If Warner Brothers Does A Green Lantern 2; Here Is How To Do It Right.
Despite the fact that Green Lantern dropped 65% over the weekend, rumors swirled this past Sunday Warner Brothers were going to go ahead and pursue a sequel anyway, to the surprise of almost everyone. If Green Lantern had been a cheap movie to make, that would not be such a surprise; after all, opening a movie to $53 million dollars is no small task, even today. But at a reported $200 million dollar budget, not to mention an enormous advertising budget, this movie needed to be a hell of a lot more profitable to be considered a true hit. In regards to this potential follow up, part of me is thinking “I’ll believe this when I see it”; after all, after Superman Returns came out, Warner Brothers issued press releases announcing not only Bryan Singer returning to direct a follow up, but also Kevin Spacey returning as Lex Luthor. And we all know how that turned out. Having said that, the Harry Potter series is about to be done, and Warners is desperate to make their DC Heroes work on screen and create new franchises for them. They might see all this money spent as an investment for the future, and write it off as such.
It was said that Warners spent at least $100 million on the advertising alone for Green Lantern. And I for one believe it…for the past couple months, you haven’t been able to get away from Green Lantern commercials, billboards and bus stop ads. Warners spent a very pretty penny making sure everyone and their mother, whether they were comics fans or not, knew what Green Lantern was. And whether they saw the movie or not, everyone knows who Green Lantern is now. And Warner’s intense strategy worked too, at least at first…GL’s Thursday midnight screenings made more than both Thor’s and X-Men First Class, and their first Friday numbers were great too. It was only that following Saturday that we saw the shitty word of mouth take effect. If people had loved the movie, the numbers would have shot up on Saturday, as is the usual case. This was not, as some critics made have said, an issue with mainstream audiences thinking GL was too “weird” or alien (when did mainstream audiences have issues with Aliens?) None of the otherworldliness and comic booky nature hurt Thor a damn bit, did it?
But OK, let’s assume the studio is serious about a sequel though…here is some free advice for you Warner Brothers…just follow these six simple rules when making a Green Lantern 2, and everything should work out great.
Get A New Director
Martin Campbell is talented as all get out, as evidenced by Casino Royale and Goldeneye. But he is pushing seventy years of age, and a younger director who is more comfortable and experienced with modern effects might be what is needed for a follow up. There have been examples where a heralded director with great pedigree has dropped the ball on a big movie, only to be replaced with a newbie for a sequel to greater success. In 1979, Star Trek: The Motion Picture was directed with an enormous budget by director Robert Wise, a man responsible for some of the greatest movies in Hollywood history (The Sound of Music, The Day the Earth Stood Still and West Side Story are just some examples) Star Trek: The Motion Picture was slammed by critics and fans alike, but Paramount remained committed to the franchise. They got a newbie director named Nick Meyer, slashed the budget by a huge margin, and the result was Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, still regarded as the best Trek film in the series to this day. Maybe Warner Brothers should look to this example for how to proceed with GL 2. And although a new director is needed, keep what does work. Ryan Reynolds was a great Hal Jordan, and Mark Strong was an excellent Sinestro. Neither of those actors failed the movie…the movie failed them.
Get Rid of the CGI Suit
Not that the costume looked bad, because it didn’t, not really…but it wasn’t worth the enormous amount of money it cost to create it and make it move with all the actors body movements. I bet if you got a practical suit that looked just like it, half the audience wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.
Look To Green Lantern: First Flight For Inspiration
First Flight was the direct to DVD animated film that came out in 2009 from Warner Animation. While the first ten minutes served as Hal Jordan’s origin story (Abin Sur’s crash, Hal getting the ring, etc) 90% of the movie’s run time was set in outer space. The main basis for this story was the 2001 movie Training Day. In that movie, rookie police officer Ethan Hawke has to partner with decorated veteran of the force Denzel Washington, only to find out the Pride of the Force is a crooked cop. In First Flight, that story is told, but in space, with Hal Jordan standing in for Ethan Hawke and Sinestro standing in for Denzel’s character. With some tweeks and omissions, this could easily serve as the basis for a strong second film.
Green Screen It
Back in 2004/2005, several movies came out that were shot on “Digital Sets” –Sin City, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, and the Japanese film Casshern. A great deal of 300 was shot that way as well. Some of these movies looked better than others, but none of these movies had enormous budgets. In the seven years since those movies were made, effects technology has improved drastically, and it would be possible to film a Green Lantern movie totally set in space and on alien worlds using this technology, and also keep the budgets down, especially if you cut the expense of a CGI suit on the actors having to track every movement of their bodies. There is simply no need for a Green Lantern movie to cost $200 million dollars in this day and age.
Get Rid of the Dead Weight
Yeah, I’m looking at you Blake Lively. While I didn’t hate Lively’s performance as much as some critics, I don’t think anyone really cares if Hal and Carol end up together the way people cared about Lois and Clark, Peter and Mary Jane, or Tony Stark and Pepper Potts getting together in the end. Besides, in the comics the Hal/Carol relationship was never this long ongoing drama played out for years. Hal was a player, and Carol was just one of his many women. GL 2 should focus on the relationship fans wanna see: Hal Jordan’s and Sinestro’s.Also, Hal’s friend Tom was a lousy sidekick in the movie. He can totally go too. And no one will miss them.
Change the Release Date
Since Green Lantern didn’t fare so well competing against the big boys of summer, how about changing the release date to February, March or April? In those months there is not only less competition in terms of blockbuster sci-fi fantasy fare, but also less expectations in terms of box office. A potential Green Lantern 2 might seem a lot more enticing during the doldrums of winter when there is nothing else like it to compete with.
A lot of critics seem to be saying that the failure of Green Lantern signals the end of super hero movies, or at least super hero movies for characters not as well knows to John Q. Public. But in terms of name super hero properties, the truth is we were/are getting to the end of them anyway. The way I look at it is this: The studios are only going to dump hundreds of millions of dollars on comic book heroes who have had long term sales success in the comics. And by long term I mean years and years…Characters/concepts that have been able to hold their own titles for decades. For Marvel, those characters are all the ones Stan Lee had a hand in creating back in the 60’s for the most part – Spider-Man, The Fantastic Four, The Hulk, The X-Men, Iron Man, Thor, Daredevil, and the Avengers (of course, some of the have had long term successful spin offs, mostly the X-books, but I’m not counting spin-offs) Sure, there have been some like Hellboy and Blade that wouldn’t qualify under that criteria, but they are the exceptions and not the rule. At DC, the only 6 “brands” that have had long term sales success are Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Flash and the Justice League. Yes, characters like Aquaman, Green Arrow, Hawkman have always been around, but let’s be honest…as solo characters they always struggle to maintain a series long term. Warners was never, ever going to spend upwards of $150 million dollars (which is what it would cost to bring most of these guys to the screen in solo films) on these guys.
The studio has no one to blame for what happened with Green Lantern but themselves. Warners just sat by this past decade while the comic book movie juggernaut ruled the box office, led by Marvel. Yet they let it go by, concentrating only on Batman for the most part, developing scripts for Flash and Wonder Woman only to chicken out and drop them. They don’t really have faith in their non Super-Bat DC properties. This attitude goes all the way down to the animation department; just look at all the DC original animated movies….it is either Batman, Superman, Batman/Superman or JLA. Their experiments at doing Wonder Woman and GL animated features were considered failures, and the only reason GL got another one is because he got a movie and they needed a tie-in.
The best case scenario, had Green Lantern been a big hit, would have been DC Entertainment begin to work towards a Justice League film the way Marvel is doing with Avengers. Despite the party line saying that they are not approaching their Justice League movie the way that Marvel is approaching Avengers, if GL had made Iron Man money, you bet your ass that the following Monday DC would have issued a press release announcing feature films for Flash and (possibly?) Wonder Woman culminating in a Justice League feature film. That is pretty much off the table now, as Green Lantern was their big experiment into non Super-Bat heroes. My personal opinion is that the next time we see Green Lantern on the big screen he’ll be in a Justice League film, but if a Green Lantern sequel really does emerge, then maybe Warners really has commited to their DC characters. Only time will tell if this announcement of a Green Lantern 2 is genuine or if this all just about saving face.
