Consider this your official Techland rapture alert. The antichrist has returned. He has taken over Hollywood. He has green-lit G.I. Joe 2. All hope is lost.
From the pages of Variety:
Paramount is bringing G.I. Joe back for a second tour of duty. The studio is moving forward with a sequel to last summer’s “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra,” inspired by the Hasbro toy, and is in negotiations with “Zombieland” scribes Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick to pen the script. Reese and Wernick recently signed on to write 20th Century Fox’s “X-Men” spinoff “Deadpool.” “G.I. Joe” hauled in $302 million at the worldwide box office last year…read more.
Anyone who saw the first G.I. Joe knows why this marks a dark day for all movie fans everywhere. But I think it also reveals the utter desperation and cluelessness of Hollywood.
A few days ago we launched our most underrated sci-fi movie masterpieces, and reader Kemper, after seeing my inclusion of Serenity, wisely posited: “In an era where all studios talk about is the next big franchise, why isn’t another Serenity movie on anyone’s drawing board?” I have no answer for this question.
Studios could be spending moderately to make films of some substance in exchange for moderate profits. But instead, the execs have decided that everything needs to be a home run. Everything should reap a windfall.
But for this strategy to work, every title must be a must-see, which means name recognition, blow-out marketing and jaw-dropping special effects. This is why we’re now seeing movies based on toys, marketed as if they were the second coming of Christ himself, featuring special effects sequences that cost more than most four-year university programs.
There is no middle ground anymore, no mid-level franchises. Could Hitchcock have made the majority of his films in today’s Hollywood? Sure, an action-packed North By Northwest. But Strangers on a Train? Or think about this: Would an original script about a middle-aged archaeologist running around World War II Egypt be green-lit in today’s marketplace? I mean this sincerely: I don’t think they’d give Raiders of the Lost Ark a green light today.
What the hell are they thinking?
So all we have left are the likes of G.I. Joe 2, Spider-Man 3, Mummy 4 and Monopoly. Hollywood rummaging around in the cookie jar, grasping for anything that sounds faintly familiar, all to be made in 3-D.
More stuff. All crap.
