Porthos

I bet that Suicide Squad does under 130m OW DOM, 3 people 75 points. Bet ends at August 4th, 7pm PDT sharp.

And to think that film came out only four years after infamous freeway shooting sprees of 1987. Still, gotta tell you, as someone from NorCal, I busted out laughing at that scene. Even if I did feel a little bad about it afterwards. I think it was the fact that it was just so matter of fact and yet so over the top which did it.

But what if my heart was set on ordering the duck?

Controversy from Comic Con aside, they've been marketing The Killing Joke exceptionally. I'm not even sure they realized quite what they had on their hands. In retrospect it's pretty obv TKJ could have done a limited one week/weekend run and/or a roadshow leading up to the Blu-ray/DVD release. All hail the power of HamillJoker and the deep deep love of The Killing Joke in the first place.

Been gone all day, so I'm late to the party, but I wanted to chime in on Battle Royale. Fantastic movie, and one that isn't easily forgettable. Yes, there are some surface similarities between it and THG I/II. And I'm not about to try to say which one is better or better at what it is trying to say. While they are both satires and both deal with school kid age teenagers in gladiatorial combat, beyond that they're really different. Mostly because the satire itself has different targets. For THG, a lot of the satire is aimed at celebrity worship and modern Reality TV. Sure that isn't nearly all of the satire, but that's the hook. There's much more to the film, but since I'm not as familiar with it as I am BR, I'll leave it to others to tell. For BR, the satire was more aimed at quirks of Japanese society. How kids are taught and pressured to conform in a competitive enviroment being at the top of the list. BR is also a highly, highly, highly subversive film and it's no wonder it had trouble finding an American distributor. And @Baumer is absolutely right about how THG is far more sanitized than BR. It is disquieting in every since of the word. Let's just say one of the very first scenes of the movie sets the stakes about just how take-no-prisoners this film will be. Literally. So even if one really didn't like the hook of THG, I'd still recommend BR. Mostly because it really isn't all that similar beyond the one sentence description of "School age kids kill each other in a bread and circuses enviorment to distract people from their tyranical government."

They were shown at Celebration after the end of the SW: Rebels panel. Speaking of which, here is the SW: Rebels panel for those who didn't get to see it: No, it doesn't have the two episodes that were shown to the audience afterwards for some strange reason. BTW, that panel is fab. And the more I see of Dave Filoni, the more I want to see what would happen if he were given a SW feature film to play with.

I say this without hyperbole that I consider the main theme/title of the movie is one of the great movie themes of all time. I wouldn't try to figure out where to place it in a Top 25, 50 or even Top 100*. But it is there somewhere in that list. * It is absolutely no contradiction in my mind to say that something of one the best of all time and say it is somewhere in a list of a 100. There's been a LOT of truly great movie themes after all. You wouldn't think someone like Vangelis would become synonymous with both the Olympics and the triumph of the human spirit, but he did. Still gives me chills to this day to listen to it.

Man, Suicide Squad is going to cause a LOT of movement in the Casino.

Hmmm. Two films immediately leap to mind. or If it's not one of those two, then I'm intrigued to see what it is.

You can say that again: (h/t TV Tropes: Covers Always Lie: Behold the new Blu-Ray covers◊, meant to lure in Twilight fans.) ((I know you're a Twilight fan, Baumer, but you have to admit that is hilarious! ))

Headed to bed now, but I want to leave with one last point. The campaign against the new version of Ghostbusters is hardly unprecedented. 538 took a look at The Story Behind the Worst Movie on IMDb a while back: This is all rather small fry compared to that, I think. And even in the US proper, there have been successful drives to kill movies at the box office. Far more successful than this one, I'd say, as this one wasn't all that killed. Sure, there were a lot of NOISY peeps running around. But that's The New Aughts social media for you. That being said, "noisy" and "influential" aren't always synonyms. Maybe not even usually.

Uhhh. Yeah. No. The trolls over at IMDB and other places aren't that important or influential. It was Sony's reaction to everything that causes things to go badly. If they played it a bit cooler, things might have been better. Or not, I gave the reasons above why even a 'fan blessed' property would be a hard sell, and I see little reason to change my mind. Besides, I thought you argued just a while back that Ghostbusters was out of the public consciousness and a dead franchise. So which is it? Just exactly how much pull did Ghostbusters have after, oh let's say 1996? Far less than you think, I would guess. No. Not even remotely close to the same. Like I said, I think you have fan-blinders on here. No sin in that. Just think you're not being very objective, that's all.

Sorry. Gotta say I think you have fan blinders on here. I loved the original GB back in the day, but there was not a level of similar interest between Indiana Jones mooted films and GB ones. Not even remotely the same. Not then, not in the 2000s, and not now. Interest? Sure, I'd go with that. Especially in some nerd communities. Anything even remotely close to 'fever pitch'? Not even in the last fifteen years, which is long before Feig ever entered the picture.

Now if one wants to talk about similiarites, IMO the most similiar franchise to Ghostbusters when it comes to public consciousness and staying power isn't Star Wars or Indiana Jones or even Jurassic Park. It's Back to the Future. It has had a lasting impact on the culture, it has had cosplayers forever. It had a (semi-)successful cartoon and a couple (semi-)successful games. But much like Ghostbusters it hasn't been in the forefront of public consciousness. However, I am fairly skeptical that any sort of sequel to BTTF would be guaranteed to be any sort of massive hit. For one thing, nostaliga doesn't always sell, as ID:R more than easily proved. For another, recapturing that magic is a tough job even when the public might feel fondly toward things. More to the point at no point in the last ten years was there EVER a high level of anticipation for a Ghostbusters film among the general public. Reboot, remake, or sequel. In fact, IMO Sony dropped the ball almost from the inital get go with this version of the film. Then they proceeded to keep fumbling the ball backwards. That they opened as well as it did is a near miracle in and of itself. That it appears to be resonating with at least a portion of the public, an even greater one. So I am afraid I have to disagree with all of your points, @JediJones. This property didn't follow the arc of SW. It was never highly anticpated. And while it left its mark on society, I don't think it was nearly as deep or as successful as you think. Successful? Yes. Just not as much as you think it was. Could it have played differently? Maybe. But with one of the original actors dead and another not interested in the slightest at reprising his role, it's a mighty tough lift. Throw in the fact that the one person who seemed to want the film the most (Dan Ackroyd) never really could pull a script together..... Well, the only chance at this succeeding on the level you are implying is if they pulled a Next Generation scenario. But coming up with an original idea is still the problem (see, in reference, ID:R for the pitfalls here). Throw in trying to capture lightning in a bottle again with the new leads (presuming there would be new leads as I think there would have to be), and, well. Let's just say that while it probably would have done better, I don't think it was a sure thing. At all.

Uhhh.... As a person with more than a passing interest in Star Wars: No. Not in the slightest. (for one, interest in "GB 3" was NEVER at a fevered pitch. Not once.) Honest question. Did you read the first post in this thread? "Softening language", as you put it, is kinda implied there.

These seem like contradictory points to me. How can there be '30 years of legacy', for instance, if things were killed stone dead after the second film? And it's not like "The Real Ghostbusters" had much of anything to do with the movies. And cosplayers only go so far, IMO. PS: Terms like "Girlbusters" and "cinematic abortion" probably aren't helping your cause here much.

The Audience Score has already risen by 10 points from the initial onslaught of trolls. Now stands at 54%/3.0 and has been slowly but surely rising (it was initially around 42/43 2.5 right out of the gate). Might eventually end up in the low 60s range which wouldn't even be that bad if there weren't a bunch of bogus ratings.

I think it's on basic cable about once or twice a year or so. Just checking though, I see it's coming up on Starz Encore this week and next. So folks with that premium channel can record it and watch it at their leisure.

I wonder if the failed coup in Turkey suppressed turnout in the US. People being glued to their TVs and all. Might see higher bumps on Sat if there was even a little effect.

Would you prefer another poster? Perhaps a militant member? Then name the poster. *pause* I grow tired of asking this. What is the name of the hidden troll?

If Ghostbusters does above 47 this weekend I'll A) Be happy that my risky bets cleared in the Casino. and B ) Pissed off that I didn't follow my gut and offer a couple of last minute ones over there. Of course given that it looks to be right around the 47-50 marker, I'd be sweating out those extra bets all weekend long, so maybe it's a good thing that I didn't make them. Don't need ulcers quite yet.

Well, legit in that they actually saw it. Someone could have seen it and still be a troll (in either direction). Still, fair enough. And, yes, Deadline is pretty much screwed here. Well, more screwed than normal.

@somebody85 Trying to figure out which is a "real" review and which isn't is a waste of time, IMO. At least in this case and probably for a while. Even a "review" that goes on for paragraphs doesn't say all that much because, and I know this for an utter fact, way too many people have way too much time on their hands and spending 15 minutes on a fake review is pretty much child's play for some. Is it "more likely" that a five paragraph screed (or sycophantic) review is more legit than a two line one? Sure. But still has a decent potential to be bogus. Shame really, but what's one gonna do? And even if most of the longer reviews are "legit" good luck actually using them to figure out what the "real" score "should" be. Too much noise to filter out to try to find the signal in other words.

(responding to this post instead of @somebody85 because it's easier to piggyback my point - but consider it a response as well ) In many cases, you won't be able to. Hence "poisioning the well". Sure there will be legit 1/2 star reviews. Wouldn't dream of saying otherwise. But there's gonna be plenty of agenda driven shit-stiring going on from people who haven't seen the film or went in going to hate it no matter what. As well as agenda driven shit-stirring from those who went in convinced they were going to love it. And, frankly, it won't be worth the time and effort to try to figure out which is a real review, which is somone deciding to invoke Poe's Law for a laugh, and which are the real trolls. At least it ain't worth MY time and effort. Object Lesson # 45782 why "poisoning the well" is so awful and counterproductive.

The reason I say "of course it's trolls" is that the "want to see it" score (which is what shows up BEFORE the Auidence Score goes live) was plummeting over the last few days. Something that I have never seen on RT before. Admittedly, I don't make it a habit of watching the Flixster score of a lot of films before release, but I have never seen a tentpole film drop as much as it had over the last week. All coinciding with a segment of the IMDB userbase declaring war on this film. Don't have to believe in conspiracy theories to see a connection. So unlike for most movies, the Audience Score is going to be pretty damn useless for a while. Perhaps forever, thanks to all of the bogus votes that are readily apparent here.