OFFICIAL NEWS A Lasting Record Of Solo's Financial Performance.

What Lucasfilm should have done was slam the breaks on everything and rewrite episode 9 to be a direct refutation of TLJ(right down to its treatment of luke skywalker, sue mark hamill for damages if he refuses to come back), Now Episode 9 is filming with a script by chris terrio who has made a similarly divisive BATMAN V SUPERMAN and a disobedient director who respects Rian johnson too much(jj abrams).

 

If Kennedy walks out of Lucasfilm for the last time sometime before Episode 9 gets released, she will have been fired.

They can frame it any way they like. A push, a gentle shove, a quit for bigger challenges, she needed some fresh air, whatever to make it not BE an actual firing on the books.

But make no mistake, that's what it will be. She will have been fired.

But... it hasn't happened until it happens. I've said for a while I thought they were not wanting to interfere with the release of Solo and for it to perform without interference to see where it landed, before they started heads rolling. But heads rolling we're very likely to see. And I don't think it'll just be Kennedy, but a house cleaning.

Disney does not lose hundreds of millions of dollars on a film(not even the trades are willing to claim it'll break even, and those guys would sell their mothers if it'll make Disney look good. Just what the what Daily Plunge?), and on a level not seen since John Carter. And certainly not on a prized IP like Star Wars. Solo is dying on a level that makes Justice League look like a successful film.

Trying to make it a direct refutation of TLJ is kind of silly. They're kind of in a no-win scenario at the moment. They have to somehow find a way of taking the first two films, not pitching anything, while finding a way to move on. All while having to conclude the trilogy presumably with a happy ending due to the backlash from TLJ.

And really... as stated in the Rey's parents thread, in this position if you're falling off a cliff, you might as well try to fly and simply have the Dark Side completely win out with Rey getting completely torn down to the rivets by the end of the film. They'd then build her back up with the big comeback in 10-12, with that trilogy ending the Saga. That would then mirror or 'rhyme' with the first six films.

Remember, 3 ended with Anakin getting torn down to the rivets and becoming Vader. I've always wondered if anybody would ever have the guts to do what Lucas couldn't and actually have that happen to end a trilogy without knowing what comes after. I doubt we'll see it, but i'd die and go to heaven if they did, because the reactions alone would be worth the price of multiple admissions.

 

list of fan approved plot points that are things fans will love

1. Make the knights of ren appear and to be subversive have them be anti-heroic and charismatic, Make them team up with reys new jedi to take on.....

2. THE PRIME JEDI, who was snoke the whole time, who is trying to get a new body, This new body will allow him to take control of the cosmic force...that new body possibly being ben solo in the end where rey saves him. They are informed of the prime jedi nature by.......

3. the resurrected Luke skywalker, who used his sisters life force to take temporary physical form...as he reconciles with ben solo and the knights of ren. they are helped by....

4. Moderates within the first order who is being lead by admiral FEL, who is working with the galactic alliance to take down the rest of the first order and reform the empire to the new Fel imperium. all of these plot points will effectively...

5. Squeeze rose right out the movie but also allow for...

6. Finn having to learn the force from rey...

7. for all of it to come together in the end when the light and dark siders have to combine their power to destroy the PJ forever

similar to this

 

Wow! That is something.

 

Rick Ross was head of Disney studios? wow!

 

But you talking from a Bob Iger - and the board - POV. Correct me if im wrong, they weren't any youtube videos about sacking Rick Ross for his SJW values.

What do I know, maybe they sack Kennedy and the general audience suddenly coming back again and even greater numbers.

 

Or maybe they replace her with some real SJW nutjob and the next SW movie would be about oppressed minorities, gay romance and open misandry. This belief that firing KK would fix everything is irration.

 

The PT did decent numbers in china for the time of their release tbh.

 

With regards to Disney and their expectations...

There were reports that Disney was expecting this to bomb as far back as 2017. The film was in trouble from day one--nobody wanted this film to exist. Then the film did exist, and the production fell apart under the directors Lord and Miller, and they essentially had to start filming over. They had already had on-set tensions, problems with editing the footage coming from Lord and Miller, and they even had to hire an acting coach for Ehrenreich. The budget was going out of control and they had no film. Howard was brought in to get the film done, done quickly, and done competently, which he accomplished.

Disney gave up on the film at that point, and you can tell from the marketing.

There hardly was any marketing.

Kathleen Kennedy could have produced the greatest Star Wars film in years, and it wouldn't make a difference if there was no marketing for it, no hype build up. They didn't release a frame of footage all of 2017. They had no poster, only a logo, until early 2018, and when they first put out their first character posters in the initial marketing run-up, they had to be pulled because of a plagiarism lawsuit. The first teaser was out in February--4 months before the film came out. TFA had a teaser thirteen months before release. More than three times the period of build up. Rogue One and Last Jedi had nine months, still more than double Solo's. And there was not a big marketing push with tie-ins and toys, and television appearances. Not even a Celebration convention this year, and this film was absent from the last Celebration.

In other words, the reports were true--Disney expected it to bomb in 2017, so they let it quietly be released and cut their losses.

They were never expecting this to be a hit, and they did not give it the push to become one. Kathleen Kennedy will escape unscathed because it's not her job to sell the film, it is the marketing team, and Disney put the breaks on the marketing. As long as it's a decent film--that's how to protect the brand. Few go to see it, and those that do find it not-embarrassing. Disney does fine because Infinity War is kicking ass, and the massive profits of Black Panther and The Last Jedi at the start of the year are still coming in. The bigger picture is that all is well.

People always project their own frustration with Kathleen Kennedy onto the situation; they want her to fail, and so they see it everywhere. She produced three of the biggest films of the last three years, three times in a row, one of which was the biggest film of the year (TLJ), one of which was one of the biggest hits of the year (R1), and one of which was one of the biggest earners in history (TFA). This was a film that was pushed on her by George Lucas before she was settled in with the company and probably seemed like a good decision at the time--Lucas certainly thought so. But the movie came apart during filming. The situation with Solo was a production disaster which she successful salvaged into a film that is actually half decent, got okay reviews, and will not lose money at the box office. Move on to the next big hit--and Episode IX will be a big hit, especially with the thirteen months of marketing lead in they will have, like TFA.

It's all about marketing, guys. Marketing is the difference between an indie hit making money, and being another underrated film no one heard of. When Disney made the decision to not start showing footage of this to anyone until April, and then release it in the aftermath of their own Infinity War, they knew what the score was. They have marketing teams that were telling them what we already knew here--that no one wanted the Solo movie to exist from day one, and the film had a toxic reputation because of all the bad press from the production. It had nothing to do with TLJ; if anything that would be a palate-cleanse, a fan-favourite character movie with the writer of ESB and TFA, directed by Ron Howard, and you know it's actually half good. Only weirdo hardcore fans--and a percentage of them at that--like us will even contemplate staying away "to teach Kathleen Kennedy a lesson." No one knows who she is, and no one cares. All the fans raving about the "failure" of this and SW brand going up in flames just seem like weirdos to everyone else. You can make people see any stupid Transformers film if you market it enough and shove it down peoples throats. Disney expected this film to not be a hit, and it's not, they move on and laugh all the way to the bank with the biggest hits of 2017 and 2018 regardless.

 

I don't think those reports were from Disney, but let's not act other studios don't know how to twist the knife. There was a lot of garbage leaks that help fan the flames of "this is a disaster."

I agree the marketing was terrible, but some of that's just on Disney. They refused to have a trailer of any kind before The Last Jedi. People even argued here that it would confuse the marketing for TLJ to have Solo trailers. This is something Disney will have to figure out. Marvel promotes several films at once with trailers before the film. Heck, they're able to do this with other Marvel films they don't control going on at the same time. Waiting until the end of January to start promoting this film was bizarre.

 

Interesting video about the theme

 

Alden's take on the Solo box office. As always, he's a super good guy that takes the high road, and he's not wrong.

 

Solo's second week comparison is affected by the December holiday break TFA, RO, and TLJ got so it's not the best time for direct comparisons. Still not a great number.

 

Probaly, in the third week, Solo will be only on number 3 on USA BO charts.

Wow.

 

Number 2 in USA this week, $15,154,000, total: $176,105,474

 

It's dropping like a stone... fast... part of me is shocked it beat Deadpool 2 though, though only by 2 million. So far it has about 200m to go before it breaks even. Yikes.

 

Actually did a little better this weekend than expected.

 

i'm glad you have quoted his/her whole post so that everyone can see it.. i think it's important, as vulgar as it is.

thanks for acting so quickly @Trevor