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The Screen Rant Pitch Meeting mentions a couple of things that are worth considering, like how someone who had a terminal illness and wished to be cured would renounce their wish or a couple of other altruistic wishes which now mean those people renouncing their wish are worse off.

IMHO, and I know I'm going to get branded a toxic fanboy, the overall low quality of the story is going to be the downfall of WW84, just like Ghostbusters 2016. It is a bad movie and would suck no matter who was in it. (IMHO just like JL). I know the post Covid movie world is different but WW84 was never going to be a $ Billion movie. I may be wrong but it just doesn't seem as polished as other super movies. None of the interesting aspects of WW84 were explored. The morality of using others for personal fulfillment, the role of supers and mortals, the morality of a mortal and an immortal vs "no shortcuts".

Kayback wrote:
The Screen Rant Pitch Meeting mentions a couple of things that are worth considering, like how someone who had a terminal illness and wished to be cured would renounce their wish or a couple of other altruistic wishes which now mean those people renouncing their wish are worse off.

These are good points, but I feel like no one is talking about the most absurd thing in the end sequence (which I've hunted down just to see how it plays out).

Apparently there were an immense amount of behind the scenes shenanigans over the last few years. There were studio/production issues, many many rewrites and reshoots, some of which were long after initial completion. I get the impression this could be an instance where a documentary on the making of the film could be more interesting than the actual film itself.

On this one or the first? Jenkins has been opening up to media about the stuff that went on leading into the first film, and that was when the studio was at its most meddlesome. I think she had pretty much full creative control on WW84, so if you don't like it...you can probably lay it right at her feet.

Hamada -- the guy now in charge of DC films -- has been more of a traditional WB 'let the creators create' executive AFAIK. Aquaman, Shazam, Joker, Birds of Prey, The Batman, etc...directors just doing their thing without Feige-style central control.

Definitely from this one as well. Apparently a lot of what happened was due to negative test screenings over the summer of 2019 and a lot of reworking done since. There's also a lot of stuff rumored to be intended as lead ins for other DC properties (the trip to Egypt, for example is rumored to have teased Black Adam) that mostly got cut out. I've also heard that the body swap guy was supposed to be "somebody".

What I haven't heard is the story that this was a great movie "ruined" by executive meddling. It seems more like it just didn't work to begin with coupled with the ever shifting state of the DCEU that left some ugly patchwork seems while trying to fix it.

It was definitely weird them namedropping Bialya, but nothing quite coming from it.

Bialya is *IMPORTANT* when it comes to Black Adams story.

 LunarSol wrote:
Definitely from this one as well. Apparently a lot of what happened was due to negative test screenings over the summer of 2019 and a lot of reworking done since. There's also a lot of stuff rumored to be intended as lead ins for other DC properties (the trip to Egypt, for example is rumored to have teased Black Adam) that mostly got cut out. I've also heard that the body swap guy was supposed to be "somebody".

What I haven't heard is the story that this was a great movie "ruined" by executive meddling. It seems more like it just didn't work to begin with coupled with the ever shifting state of the DCEU that left some ugly patchwork seems while trying to fix it.

Right. Executive involvement is an independent variable from a film having a troubled production. There are certainly films where the studio should have gotten more involved.

Peter Jackson's King Kong, I'm looking at you. There was a really good movie in there, Peter...cut the fething film!

At any rate, she's been talking about how she had creative control on this one. So unless she's lying...she just didn't bring it home. There's a rumormonger out there saying that Jenkins booted all of Snyder's people -- writer, FX folks, etc -- from this one and it bit her. Said rumormonger is wrong as often as right however and is a big Snyder booster. So I suspect that there's some spin going on with that scoop.

It looks like it could have used more control. Some parts should have been cut out with an axe or never committed to film.

As others have pointed out, she also wrote/co-wrote this script, and didn't for WW. She might just be a good director with terrible story ideas.
And wont to force her actors to deliver wretched, unending platitudes that don't match what's going on.

Voss wrote:
It looks like it could have used more control. Some parts should have been cut out with an axe or never committed to film.

Finding the right balance of creator freedom and franchise control seems to be a consistent theme of late.

The MCU has it right I think, at least insofar as they can keep churning out consistently films that meet a certain quality threshold.

Fox never seemed to know what to do with X-Men or Fantastic Four except get sold to Disney. Sony stumbled about with Spiderman after the Toby trilogy the modern age of comic book movie adaptations. Star Trek and Star Wars have been so incredibly hit and miss the past decade, with 'so okay it's average' entries, pretty good entries, and awful entries. the DCU though I think is easily the biggest disaster of the bunch since Fox's constant not knowing what to do next. They've put out in my book, two so okay it's average movies (Man of Steel and Wonder Woman), one really good movie (god how fun was Shazam! right?) and everything else has been an awful movie that seems to run on nothing but nostalgia and hope and at best looked good just because Batman v Superman and Justice League were so terrible. And they've got this huge roster of movies announced but seemingly no real idea what they're trying to do with any of them.

At least the animated films keep being pretty good XD

Suppose we'll see how Snyder's Justice League super cut does. My bet is the internet response will be way more entertaining than the product though XD

I just saw the Pitch Meeting parody and yeah, it sounds just awful.

I mean the best I could say for WW WWI was it was a good start. This just sounds like a plethora of bad ideas. Certainly not something I want to pay money for.

I am the minority in that I LIKED Birds of Prey.

The rest of the DCEU..... not so much. WWI was a great start though.

 Easy E wrote:
I am the minority in that I LIKED Birds of Prey.

The rest of the DCEU..... not so much. WWI was a great start though.

I think that's the intended DCEU experience. Something for everyone across the overall portfolio. I mean, they'd prefer that you like everything. But between say Joker, Shazam, and Aquaman...three very different films...there's probably something there for many people. The MCU experiments, but there's guardrails and central control. They're selling a universe, so those who like that formula are in all the way.

Of course, it's unfortunate for WB when one of their big franchises has a misstep. It won't have the inertia of the MCU to pull it along. Still, WW84 would probably be making solid bank in normal times, regardless of reviews.

The more I think about it the more I think that WW84 is the worst movie I've actually sat all the way through. It's Game of Thrones S8 stupid, but somehow even worse. It's offensively stupid. It's pre-K story quality.

 trexmeyer wrote:
The more I think about it the more I think that WW84 is the worst movie I've actually sat all the way through. It's Game of Thrones S8 stupid, but somehow even worse. It's offensively stupid. It's pre-K story quality.

Did you sit all the way through The Predator? Because that is BY FAR the worst movie I have ever seen.

The Predator is easily worse (the acting was god awful). WW84 has decent enough acting it's just not worth appreciating when the plot is so bad.

I mean...I've seen probably 100 movies worse than WW84. Did no one else rent movies? Video stores had whole sections of horror and scifi films with bad writing, worse acting, and effects that were several levels worse than 'special'.

I watched WW84 a second time with my brother the other day.

This is what I realized.

The entire movie, from the opening olympics nonsense scene all the way to the post credits, is entirely made up of a set up scene and a scene later in the movie to pay off on that set up.

Often the set up scene is WAY too long and often the pay off scene is meant to have some big impact because of the set up except there is no impact because it's just pay off after pay off with no real connecting tissues (or at the very least the most dragged out and flimsiest connecting tissues possible).

The olympics is just so diana can remember to take no short cuts later. The Max loves his kid is just so he can yell about having his kid later. The oil baron stuff is just so max can go get oil later.

Now these kinds of set up and pay out scenes are in lots of movies right? It's not even a bad thing to have them. But this movie is NOTHING but that. It's 100% built at every moment to lay a foundation for some scene later to pay off. The beginning 1/3rd of the movie drags on so long because it's NOTHING but set ups. And the last 3 is just pay off after pay off after pay off meaninglessly stacked end on end. And in the middle it's a mad mix of set ups and pay offs.

I have never seen anything like it.

 Lance845 wrote:

 trexmeyer wrote:
The more I think about it the more I think that WW84 is the worst movie I've actually sat all the way through. It's Game of Thrones S8 stupid, but somehow even worse. It's offensively stupid. It's pre-K story quality.

Did you sit all the way through The Predator? Because that is BY FAR the worst movie I have ever seen.

Oh, yeah, see...I'm not crazy enough to watch movies I know will be terrible and the Aliens/Terminator/Predator sequels fall into that category. I haven't seen the last 2 Alien Movies, any Terminator other than the first two, and only Predator 1/2 and Predators (sadly). The worst things I've seen recently would be various DC films.

 gorgon wrote:
I mean...I've seen probably 100 movies worse than WW84. Did no one else rent movies? Video stores had whole sections of horror and scifi films with bad writing, worse acting, and effects that were several levels worse than 'special'.

Indeedy, as a veteran of the VHS era I've watched some stinkers, often purposefully due to the nerdsphere rule of renting the worst film if all the good movies were out, but those didn't have the budget, brand or talent attached, so in the immortal words of William Hurt, how do you fup that up ?

I offer for evidence: SWAT, starring Sam Jackson and Colin Farrell at a time when that meant something.

I left the cinema actually angry that I'd wasted time, money and effort on that piece of gak movie.

But because it was a nothing film with nothing characters (as opposed to something high profile or a literary adaptation which tends to be more enduring) I'd completely forgotten it existed until channel surfing late a few nights back. Which is the only reason I think to suggest it now.

The trouble with bad franchise movies featuring popular characters is they don't have the luxury of fading into obscurity the same way all the other terrible blockbusters do.

 gorgon wrote:

 Easy E wrote:
I am the minority in that I LIKED Birds of Prey.

The rest of the DCEU..... not so much. WWI was a great start though.

I think that's the intended DCEU experience. Something for everyone across the overall portfolio. I mean, they'd prefer that you like everything. But between say Joker, Shazam, and Aquaman...three very different films...there's probably something there for many people. The MCU experiments, but there's guardrails and central control. They're selling a universe, so those who like that formula are in all the way.

Of course, it's unfortunate for WB when one of their big franchises has a misstep. It won't have the inertia of the MCU to pull it along. Still, WW84 would probably be making solid bank in normal times, regardless of reviews.

I watched Shazam! last night. It’s......entirely mediocre. Like a Spider-Man Homecoming by the numbers, with all charm sucked out of it.

In the end WW1984 will be excused because of covid, maybe even praised for trying to make a movie during the pandemic, and the people who hate it will be labeled misogynistic incels by the media.

I'm not all that convinced of patty jenkins as a director if i'm being honest. Has me worried about that rogue squadron film. But then again I generally dislike almost all marvel/dc films. I initially did like the first WW movie but upon rewatch last year I began to wonder what I even liked about it in the first place.

 Matt Swain wrote:
In the end WW1984 will be excused because of covid, maybe even praised for trying to make a movie during the pandemic, and the people who hate it will be labeled misogynistic incels by the media.

You're stretching. The media reviews I've seen for this movie have been pretty consistently negative, and put the blame for that squarely on the director.

 Matt Swain wrote:
In the end WW1984 will be excused because of covid, maybe even praised for trying to make a movie during the pandemic, and the people who hate it will be labeled misogynistic incels by the media.

A quick check shows principal photography wrapping before Christmas 2018 and supplementary shooting being finished in 2019. So, no, nothing that's fundamentally wrong with this film can be blamed on Covid without a degree of mental contortionism.

Discussion of a sequel began shortly after the release of the first film in June 2017 and the decision to proceed was confirmed the following month. Principal photography began on June 13, 2018, with filming taking place at Warner Bros. Studios, Leavesden in England, as well as the District of Columbia and Northern Virginia in the United States, London and Duxford in England, Tenerife and Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands, and Almería in Andalusia, Spain. Production wrapped on December 22, 2018, after a six-month shoot, with additional filming in July 2019.

 Thargrim wrote:
I'm not all that convinced of patty jenkins as a director if i'm being honest. Has me worried about that rogue squadron film. But then again I generally dislike almost all marvel/dc films. I initially did like the first WW movie but upon rewatch last year I began to wonder what I even liked about it in the first place.

The middle bit is pretty decent superhero fare, if a bit cliched. The CGI end is the usual naff muddle, and the beginning is another plodding origin story, but there is a brief bit where they're actually convincing as people, which really stands out for DC films.

 Azreal13 wrote:

 Matt Swain wrote:
In the end WW1984 will be excused because of covid, maybe even praised for trying to make a movie during the pandemic, and the people who hate it will be labeled misogynistic incels by the media.

A quick check shows principal photography wrapping before Christmas 2018 and supplementary shooting being finished in 2019. So, no, nothing that's fundamentally wrong with this film can be blamed on Covid without a degree of mental contortionism.

Discussion of a sequel began shortly after the release of the first film in June 2017 and the decision to proceed was confirmed the following month. Principal photography began on June 13, 2018, with filming taking place at Warner Bros. Studios, Leavesden in England, as well as the District of Columbia and Northern Virginia in the United States, London and Duxford in England, Tenerife and Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands, and Almería in Andalusia, Spain. Production wrapped on December 22, 2018, after a six-month shoot, with additional filming in July 2019.

There you go again, being reasonable, citing facts, etc. That's not how some people work. Covid will get the blame for the bad editing and poor CGI, the director will claim her original vision was better and eventually someone will be accused of attacking her because she's a woman. Maybe a 'director's cut' will be done with improved cgi and some deleted scenes added that will be at least a little better.

WW1984 was originally announced for release on Dec. 13, 2019. Then it was moved up to Nov. 1, 2019. Then it was pushed back to June 5, 2020 (with producer Charles Roven explaining the film had a rushed pre and post-production and could use the extra time).

Literally the only reason it got caught up in the pandemic at all was to give it more time in post production. It was feasible it could have been released a full year before it eventually did, and ironically putting Jenkins in more of a time crunch may have resulted in a better movie.

-Please leave the politics out of it at this time, thanks!

The only people not ripping on WW84 are hardcore DC/WW fans. The reactions to the movie are overwhelmingly negative. Gal Gadot doing that Imagine crap earlier in the year didn't help.

 trexmeyer wrote:
The only people not ripping on WW84 are hardcore DC/WW fans. The reactions to the movie are overwhelmingly negative. Gal Gadot doing that Imagine crap earlier in the year didn't help.

And honestly, at this point I'm not sure their opinions are worth much when it comes to DC movies. The amount of praise Justice League got from some corners was baffling. If you like it like it. I won't begrudge you. But don't sit there and tell me this was anyone's idea of a good movie XD