. Just not the ending. Hunger Games was pretty good ouside of the love triangle drama. So i'm adding this to my pull list this afternoon when I go in.
As much as I've enjoyed most of Millar's work (Nemisis was a fun messed up ride) I will wait and get the arc in bulk and make my decision after. I did that for Nemisis so I didn't have to wait each month for issues.
Oh boy today is going to be a pricey one.
AGP...if it would've come out before HG I'm sure it would've done better. Now? It's too close to HG which was so boring and crappy imo, I'm sure at least this book will do way better then whatever was done in HG.
Joel, where did you get this from, "Wanted wasn’t the blockbuster they thought it would be,"?
Wanted made over 341 Million $ world-wide on a 75 Million $ budget.
It sold well on the DVD market.
It has a sequel in production.
It wasn't a sequel OR a known property to anyone outside of comic book fanboys.
As for Kick-Ass, while I will give you diminishing returns it did do almost $100 Million on a $30 Million budget which is considered quite profitable. Additionally the after market (ie. DVD, etc.) did very well.
@Jedibanner I totally agree, last year Images was killing it- Blue Estate, Butcher, Baker Righteous Maker, Intrepids, Non-Player, Green Wake...
@Bryzarro Glad I sold you on AGP! Please let me know what you think once you get a copy.
@Boombatty True, looking at worldwide BO, Wanted is a modest success, but they were hoping for much more than $134 mil domestic, and the budget was much closer to $130 mil with marketing included. Plus, take away the theater's share of the BO, and Wanted suddenly didn't even break even domestically. Not to mention they were hoping Wanted was going to be a profitable franchise...
Kick-Ass was unfortunately a bomb. Again, the budget was probably much closer to $60-$70 million, and it grossed far below that before the theaters even took their cut. Lionsgate though they had a bonafide blockbuster on their hands, and well.. they didn't. They were hoping for a $40mil opening weekend alone...
By all published accounts Kick-Ass had a $30 million budget and took in over $98 million worldwide. Do you just change the budgets as you see fit so your articles look like they were researched or do you actually have some evidence as to your $60-$70 million justification other than your uneducated opinion? Theaters BTW, don't take much of a cut during the first couple of weeks, they make their money at the concession stands. So that $30 million was pretty much made back in the first week if you add in the first week worldwide as well. How, exactely, was that a bomb?
@Shmoooo Sorry friend, but I have no reason to try and make anything I write "seem" researched, and when it comes to the film/television/comic industry I believe I am quite educated, but would never laud over that fact, or play it as some kind of trump card. I'm here to talk about and celebrate comics with some good folks who want a place to hang out and talk shop.
I know the box office and how it works quite well, so trust me when I say all the facts i've presented are genuine. Look, I was once in your shoes, if a movie I liked made even a little over it's budget I would be overjoyed and feel justified. However, as I educated myself, I realized that's sadly not the case in Hollywood (or anywhere). If you pay attention to the industry you will quickly see that studios never report the actual budgets (usually leaving out marketing costs which can add 30%-50%), and when news outlets talk about how much a movie made they never factor in the theater's cut, and we never see what the studio actually makes. Sure, the studio/theater profit model is a sliding scale- the longer a movie plays in theaters the larger percentage of those profits goes to the theater week after week. However, each film a studio releases has it's own deal with the theaters. Some are very front-loaded in the studios favor, some are actually quite a bit more equal. And the foreign market is a whole 'nother can of worms.
If you liked Kick-Ass, then great, I'm happy for you. Box Office has no bearing on whether you should like a movie or not, but facts are facts- Kick-Ass was a financial failure as a film, plain and simple. Need more proof? Go to Box Office Mojo and scroll back to Aptil of 2010. See that headline? "Kick-Ass opens up a can of weak sauce."
That's just something I found through, ya know, research.
Geez shmoooooo, give the guy a break, you have to have faith in what the people write when there is an article specific about something and that it's all true and can be proven.
And Wanted was a bomb, everyone knows that...
Go to Box office Mojo and they also state the budget as $30 Million.
As for domestic vs worldwide, the fact is $340 million against a budget of $75 Mil (Box Office mojo again) or even $130 Mil is pretty good. I don't think you can discount the Wordwide gross. My understanding it is just as important to more than important than domestic only. I seem to recall that pre-marketing budget times 2.5 is the goal (or obviously higher) to be considered profitable. This applies to worldwide and in both cases means Wanted did really well and Kick Ass did generate profit (although I would say this is the modest hit as opposed to wanted).
Additionally, DVD/Download sales can generate a significant profit and turn a film finacially viable even if it didn't gross enough. A good example is Fight Club which made $100 Mil against a $63 Mil budget BUT added $55 Mil in DVD sales for the 2004 RERELEASE alone (which don't incur even close to the Movie Run costs) it was considered profitable when added to the original DVD release, Blu-Ray, and showing rights (HBO, etc.).
The point being that I would love to see the final numbers on Wanted. I know it was a pretty popular second run (the DVD release hit $65 Million in revenue in 09 and I don't know what the Blu-Ray numbers are) and $340 Mil Box Office. I would hazard to say it was considered more than a modest hit.
Also keep in mind that Wanted was Rated R. Not PG-13. So I don't know how high the thought of Franchise was. Typically to make a franchise soar the studio demands the film be PG-13. The highest domestic R rated movie that year was $154 Mil, not that much higher and $415 Worldwide, also not a huge leap more. So I would have to vehemently disagree with you on it's staus as a hit.
As for Kick Ass and your referencing of the Box Office Mojo article, well from the very first line, "Kick-Ass didn't bust out of its unpopular superhero comedy confines nor did it match its hype, but it nonetheless delivered one of the highest-grossing starts ever for its sub-genre". I don't believe a studio looking for a franchise hit delivers a $30 Mil budget. $130 Mil maybe. My guess is the studio knew it was a hard sell and set the budget with the expectation that to be profitable they needed to hit 2.5x, or $75 Mil. Also, in February it was announced that the sequel is scheduled to begin filming in the summer of 2012.
LOGIN
REGISTER
RSS
HOME
Last year was a great year for Image comics and a lot of the new stuff that came out was just so good. Anything from Radical is also usually very good and fresh (although the books take forever to come out).
Love the new Millar stuff, Superior was great and the new Kick-Ass is also a whole lot of fun.