Official TMNT 2 Discussion

[Myko]

Originally Posted by Leo656

No matter what the problem, there's a two-word solution.

Buck buck?

[darthwahl56]

Originally Posted by Leo656

No matter what the problem, there's a two-word solution.

I think it's, Don't Panic!.

[sethmartin]

All the writers and filmmakers have to do is come to these forums. They could make the ultimate TMNT movie (something on par with the Avengers, or Dark Knight) just by reading this site. Everything is laid out here like a blueprint. Designs, acting choices, storylines and origins. Everything we want, and everything we don't want. The most frustrating thing to me, is that these movies are unbelievably expensive to make. 120 for the last one. Why would you spend that much money without researching what the target audience wants first??

I know some people on here will say "Because they don't care". But that's my point, WHY don't they care? It's their business on the line.

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

Originally Posted by sethmartin

All the writers and filmmakers have to do is come to these forums. They could make the ultimate TMNT movie (something on par with the Avengers, or Dark Knight) just by reading this site. Everything is laid out here like a blueprint. Designs, acting choices, storylines and origins. Everything we want, and everything we don't want. The most frustrating thing to me, is that these movies are unbelievably expensive to make. 120 for the last one. Why would you spend that much money without researching what the target audience wants first??

I know some people on here will say "Because they don't care". But that's my point, WHY don't they care? It's their business on the line.

I'm as astonished as you are. Quadrupling down on their investment is to be found right here.

[DarkLightDragon]

Because to them, we're a bunch of uneducated ungrateful brats who use the Internet to vent, piss and whine regardless of what they do or don't do. Cause that's what fanbases do half the time, let's be honest. There'd be some logic and constructive critique here and there, but most of time, it's not really what we select fans say that they want to avoid, but how we select fans say to express discontent.

Or they're just a bunch of thick-skins who villanize those who dare question their decisions and directions. Whichever anyone wants to pick here.

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

I'm just looking at the tags here and wondering how many pages back do I have to go to find CyberCubed Thinking Deep?

[Bry]

Originally Posted by sethmartin

I know some people on here will say "Because they don't care". But that's my point, WHY don't they care? It's their business on the line.

Not to start a whole thing here but... It's because they don't care about "the fans", or even the property, at all. They have no reason to. These movies are a means to an end, and that end is 100% only making money. They don't care about telling a good story or "doing right" by the property. I'm sure there are plenty of people working on the movies that do care, but the ones in charge absolutely don't. They're sure that for all the fans' complaining that they'll dutifully line up on opening night to "support the franchise" anyway. And they're following the Transformers playbook with the general audience, assuming that all they want is a dumb "turn your brain off" 'splodey-action movie to numb their minds for a couple hours.

And last time they were proven right.

[srmff]

Originally Posted by Bry

Not to start a whole thing here but... It's because they don't care about "the fans", or even the property, at all. They have no reason to. These movies are a means to an end, and that end is 100% only making money. They don't care about telling a good story or "doing right" by the property. I'm sure there are plenty of people working on the movies that do care, but the ones in charge absolutely don't. They're sure that for all the fans' complaining that they'll dutifully line up on opening night to "support the franchise" anyway. And they're following the Transformers playbook with the general audience, assuming that all they want is a dumb "turn your brain off" 'splodey-action movie to numb their minds for a couple hours.

And last time they were proven right.

Exactly. The last movie made millions so why change it. In their point of view, don't fix what isn't broken.

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

Originally Posted by srmff

Exactly. The last movie made millions so why change it. In their point of view, don't fix what isn't broken.

More like, don't fix what nobody cares about. But yeah, semantics. to them it's the same.

[Foombamaroom]

Hopefully this movie will make less than the first one. The first one didn't do particularly well, so maybe TMNT 3 won't be happening. If it DOES happen, that'll probably be it (I don't see them transforming (HA.) this into a franchise past 3 movies.). If they do, god have mercy on us all.

[Leo656]

I've posted this before. This is a quote from 1998, when concept artist Sylvain Despretz was working on Tim Burton's Superman movie that thankfully never got made. Fans everywhere were becoming very vocal about all the changes that were in the works for Superman, everything from a black pleather costume to his S Shield turning into twin daggers, and on and on. This was Despretz's rebuttal (I've chosen to highlight certain sentences for emphasis):

"Fans are not clued into reality. Fans think that years of buying comics entitles them to speak with authority about comics characters and pass judgment on producers and directors who exploit these characters for the silver screen... This delusion is laughable. Fans seem obsessed with a sense of personal kinship with an imaginary character, which is at best a publishing product. If fans sat in a room and tried to come up with a film about their hero, nothing creative nor effective would ever come of it."

So, it's basically: "We're smart. You're stupid. We get paid to make this stuff, you pay us to watch it. Thus, we know better than you, because we're rich and you're stupid."

All of Hollywood works like this. So if you don't know, NOW you know.

[Autbot_Benz]

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

Originally Posted by Leo656

I've posted this before. This is a quote from 1998, when concept artist Sylvain Despretz was working on Tim Burton's Superman movie that thankfully never got made. Fans everywhere where becoming very vocal about all the changes that were in the works for Superman, everything from a black pleather costume to his S Shield turning into twin daggers, and on and on. This was Despretz's rebuttal (I've chosen to highlight certain sentences for emphasis):

"Fans are not clued into reality. Fans think that years of buying comics entitles them to speak with authority about comics characters and pass judgment on producers and directors who exploit these characters for the silver screen... This delusion is laughable. Fans seem obsessed with a sense of personal kinship with an imaginary character, which is at best a publishing product. If fans sat in a room and tried to come up with a film about their hero, nothing creative nor effective would ever come of it."

So, it's basically: "We're smart. You're stupid. We get paid to make this stuff, you pay us to watch it. Thus, we know better than you, because we're rich and you're stupid."

All of Hollywood works like this. So if you don't know, NOW you know.

Geez DAMN that is the most insulting thing I've ever read. F*ck that guy and his mindset.

Explains a lot, though...

[Commenter 42]

Originally Posted by Leo656

"Fans are not clued into reality. Fans think that years of buying comics entitles them to speak with authority about comics characters and pass judgment on producers and directors who exploit these characters for the silver screen... This delusion is laughable. Fans seem obsessed with a sense of personal kinship with an imaginary character, which is at best a publishing product. If fans sat in a room and tried to come up with a film about their hero, nothing creative nor effective would ever come of it."

So, it's basically: "We're smart. You're stupid. We get paid to make this stuff, you pay us to watch it. Thus, we know better than you, because we're rich and you're stupid."

All of Hollywood works like this. So if you don't know, NOW you know.

You know what? He's right. Hate to admit it, but he's right.
I've yet to see any live action fan made TMNT prove him wrong. It's also some what true that fans don't know what they want till the see it.

It's easier to criticize than actually do. That's true.

That's not my beef with those two "visions" though. Yeah, I get where Burton was taking Superman. I get it, but I don't agree with it. Same can be said of Snyder, in my opinion, which we don't need to retread.

But PDMT, it feels like a deliberate and unapologetic bastardization. It feels like a malicious and intentional double F you to fans. It absolutely feels like " We could absolutely do this justice. We have all the money to make something epic. We can, but we won't. and the best part is, you'll still give us money, because you can't help yourself. So we're not even going to try. Agiain, f*ck you.

So I can't respect them, or give them credit, but by the same token, that doesn't mean a well intentioned fan would have done any better.

[Leo656]

The whole industry is like that. And when "fans" end up getting jobs in the industry as artists/writers/etc., it means nothing. Acknowledging that you're a "fan" of a property means you won't get to work on it, because the producers will say you're "too close to the material" to be objective, and to make the "necessary" changes and deviations from the source material that you "Need" to have in every movie adaptation.

To clarify: If you work in Hollywood, or want to, and your goal was to one day work on a TMNT, Superman, Batman, etc. movie, so you can help one day bring an "accurate, faithful" interpretation to the screen, because you CARE, the very fact that you identify as a fan of those properties means you will NEVER get near them. There is an entire system in place to prevent "fans" from interfering with these projects.

Because a fan will give you reasons WHY you can't do the stupid sh*t they want to do, and they don't want to hear it. All they care about is taking a pre-existing property that's worth money and has a lot of brand awareness, and marrying it to whatever turd made a billion dollars last year, even if it's like stuffing a square peg into a round hole. "How do we make TMNT more like Transformers?" "Well... you can't... they're nothing alike at all..." "Yeah but we HAVE to, that's what SELLS, don't you get it?" "But... the story and characters aren't even..." "So CHANGE it, who cares? These f*cking internet dweebs are gonna go see it anyway just because of the sticker on it! They don't know anything, f*ck 'em! SHREDDER IS MEGATRON! F*CK 'EM RIGHT IN THE FACE!"

And we keep proving them right. That piece of sh*t last year made $493 million. That's what pisses me off. We can't support sh*t like that. It's like telling someone you WANT them to spit in your face. They're going to do it anyway, and that's whatever, but don't BEG for it, and then tell them it's all good. "They'll go see it anyway, they just like the brand name and they're too stupid to know Good from Bad"... and then people DO go see it anyway just because they like the brand name, and admit they never DID care if it was good or bad! That's awful. What a bunch of f***ing marks.

[IndigoErth]

Originally Posted by Leo656

...the very fact that you identify as a fan of those properties means you will NEVER get near them.

Too bad it didn't work for Megan Fox.

[Leo656]

I'm questioning how much creative input she was allowed, if any. It's not like she wrote the thing.

[Commenter 42]

Originally Posted by IndigoErth

Too bad it didn't work for Megan Fox.

Meh, I buy that she is a fan of Fathom, Michael Turner and J Scott....but I think she knew f*ck all about tmnt, except that it was a potential goldmine.

Here's the thing though, you can be a fan, but also, like the worst kind of fan. the concept guys who gave them pants, are fans. The guy who butchered Mike, gave him big big green lips and insisted on Dons Ghostbusters tech, is a life long fan.

From a certain vantage point, Leo's right. I can also tell you, from experience, sometimes the "dream job" the one you waited for your whole life...can be poison.

I think the real danger with fans, is that they have an incredibly specific point of view, with all sorts of head cannon. Sometimes that's a plus (Ciro and Brandon etc at Nick) or it can be a big negative, with PDMTs so-called designers.

A while back I started a thread with TMNT redesigns, because I find it fascinating that from something so simple, has sprung so many variations, and no two are really alike.

So when dude says " if you got a bunch together in a room...they wouldn't agree, it's frankly true.

[pennydreadful]

Originally Posted by Commenter 42

I've yet to see any live action fan made TMNT prove him wrong. It's also some what true that fans don't know what they want till the see it.

No live action fan projects have ever had much of a budget though, which significantly restricts what the people making it could do.

Give a few fan projects a decent budget and I'm sure you'd end up with something far more watchable than BayTurtles. Of course, I consider watching my cat clean her arse more entertaining than watching BayTurtles, so... yeah.

[Candy Kappa]

Bat in the Sun have done some amazing fan-work, showing fans with the know-how to do cinematography, costumes, lighting and general movie skills can do better then some of the official stuff.