Hatebox

I'm not buying this 'TDKR is in trouble' talk. This opening just cements that people are really into movie-going now, especially these kinds of movies. TDKR picked the perfect movie to debut its trailer with.

That'd be insane. But then.. it's an insane opening.

I'd say TDK took more people by surprise, but they're both equally as impressive.

The trailer seems to have gone down really well and the way 2012 is going it feels like the limits of reasonable expectations are getting higher and higher. But I'll wait to see TA's OW figure before thinking about it too much.

If TA scores 80m OD I may just start to believe TDKR can get a 200m OW. How soon before we find out about this?

Pretty much everyone expected that 67m OD number to go up when it was announced. All I care about is the OW figure, something we won't have a good idea of for a while yet.

Does Nikki's 160m figure mean anything at this point?

What's the ratio of Nikki underestimating to Nikki overestimating? Recently it's been a lot of the latter, though it's hard to imagine this Friday number going down.

157m wouldn't be that crazy, it's still a huge number. But I expect more.

I think kids kind of like to see stuff that they feel is a tad inapporpriate for them. I know I did. Whether they're allowed to by their parents is another matter.

Didn't Disney specifically release it so there weren't many 2D options?

That's true if it has good legs, but if someone's willing to see a 2.5 hour movie at midnight on a weekday then the 3D surcharge is negligible to them.

TA doing a huge OW only makes me think TDKR will do even better than I previously thought.

With the awful May that follows it could well have record breaking OW and great legs.

Agreed, as much as I enjoyed the film they played very fast and loose with the physics of the world and the heroes frequently felt a little too immune at times. Seeing Tony get sucked into a huge jet turbine and then cutting to RDJ's face gently going from side to side in the suit didn't exactly heighten the suspense. A nitpick, perhaps, but the cumilative effect was felt.

Urg, the estimate fluxes are starting already.

I'm not surprised by TA's high RT - it was a good film that got far more right than it got wrong, and the binary system of the site favours those kind of movies greatly. Iron Man 1 is good example of this.I suppose a more interesting battle would be in user ratings, but I'm guessing that more critics will be disappointed by TDKR than the tiny minority that were with TA so it doesn't matter much now.

The problem is the games had no story, so staying true to their platformer spirt would be difficult while also contriving a plot people might care about for 80+ minutes.

A brief review just having seen it:Pros:- Loki was even better than he was in Thor. Hiddleston has more fun than all the other actors combined, and it's contageous. I'm not sure whether Loki's actually a great character or if Hiddleston's just really fun playing him, but the end result is the same.- Hulk was very well realised. They left him as late as they could and paid off when he finally arrived. Less really is more with this guy.- The lack of sentimentality, and the right amount humour. Mercifully they didn't go overboard with the comedy, but Hulk punching out Thor near the end, or Loki's request for a drink ensured there was just the right amount of laughs.- The last half hour. Obviously.- Good hero interaction. It'd be an exaggeration to say there was much character development, but I liked seeing these guys disagree and, finally, get on. I found myself wishing they'd all gotten together sooner so there could have been more of it.Cons:- The first 40 minutes were curiously rubbish. It wasn't until the scene in Germany that I felt at all involved in what was going on.- Black Widow and Hawkeye were pointless. No reason for them to be around and I felt increasingly annoyed that they were.- Like Mission Impossible 4, it was too long for a film that was essentially relentless action.- Thor celearly got the short straw in terms of character focus, and I didn't entirely buy Cap's sudden commanding role at the end. It felt like they had to give him something to do because he was stuck on the ground fighting foot soldiers. Talk of the film being from his POV was clearly bullshit.Overall:That this film is not just coherent but actually good is kind of amazing. Credit to Marvel: they gambled and won. I'm sure many others will enjoy it a lot more than I did because my threshold for action isn't that high, and that's really all this film is, but it's a very solid way to kick off the summer. I'll watch its box office with great interest, although I'm not much more excited for future solo sequels than I was before seeing this.

People go to see characters now, not stars. And that's probably a good thing.

Just out of curiosity, what other Apatow related films have underperformed?

So much for Shawn's 5YE over 100m club...

People are crazy to expect TDKR to increase domestically (has anyone around here actually rpedicted as much though?) but I don't think it's unreasonable to think it has a good chance to beat it WW. 4 years is a long time in the international markets, it seems.

Nor was there any 'fair' to speak of.

Ha, does he say that? Well, I guess there was a Myspace reference in the first Iron Man...