PatD

"Superman III"; "Alien Resurrection"; and "Star Trek" (2009) are WTF? turning points to a franchise. It's when there's a genre movie series that has a serious dramatic core jarringly has an installment that changes everything--making everything farcial--and it can never fully recover and can never truly be taken as any kind of serious cinema again. It's a like campiness turned into an incurable retrovirus. It essentially turns a franchise into a joke.
Case in point: compare the openings of "Superman: The Movie" and "Superman III"--it's mind-blowing that they belong to the same series.

Some jokes can rake in the cash (Trek '09) and some not (Alien: Resurrection)

Now, there are movies that add broad humor without diffusing the dramatic elements of a film series--"Star Trek IV"; "Superman II" (kinda); and "Return of the Jedi" (for the most part). But it's a balancing act that is rarely done well.

Is there a cure for the "DELIBERATELY-turn-the-movie series-into-a-joke" disease?

Supermallet

Star Trek '09 is a better film than Return of the Jedi.

TGM

I thought Star Trek 2009 was second only to The Wrath of Khan and First Contact, so for me, this threads premise starts on shakey ground.

islandclaws

I'll agree on your first two exmaples, but you lost me on the third. Although, I'm also not a big Trek nerd. Big Trek nerds seem to hate the fact that JSP now enjoys their series.

gmanca

The only real cure is for studios to choose producers who care about a franchise beyond the gross. You look at the Salkinds and how they didn't care that they pissed Donner off or how Fox basically cut Walter Hill out of Alien franchise due to his fear of Resurrection ruining it.

In regards to Star Trek(2009) I will reserve judgment on the sequel before I say whether it ruined the franchise. Even with the light-hearted take it had on the sci-fi elements, it was still a good film, which the franchise really hadn't had since the release of VI.

redrum

Star Trek 09 was my favorite film that year

PatD

At least there were no lens flares in ever frickin's scene "Return of the Jedi".

jaeufraser

Star Trek 2009 was a turning point for the franchise. It was the turning point where the franchise stopped sucking.

Kind of the opposite of your other examples.

DarthVong

Wait....what?

Star Trek 09 breathed life into the series.

Supermallet

At least Star Trek had no Ewoks.

DarthVong

PatD

That's why I'm a little glad about the winning streak of Nolan on the Batman franchise--as long as a Schumacher-type doesn't get in charge of it.

And I still don't understand the love-fest for Trek-09. What serious difference is there between "Trek 09" and "Batman and Robin"? They're both farces that are a 180 degree turn from what came before.

gmanca

Ahm...

PatD

^^
You're basically are confirming what I'm saying.

redrum

Hokeyboy

NOTHING is tastier than the sweet sweet tears of whining Trekkies.

Hokeyboy

Do me a favor: define "farce".

PatD

Compare and contrast the tones.

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<object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/LQAwgSYHDvA?fs=1&hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/LQAwgSYHDvA?fs=1&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object>

And maybe that's the thing: "Star Wars": "Lord of the Rings" "Batman", ect. and considered serious pop art, but Star Trek is regarded from the get-go as schlock since it's origins are from 60s television.

Supermallet

That guy was way cooler than Ewoks.

So you're telling me that Star Trek V was less of an insult to the series than Star Trek '09?

PatD

^^
That's like comparing "Return of the Jedi" with "The Phantom Menace". "Jedi" and "Trek V" at least TRY to jibe with the canon and the tone of the established canon.

And what's the difference SERIOUSLY, between "Trek 09" and "The Phantom Menace"? Beyond some glib, "well one sucks, and the other doesn't."

Supermallet

Well, I can see this conversation is going nowhere fast. I had enough talk about trolls in the Armond White thread. I'll see you later.

Luther Heggs

PatD

Why is voicing an unpopular opinion without attacking anyone considered trolling? I didn't like these movies and I offered reasons why. Is that not discussion?

OldBoy

I think u are clearly talking out your ass to get a rise out people with Star Trek 2009 as an example.

PatD

^^
If I had said "The Dark Knight"? Would that have been less provocative?