Captain America 2: The Winter Soldier
Rio 2
Amazing Spider-Man 2
Godzilla
X-men: Days of Future Past
Million Ways to Die in the West
Maleficent
Edge of Tomorrow
How To Train Your Dragon 2
22 Jump Street
Transformers: Age of Extinction
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
Jupiter Ascending
Guardians of the Galaxy
Other (list in post)
Marvel settles with the family of Jack Kirby, co-creator of characters from three of your top movies from this summer (and every summer).
During his decades in comics, Kirby created or co-created Captain America, the Hulk, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, Iron Man, Doctor Doom, the Silver Surfer, Magneto, the Black Panther, Ant-Man, the Red Skull, Galactus and dozens of other comic book characters, helping define Marvel Comics during the Silver Age.
The issue had been whether Kirby, who died in 1994, created the characters under work-for-hire deals, in which case he would not be entitled to any profits from the toys, video games or blockbuster movies starring them. In the 1960s his longtime partner Stan Lee became the public face of Marvel, and the once-close collaborators became estranged over creative credit — resulting in Kirby’s defection to rival DC Comics in the early 1970s.
Not really. His Fourth World books were OK, but not spectacular. While there's some debate about sales figures, his arrival (return, since he did quite a few books in the early '40s) didn't turn the company around. And he was gone in a few years. Hiring Jenette Kahn as publisher in '76 helped get things started. But the "quality" resurgence came more in the early/mid '80s when the British invasion of talent happened.
I am assuming the contest is now over. Final results I used are here (sans Captain America and Rio 2 which they consider spring releases. I shoehorned them in below):
- Guardians of the Galaxy - $319,169,216
- Captain America: The Winter Soldier - $259,766,572
- Transformers: Age of Extinction - $245,370,666
- Maleficent - $240,366,802
- X-Men: Days of Future Past - $233,893,992
Biggest surprises -
- Amazing Spider Man 2 - 95% picked, finished 6th with $202,853,933 (okay, not really a surprise as it was close, but the movie was a big disappointment compared to its predecessor)
- How to Train your Dragon 2 - 84% picked, finished 10th with $175,859,659 (good movie with little to no competition that just couldn't hang on)
- Guardians of the Galaxy - 13% picked, finished #1 with $319,169,216
- Maleficent - 0% picked, finished 4th with $240,366,802
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - 0% picked, finished 9th with $187,182,309 (beating Dragon)
- Million Ways to Die - 15% picked, finished 27th with only $42,720,965
- Rio 2 - 20.5% picked, finished with $131,538,435 (roughly 12th)
Feel free to check my math, but I think NashvilleDevil is the only person who went 4 out of 5, missing only Maleficent.
"There can BE only one."
I blame Kristen Stewart for my poor performance. She caused Snow White and the Huntsman to crater so badly (despite her Twilight fans) that I was scared off of picking Maleficent as I initially intended.
I blame the knowledgeable posters who predicted Spidey 2 to be a lock. Y'all convinced me to pick a movie I cared little or nothing about.
I blame good parenting for the failure of Train Your Dragon. Just not enough parents dumping younger kids at a kids movie while they shop, or have an adult lunch.
I blame society for Transformers.
It is not available for viewing online, but Clooney showed some Tomorrowland footage at comic-con that was full of great action sequences. The crowd was wowed.
Has Brad Bird made anything that wasn't instantly one of the best films of the year? Iron Giant, Incredibles, Ratatouille, and Ghost Protocal all scored above 94% on Rotten Tomatoes. That's absurd! I just hate that he seems to take 3+ years in between each project.
-Jason "much as I like JJ Abrams, I wish Disney had given Star Wars to Brad Bird" Evans
Why are you wasting time here when you could be wasting it by listening to the latest episode of the DBR Podcast?
Since we started the summer movies in April when will we be starting the winter movies? Around election time or a week or so before Thanksgiving?
Timely question. Jason posted last year's contest on October 21 and gave us 9 days to vote.
Assuming that this year's contest ignores the October 31 weekend, here are the wide-release contenders. Info taken from Box Office Lazarus:
Interstellar (limited 11/5, wide 11/7)
Big Hero 6 (11/7)
Beyond the Lights (11/14)
Dumb and Dumber To (11/14)
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 (11/21)
Horrible Bosses 2 (Wed 11/26)
The Penguins of Madagascar (Wed 11/26)
The Pyramid (12/5)
Top Five (limited 12/5, wide 12/12)
Exodus: Gods and Kings (12/12)
The Hobbit: You've Seen This All Before (Wed 12/17)
Annie (12/19)
Night at the Museum: The Secret of the Tomb (12/19)
Hot Tub Time Machine 2 (Thu 12/25)
The Interview (Thu 12/25)
Into the Woods (Thu 12/25)
Paddington (Thu 12/25)
Unbroken (Thu 12/25)
I didn't include award-bait films with limited releases, that often appeal to DBR voters who like a few dramatic wildcards. Their release destiny is even less set in stone, but here are a few:
The Theory of Everything (11/7)
Foxcatcher (11/14)
The Imitation Game (11/21)
Wild (12/5)
Inherent Vice (12/12)
American Sniper (Thu 12/25)
Our winter poll doesn't seem to go into actual Winter much since it is pretty much decided by the New Year, should be renamed "the holiday season poll".
I'd like to vote now for our Summer poll to NOT include movies that Hollywood itself does not count as "Summer movies".
Look, a studio can release "Winter Soldier" in early April, it does not make it a Summer movie, which is why Captain America wasn't included in the Summer totals. It made a TON of money, but just because a movie makes a ton of money does not mean it should be in our poll. Hell, it would have made it even more challenging, I think.
I don't know what movies are being released during the Final Four this year, but I have no doubt there will be a block buster. A non Summer block boster; leave it off the list.
Q "Why do you like Duke, you didn't even go there." A "Because my art school didn't have a basketball team."
I hear ya and you are right. I had included Cap because I thought it might make the contest a bit tougher, adding another contender. But, you are right that the true nature of the contest is to pick movies that make their money in the summer-- beginning of May to the end of September. We will honor that next year and won't be including Fast and Furious 7 or other April movies.
I will get the Holiday contest (Nov until end of January) started in a few days... early next week at the latest.
-Jason "I think the Holiday contest will be tough... there are 3 mortal locks, IMO, but at least 4 or 5 really solid contenders for the final 2 spots" Evans
Why are you wasting time here when you could be wasting it by listening to the latest episode of the DBR Podcast?
Christmas got a little less bloated. According to this article, Paddington moved to January and Hot Tub Time Machine 2 bumped to February.
Yeah, but neither of those were going to be even tiny factors in our poll. I doubt either would have even been among the films listed to vote upon.
-Jason "the tough thing with the Winter polls is knowing if an Oscar contender is going to generate big buzz and make big bucks throughout the January award season... I could see Unbroken doing that" Evans
Why are you wasting time here when you could be wasting it by listening to the latest episode of the DBR Podcast?
I wrote this last August. I bring it up because today I read this Grantland article from Kevin Lincoln dated November 10 that, in many more words, says the exact same thing. Even the bit about William Devane. He leaves out Anthony Michael Hall, maybe because of the response from Highlander upthread.
Who are you, Kevin Lincoln? Your tweets tell me you're a Duke fan. How long have you been following DBR? Let me know the next time you have a deadline and you need a story idea. Or, you know, just search my posts again.
Some good news for Cato
http://www.msn.com/en-us/movies/revi...pic/ar-AA8W4Ik