Captain America 4 Brave New World - February 14, 2025

[crows]

Calm down bro!

NO

 

[loki2371]

The media is trying to protect Feige by saying this was a Bob Chapek disaster in the making, and yes, while Chapek was quoted as saying “pump out as much product as humanly possible” I still don’t absolve Feige from this Multiverse mess.

Of course. Chapek will be the perfect scapegoat and blamed for Disney's problems for years. Even though he was only really in charge for like 10 months without Iger breathing down his neck and still showering in his office. Iger was the one who set everything in motion.

And I'm sure he can never actually respond or make any kind of statement due to his fat golden parachute he received and the NDA he signed.

 

[choombaz]

Yeah Tony Gilroy isn’t much into Star Wars. You can tell because there’s like 1 alien in the whole of Andor S1.

He’s said multiple times sitting next to Kennedy lol in interviews he was never into Star Wars. He just wanted to tell a good story.

 

[MeatHookGekko]

And maybe get some writers.

From a pure logistics standpoint, what would help is if there were more active "anthology" shows still running. Things like The Outer Limits, Twilight Zone, Monsters, Freddy's Nightmares, etc, etc. Effectively, those productions were "feeder systems" to help establish who could do what in practical terms with limited resources/limited budget/limited time. They also created more chances for interpersonal connections that would reap rewards later. The most fruitful test case of this was X Files, where the standard issue "Monster Of The Week" offering ( basically running the anthology formula for the most part) gave everyone a random pairing of Vince Gilligan and Bryan Cranston. Which set the pathway for Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul.

The loss of the "mid tier" budget film is also problematic. I don't think we'd see a film like Mimic made today. But without it, we don't get Guillermo del Toro. Without del Toro and Mimic, you don't get the soft lift for The Host. That leads to the pathway to Parasite, which won Best Picture and helped the fast rise of the South Korean film industry. Again, another opportunity to see who can do what under complex constraints. Even though smaller films don't seem impactful at the time, they tend to have a domino effect into bigger results later.

You need a practical and consistent "feeder system" to create practical battle testing for high level creatives. The explosion of original content everywhere is a double edged sword, you are in a situation where some folks, real talent but not a lot behind them, get a chance, a real opportunity, and might break through. But you also are making huge bets with thin resumes.

The writing is an issue overall, I agree with you there. But there are trend shifts and logistics behind a lot of the core problems as well. For example, I think Jessica Gao ( of She Hulk) is actually a pretty good writer in terms of baseline talent. I don't think she was the right fit for a MCU show though. If 21/22 Jump Street got another sequel, she's probably more suited for something like that. But if she was able to write and direct 2 episodes of The Outer Limits, an episode of The X Files and an episode of Twilight Zone, for example, at that kind of pace and with those core limitations, that would have probably made things a lot easier for her as a showrunner. Or, more painfully, it would have set the conditions to realize much faster that she needed to be filtered out of contention earlier on and without as much total bloodshed.

My observation and experience, in dealing with inexperienced show runners and screen writers, is that

1) Most simply are not exposed to writing against what a practical production can do. You can't have 6 major battle scenes with a budget of an Outer Limits episode or a Stargate SG-1 episode. You might get 3 major battles across an entire season. A lot of times an effective writer with less skill but considers what can actually be filmed is more valuable than a pure natural writing talent. "Good writing" is often about telling a compelling story within the natural logistical limitations you have already. This is where IMHO Taylor Sheridan shines. His stories are typically character driven and often don't require extremely complex types of shoots. Shawn Ryan and The Shield is another good test case. They shot fast and dirty, but effective and on a thin budget.

2) Most screen writers struggle to adapt once they lose something. Once you start trimming a script out of things that are too expensive, too complicated, not enough time, too much SFX, too controversial, etc, etc, a lot of high level creatives can't adjust. This is where the core concept falls apart as changes are made. Not all changes and interference is bad, per se, but that's not the first impression most of the time. Some people have to be honest about the medium where they are more likely to thrive. Like Jessica Gao, again, might be better suited far away from live action. She Hulk would have been just way more effective as a purely animated series.

3) Most screen writers can't write fast enough. It's like professional sports. When you see a superstar in college throwing five touchdowns a game, it looks impressive. But in the NFL, everyone is big, everyone is fast, everyone is covered, everyone is smart, everyone can hurt you. The level of multi-tasking is very complex. You need to understand every major character and where they are going and where they have been before. All at once. It's just very difficult to do. It's even more punitive at speed. And you have to have the soft skills to "sell" your concept to difficult and often moronic people.

Maybe another way to put this is there has to be more practical conditions to put high level creatives in situations where there is operational scarcity. The industry does not reward the people who need ten years to hammer out a script and have 4 years to film it slowly. It rewards people who make make a lot of out a little, do it consistently, and delivery "big wins" against all odds as routine. And they can do it on a clock.

Sometimes the right choice isn't the sexy choice. CA4 with Renny Harlin doesn't sound sexy, but he's battle tested. He's not giving you Children Of Men or Interstellar, but he can give you effective, fast, dirty and on time. I mean it's a superhero film, it's not someone trying to remake 2001 A Space Odyssey here. The Big Mouse has a dirty habit of walking into a bakery and asking for an oil change for a truck. Like I keep saying, sometimes you just have to try to take the easy wins in front of you and not try to make things harder than they need to be.

 

[ZE_501]

From a pure logistics standpoint, what would help is if there were more active "anthology" shows still running. Things like The Outer Limits, Twilight Zone, Monsters, Freddy's Nightmares, etc, etc. Effectively, those productions were "feeder systems" to help establish who could do what in practical terms with limited resources/limited budget/limited time. They also created more chances for interpersonal connections that would reap rewards later. The most fruitful test case of this was X Files, where the standard issue "Monster Of The Week" offering ( basically running the anthology formula for the most part) gave everyone a random pairing of Vince Gilligan and Bryan Cranston. Which set the pathway for Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul.

The loss of the "mid tier" budget film is also problematic. I don't think we'd see a film like Mimic made today. But without it, we don't get Guillermo del Toro. Without del Toro and Mimic, you don't get the soft lift for The Host. That leads to the pathway to Parasite, which won Best Picture and helped the fast rise of the South Korean film industry. Again, another opportunity to see who can do what under complex constraints. Even though smaller films don't seem impactful at the time, they tend to have a domino effect into bigger results later.

You need a practical and consistent "feeder system" to create practical battle testing for high level creatives. The explosion of original content everywhere is a double edged sword, you are in a situation where some folks, real talent but not a lot behind them, get a chance, a real opportunity, and might break through. But you also are making huge bets with thin resumes.

The writing is an issue overall, I agree with you there. But there are trend shifts and logistics behind a lot of the core problems as well. For example, I think Jessica Gao ( of She Hulk) is actually a pretty good writer in terms of baseline talent. I don't think she was the right fit for a MCU show though. If 21/22 Jump Street got another sequel, she's probably more suited for something like that. But if she was able to write and direct 2 episodes of The Outer Limits, an episode of The X Files and an episode of Twilight Zone, for example, at that kind of pace and with those core limitations, that would have probably made things a lot easier for her as a showrunner. Or, more painfully, it would have set the conditions to realize much faster that she needed to be filtered out of contention earlier on and without as much total bloodshed.

My observation and experience, in dealing with inexperienced show runners and screen writers, is that

1) Most simply are not exposed to writing against what a practical production can do. You can't have 6 major battle scenes with a budget of an Outer Limits episode or a Stargate SG-1 episode. You might get 3 major battles across an entire season. A lot of times an effective writer with less skill but considers what can actually be filmed is more valuable than a pure natural writing talent. "Good writing" is often about telling a compelling story within the natural logistical limitations you have already. This is where IMHO Taylor Sheridan shines. His stories are typically character driven and often don't require extremely complex types of shoots. Shawn Ryan and The Shield is another good test case. They shot fast and dirty, but effective and on a thin budget.

2) Most screen writers struggle to adapt once they lose something. Once you start trimming a script out of things that are too expensive, too complicated, not enough time, too much SFX, too controversial, etc, etc, a lot of high level creatives can't adjust. This is where the core concept falls apart as changes are made. Not all changes and interference is bad, per se, but that's not the first impression most of the time. Some people have to be honest about the medium where they are more likely to thrive. Like Jessica Gao, again, might be better suited far away from live action. She Hulk would have been just way more effective as a purely animated series.

3) Most screen writers can't write fast enough. It's like professional sports. When you see a superstar in college throwing five touchdowns a game, it looks impressive. But in the NFL, everyone is big, everyone is fast, everyone is covered, everyone is smart, everyone can hurt you. The level of multi-tasking is very complex. You need to understand every major character and where they are going and where they have been before. All at once. It's just very difficult to do. It's even more punitive at speed. And you have to have the soft skills to "sell" your concept to difficult and often moronic people.

Maybe another way to put this is there has to be more practical conditions to put high level creatives in situations where there is operational scarcity. The industry does not reward the people who need ten years to hammer out a script and have 4 years to film it slowly. It rewards people who make make a lot of out a little, do it consistently, and delivery "big wins" against all odds as routine. And they can do it on a clock.

Sometimes the right choice isn't the sexy choice. CA4 with Renny Harlin doesn't sound sexy, but he's battle tested. He's not giving you Children Of Men or Interstellar, but he can give you effective, fast, dirty and on time. I mean it's a superhero film, it's not someone trying to remake 2001 A Space Odyssey here. The Big Mouse has a dirty habit of walking into a bakery and asking for an oil change for a truck. Like I keep saying, sometimes you just have to try to take the easy wins in front of you and not try to make things harder than they need to be.

All of this checks out. I've seen this play out across various creative disciplines, even experienced it myself in some scenarios.