Disney expects $200 million loss on John Carter

[Orbert]

That was really the problem.  Not that they didn't spend enough money on marketing, but that the marketing sucked.  I remember seeing some commercials for John Carter, and seeing nothing other than a generic action movie.  That's from what I could decipher in the first place.  Lots of quick cuts, flashes of monsters or creatures of some kind, a guy running and jumping, then JOHN CARTER in big letters.  Not enough to make me want to see it.  There may have been more to it than that, but I don't remember, and that's a symptom right there.  It was not memorable.

[CrimsonSunrise]

I'm a HUGE Sci-fi guy, mostly reading, but I do catch most sci-fi flicks.  That being said, I had forgotten about this movie completely.  I think with the not so enticing trailer I saw, coupled with the title, it was very forgettable too me right out of the gate.  Now I'm going to have to go watch it!

[ariich]

Agreed. I saw a trailer and thought it looked like the most generic sci-fi/fantasy story. It was only when I read an article in Empire about how it was based on books that pre-dated and influenced all the big stories that look so much like it (Avatar, Star Wars, etc) that I became much more interested in it.

Then again, it's hard to know what will sell with advertising. Making it look generic can bring in the mass audiences sometimes. But I think they would have benefited from showing off that it was based on what was almost the original sci-fi.

[BlobVanDam]

I saw plenty of ads for it on TV. And as others have said, it just made it look like a generic fantasy movie. Had I not read more here, I'd never have realized it was based on an existing book, or the basic idea of it.
The ad just made it seem like yet another fantasy movie, and for some bizarre reason the main character had an oddly period-inappropriate name. I was just like "Why is his name John Carter? That's not very other worldly!"

[lordxizor]

I saw plenty of ads for it on TV. And as others have said, it just made it look like a generic fantasy movie.

Well... it kind of was just a generic sci-fi fantasy movie. Unexpected person joins fight between humans and aliens. Ends up uniting the two sides agianst a common foe. Warning: Contains pretty explosions, alien landscapes and fun/bizarre alien creatures. Whether it's based on older material or not, it basically fits the mold of most sci-fi popcorn flicks. That said... I thought it was a fun movie.

[Orbert]

I've heard that it was actually pretty good, but as I said upthread, this to me just indicates how badly the marketing failed.  I mean seriously, their job is to somehow make you want to see the movie.  If that means revealing some of the plot, or hiding it, or exploiting the hot babes (I don't know if there are any in this flick) or whatever it takes, then that's what you do.  I saw nothing in the trailers/commercials that distinguished the movie in any way, plus the fact that it was from Disney may have actually hurt it.  Disney animated flicks tend to be awesome, but their live action movies are hit or miss for me, and this one looked like a miss.

[MetalJunkie]

Nope. Friend works at the local cinema so he's getting me in for free

In that case, I'm pretty sure the picture still applies.

[jammindude]

I've heard that it was actually pretty good, but as I said upthread, this to me just indicates how badly the marketing failed.  I mean seriously, their job is to somehow make you want to see the movie.  If that means revealing some of the plot, or hiding it, or exploiting the hot babes (I don't know if there are any in this flick) or whatever it takes, then that's what you do.  I saw nothing in the trailers/commercials that distinguished the movie in any way, plus the fact that it was from Disney may have actually hurt it.  Disney animated flicks tend to be awesome, but their live action movies are hit or miss for me, and this one looked like a miss.

I agree with this 100%.

I think part of the problem was basing it on the books...and then (after it was too late) trying to *distance* themselves from the books.

Apparently, the right hand wasn't talking to the left hand.   They green-lighted a picture that was based on books that contained a very beautiful...and very NAKED...princess.     Disney was suddenly in a quandary.    We've already sunk tons of money into a picture that we now have to try to make small children *AVOID* reading.   (this is all entirely *stupid* of course, but remember this is Disney we're talking about)

There was actually a small news article (it might appear earlier in this thread for all I know) where those involved with the movie were looking into changing the original material to remove all references to nudity in the original book.    Of course, that was too much like Fahrenheit 451....so they were just stuck.  $250 million in debt for a movie they suddenly felt like they couldn't promote as a family friendly movie.

The answer, of course, is that if they were *truly* worried about it...they should have passed the torch to Touchstone.  (a Disney owned movie company that releases all the movies that don't deserve the supposedly "pure and true" Disney stamp.)

[Adami]

I think another one of the movie's problems is that it was marketed near the same time as Cowboys and Aliens. So on one hand, you have a commercial with Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig as cowboys blowing everything up, exciting right? And on the other hand you have a guy from a similar time period on mars. All you see is an unknown actor running around topless. Just bad timing along with bad marketing.