My Question's Been Answered...

[D'Snowth]

Because they have no creativity, nor imagination.

 

[Drtooth]

We OZ fans have endured this "darkening" trend for years. I don't flip out if someone reinterprets something I like in a way I don't like, especially since Baum's Oz is now in public domain, but c'mon. How many times are we gonna see Sexy/Trampy Dorothy, Wicked Creepy Scarecrow, Axe Maniac Tin Woodman, Rabid-Looking-Not-Even-a-Lion-Anymore Cowardly Lion, and Evil Dictator Oz? Stuff like this is no longer even outrageous, it's just dull.

You're thinking of that Twisted WOZ toy line/video game, aren't you? Heh... Still, you have to admit, the original movie doomed the franchise for years to have anything else in its shadow, especially the books. Still, I'd want to see the darkness of the books, not the darkness of fake gothy fangirl stuff. I have to start actually reading those at some point.

But seriously, the gothy fangirls completely destroyed and ruined Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass. And druggies did too. And the book was all about being ticked off at new-fangled math concepts like imaginary numbers. I wanna see a math nerd spin on it. THAT would be an original take.

Because they have no creativity, nor imagination.

I see what you're getting at, but that couldn't be further from the truth. First off, there is no way to be creative, since absolutely everything has been done before. After all, we've had thousands of years of storytelling that follows the same basic structure. I'm sure there are historical records of someone saying "Shakespeare is a hack! I liked Hamlet better when it was called Oedipus Rex. It's the biggest ripoff since Electra!"

Here's the thing... studios copy movies (either ones coming out of rival studios or their own remakes/same story different names films), not out of some lack of creativity, but the more obvious answer... MONEY ! There have always been trends in movies. We just wish to ignore them because we like being old fuddy duddies that talk about an imaginary "good old days" we swear happened, all while ignoring the atrocious crap that we did co-exist with that we forgot all about. Look at the 30's! Everyone wanted to do Sam Spade type pictures. When Star Wars came out, everyone wanted to do sci-fi pictures again. And let's not forget the 1950's B movies, all trying to copy each other because that was the only thing getting teenagers to the theaters since TV was widespread. You could go back to the silent era and say that Buster Keaton is cashing in off of Charlie Chaplin, and Abbot and Costello are clones of Laurel and Hardy. No generation's entertainment is safe from what came before it.

Movie studios follow trends because they want movies that get the highest amount of ticket sales. That means looking at what the hit movie is now and getting similar ones produced until one kills the trend. Then an original film will rise out of that one, and the studios will jump on that trend too, because they always have forever. it's like any time some food becomes popular and all the restaurants are making pallid imitations or one up'ed versions with a different ingredient. Pesto was big... people put it on everything, especially things that don't go with pesto. Then it was chipotle peppers... and then everyone's doing sushi all the sudden. Now we're shoving the word "Nappa" in front of everything because it somehow vaguely has the name of a classy wine region attached to it for some reason. Though I choose to believe that these guys are just really big DBZ/Over 9000 meme fans.

In short, it's all about money. Directors might make movies, but studios are the ones that greenlight them.

 

[Slackbot]

You're thinking of that Twisted WOZ toy line/video game, aren't you?

And the many "Dark Oz" comics (Oz Squad, Dark Oz, Oz/Wonderland Chronicles and many others I haven't bothered to buy), and lots of art (both pro and amateur) I see at cons and on the web, and some of the "Oz apocrypha" that is published, Wicked (the book!) and its followups only being the most prominent examples.

Again, I'm not going to wig out because someone does a "grim & gritty" version of something I like. But with Oz it's been done to death, and it's just no longer interesting. As for the toy line you mentioned, I couldn't take it seriously, it was so far removed from the original material. Plus, McFarlane (no relation!) emphasized how he couldn't stand the original Oz, so I just view his works as hate art in expensive packaging.

 

[Teheheman]

Wasn't Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter based off a comic book?

It was based on an actual book this guy wrote. It's the same guy who wrote Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Both books sound like titles to REALLY bad B-movies that should have been made for DVD movies

Daniel

 

[Drtooth]

As for the toy line you mentioned, I couldn't take it seriously, it was so far removed from the original material. Plus, McFarlane (no relation!) emphasized how he couldn't stand the original Oz, so I just view his works as hate art in expensive packaging.

There came a certain point where the McFarline toys all sucked anyway. I liked the Beatles stuff, yet never had the money to get much of it. The Shrek Line was pretty good and the Austin Powers stuff was good but far too reliant on the voice box display stand for the characters to stand up. I had a Dr. Evil and one of his legs was an 8th of an inch shorter to accommodate the one peg.

But after a while the toys turned into creepy ugly stuff for the sake of overly detailed sculpts' sake. Those Twisted Oz/Fairy Tales things specifically. I had a bone to pick with the HB line being small, fragile statues/dioramas instead of action figures... but those ugly ugly horror show figures.

 

[Muppet fan 123]

I'm tired of adding all this 'Vampire Slayer" and "Dragon Killer" or whatever to it.
This Hansel and Gretel movie looks like the biggest nonsense in months...

 

[Muppet fan 123]

I just saw an ad for this in the paper. Really? REALLY?

 

[Sgt Floyd]

Suddenly makes Hansel and Gretel seem good

 

[Drtooth]

I swear the concept of Jack the Giant Killer came up before...

OH!

This really was a story, and it wasn't the first time it was made into a film.

Here's the problem. We're not familiar with that story... we're familiar withthis associated tale that's much shorter. Technically the two are not unrelated, but it doesn't seem to be completely the same.

I guess they used the term slayer over killer because it sounds more epic. Either that or some idiotic concern if the title had the name "Killer" in it.

So technically this doesn't sound that stupid. It was a story. Hansel and Gretel: Witch Slayers... that's something they forced to be darker.

 

[CensoredAlso]

I swear the concept of Jack the Giant Killer came up before...

Technically that's how Jack is portrayed in the Into the Woods musical.