Captain Marvel/Brie Larsen debacle

[cheebacheeba]

So here's a thing I've only just heard about that's happening right now...saw this on youtube, and they kind of did it, took it back, and then did it again.

Rotten Tomatoes seems to be trying to contain/cover up the fallout from Larsens rants.
Before a film comes out "rating" isn't there, it's got a "want to see" rating right?
It was plummeting.
Then they took it away. Nothing there.
When I went back to check it, it was there again (at an astoundingly low 30%), and then later, it was back to there being nothing there.
This isn't the first time RT has been accused of playing the game.

So anyone going to see this?
I guess as a white male I should say no...but to be honest before I heard about all this bullshit with her, I'd seen a teaser. I'm familiar with this incarnation of the character...I've always found them pretty bland, and the trailers just haven't really spoken to me - and that says a lot, as one of them actually has an old woman getting punched in the face!

I actually thought it was a little bit off that they chose to bring the female iteration of the character to the universe anyway...I mean I know the "old" Captain marvel is dead (yeah mcu, only a small thing like one of the first/most significant character deaths in modern comics history), but given his standing in comics history it would have been nice to see that character.
But hey, that's just one factor. That wouldn't have stopped me seeing the movie.

Just looks like...effectsy flying fight scenes.

Sure, I'll catch it on BluRay because God forbid Marvel makes a movie that's not tied-in to everything more than once a decade...just no interest in rushing along to it.

Look, I'm not too bothered by the shit the actress has been coming out with...I just take it as, she seems to be trying to come across as she is a person of substance, but it's kind of looking like she's not. This wouldn't make or break a film for me...I mean how many actors have been seen saying absolutely like brain-dead level shit in the past? It's just, she's coming across as the living embodiment of trying to look all progressive via regretful facebook post.

Anyone else following the "news"?
Anyone care?
Anyone gonna head along to see it?

[hammerfan]

1. Haven't followed the "news". What's her rant about?
2. I kinda care.
3. I'm hoping to see it.

[cheebacheeba]

Hm...to put it very, very short...Over a course of interviews and statements, she's kind of done her own Mel Gibson bit, but in a more passive aggressive way replacing "Jews" with "white males".

Yeah there's more specifics to it, and it's not nearly as yknow...Mel Gibson...but yeah, she's just got a bit of a dipshit of an attitude, putting unrelated things down to sexism, and seems to be one of those loudly proclaimed femenists that the real ones probably make fun of?

Personally I think she's just trying to give herself a platform of sorts or get some more attention/relevance because outside of TV she's still a relative unknown... but yeah she's just doing it the really, really wrong way.

Recently, the most fun one I've read about is that she started a gofundme or some such (yknow...you can't just spend 12,000 when you've just starred in a Marvel movie, to be sure)...so that disadvantaged young girls (that's nice, right?) can...go to see her movie. So, people - donate to these girls when the millionaire won't, so that they get to see her movie and make her more money. So altruistic.

These of course has resulted in a bit of a backlash. I'm surprised I haven't seen an actual organised petition against it just out of spite.

Me?
I don't hate her, I liked "united states of Tara". I think she's yknow...better than Kristen Stewart? but that's about it for me.
Never been against strong female characters...I mean, I came up on terminator and alien films. I had the best of them. Though, I'm just not really interested in this character, or the movie.
She's got some strong opinions. I don't like all of them.
I just really think she should consider talking through a PR agent for a bit...until she kind of gets a bit more used to her transition from the small screen. This shit is going to be damaging her rep, and the exposure she'll get purely on the fact it's a marvel film (not as though many white males see those...right...?) will really have it pour in.

[Elvis_Christ]

I've got pretty bored/burnt out on Marvel stuff recently with the exception of the Netflix shows so I'm struggling to care let alone drag my ass down to the theater to check it out. I was a bit disappointed in Venom so I'm just feeling unexcited in general... well until something like Logan hits the screen.

But yeah some faux feminism was to be expected really. Just like Black Panther was bound to spark debates on race. Privileged rich white people addressing issues of oppression is always pretty laughable and tiresome for the most part especially if it's for promoting their brand.

[Bloof]

When i was in my late teens and as my kids grew up, there were shows like "Bionic Woman", "Wonder Woman", "Xena: Warrior Princess" and even "Buffy". I dont really understand the "gofundme" page for young girls to go see a "woman superhero". Wasnt that like a thirty year ago thing?

[cheebacheeba]

When i was in my late teens and as my kids grew up, there were shows like "Bionic Woman", "Wonder Woman", "Xena: Warrior Princess" and even "Buffy". I dont really understand the "gofundme" page for young girls to go see a "woman superhero". Wasnt that like a thirty year ago thing?

That's exactly it...she's pretentious...doesn't acknowledge this stuff, bangs on about males and the patriarchy etc and how women haven't had the chance to represent like this...like hell...even if you don't count the classics, it's not as though female heroes/superheroes haven't been done - they're behind the curve if anything.


I've got pretty bored/burnt out on Marvel stuff recently with the exception of the Netflix shows so I'm struggling to care let alone drag my ass down to the theater to check it out. I was a bit disappointed in Venom so I'm just feeling unexcited in general... well until something like Logan hits the screen

Yeah I've stopped going to see them, but usually pick up the BluRay before too long of the ones I actually want to follow. Didn't bother with Black Panther because he's always just been a side character to me...not too interested, though I might have a look to see how the winter soldier stuff played out.
Never saw the second ant-man/wasp but I will, the first one was a refreshing break from all the forced cross over stuff.

Venom was...I didn't hate it...the creature looked the right size and sounded right, I don't think they got the Brock character right at all and while they managed to make a film that I found "entertaining enough", not having that Spider-Man connection to the origin and the pure loathing the character has...all that hate and anger that made him a superlative villain before his retribution/anti-hero arc. Huge chunk to cut out.
That and...symbiote vs symbiote? Visually that was a bit boring, with neither used being really creative.
I thought for "what it was", it was ok. For what it was.

I appreciated the style of Logan, but in my mind they've yet to make a GOOD Wolverine movie. God knows they've got enough good storylines to work with.


But yeah some faux feminism was to be expected really. Just like Black Panther was bound to spark debates on race. Privileged rich white people addressing issues of oppression is always pretty laughable and tiresome for the most part especially if it's for promoting their brand.

Yep. Tiresome, pointless and annoying...if you can't draw girls/women into your film on non agenda based interest...then you can't...the whole thing just looks more embarrassing than anything.


So the latest...

Apparently, Disney is now considering shutting down Marvel comics?
Coincidental timing?
Trying to threaten/punish all these "white trolls" that have spoken out against the shitty behaviour of your talent that's losing you money?

I guess, if that happens - Anyone holding on to some of them might be a happier collector than they thought they were going to be.

Ridiculous bullshit.
Stop making bad calls on actors that run their mouth so much.
Stop doing shit like "we have our own channel coming out, lets ruin and cancel all our netflix series that people actually like".
Stop over-merching the fuck out of all your licenses so you end up with nothing but t-shirts in bargain bins
...you know, there's a few things you could do aside from axing comics.

I mean seriously, I don't think it'll happen...but can you imagine?
Within a year of Stan Lee's death no less.
No more comics from Marvel?
Do they forget that any kind of interest in any of Marvels other "money makers" wouldn't be there, if not for this?
All print media is losing money...which is why you do things like digital subscriptions...but ffs keep the print for those that agree to paying fucking $7-8 for a comic so they can hold onto something real.

Honestly, if this happens because of the fallout/lost profit for Captain Marvel?
Between that, the netflix bullshit (eg, some of the best on screen marvel stuff EVER getting pissed away), between their shitty Star Wars effort/s, and coercing sites like Rotten Tomatoes for favourable treatment...I'm just done with Disney, and all things Disney/Marvel in the future.
I will still watch if something actually interests me, but I will pirate EVERYTHING.

Also...fuck rotten tomatoes...bunch of sellout fuckrags.
At least when IMDB lost their message boards (though I think they should have just IP banned trolls...) they still had a good product left behind, and a great information resource.
Audience scores and the "want to see" ratings were a big part of RT.
Now half of that is gone - because of THIS shit?
What next? No audience scores at all?
Just a speakerbox for Disney and whoever throws money at them?

I'm done with RT, and I would suggest the same for everyone.

[Elvis_Christ]

I think smaller runs of comics might make print still a viable option. I thought that was cool how there were no reprints of Millar's Magic Order.

Marvel really seem to fleece collectors too with really dumb amounts of variants (some of which were way overpriced or pointless).

Disney+ will bomb just for the fact that Netflix has more content and will always be ahead of the game. It sucks the Netflix Marvel shows got pulled but they will just hit the ground running with DC titles and the Millarworld catalogue.

[Sculpt]

Captain Marvel -- I've always had little interest in Captain Marvel because it's like Superman, who's super powers are rather boring because they are too powerful, too invincible, they risk nothing. So circa 2019, I really have no interest in seeing a flying, invincible superhero film.

Brie Larson -- I didn't know anything about this, but reading up -- The problem with her saying, "there's too many white male film reporters at this interview" is that it's literally racist and sexist without specifying a specific injustice. There's racist and sexist injustices to speak out against, but the makeup of the conference wasn't one of them.

She can identify and propose solutions to specific barriers, and encourage more women or other groups to get into certain fields, that's a positive way. There's an interest, physical and temperament factor in the makeup of certain fields, which by no means accounts for all types of disparity (which is more usually an affluency and class-exclusion issue), but mere group disparity in a field is not itself injustice, it's simply a data point.

Rotten Tomatoes/Cheeb -- So Cheeb, you say RT replaced the poor ratings page, with a blank ratings page, for Captain, and later replaced the blank ratings with more positive ratings, maybe more than once?

That sounds bad, but a case could be made for having a sufficient number of reviews correlating to the number of theatres the film is in. Reason is obscure films will have less reviews available.

On a related issue, to be evil, RT would have to cut out specific bad reviews, cause restarting the page won't change their reviews. Really one would have to know which critics were a part of the first page, and if they're missing from the second, to mean anything.

Anyway, I lean on Audience Score, not the Critics Score cause not only can Critics be shills (but suffer in reputation if they shill) from time-to-time, but not only do many feel pressures to inflate reviews, they support the film industry in general. The written reviews are the real value, not the rating.

[cheebacheeba]

I didn't know anything about this, but reading up -- The problem with her saying, "there's too many white male film reporters at this interview" is that it's literally racist and sexist without specifying a specific injustice. There's racist and sexist injustices to speak out against, but the makeup of the conference wasn't one of them.

Yup. That and the conference bit was only the latest. Throw that on top of saying "I don't need to hear from 40 year old white dudes about a wrinkle in time, it wasn't for them" (does this invalidate their thoughts?), generally continuing this "crusade" to, it seems, try to come across as very progressive, but just seems to be doing it in an ignorant way.
Like inclusion doesn't have to be a result of exclusion...and it's not the 50's...it's not really stand she needs to be taking.


So Cheeb, you say RT replaced the poor ratings page, with a blank ratings page, for Captain, and later replaced the blank ratings with more positive ratings, maybe more than once?

It was the "want to see" rating they took away.
When they got called on doing this to the captain marvel movie - hey came out a day or two later with a statement saying they did this because "people were confusing this with the film review score"...which nobody ever said...they took the "don't want to see" away, kept the "want to see", they made it across the site/movies to make it seem like they weren't just doing this under the Disney duress.

On a related issue, to be evil, RT would have to cut out specific bad reviews, cause restarting the page won't change their reviews. Really one would have to know which critics were a part of the first page, and if they're missing from the second, to mean anything

They aren't there yet...but after this it wouldn't surprise me if they moved onto doing that next.

[ImmortalSlasher]

I'm behind on the Marvel movies. I'll check out Captain Marvel though. I never really checked Rotten Tomatoes because I don't like the idea of scoring movies, video games, or whatever else. There are some great movies out there which I'm sure have bad scores. Doesn't mean that you shouldn't check them out if you like movies.

All those score systems do is prove that the company marketing departments got all the reviewers on the same page. Unless the movie is really good on its own. Checking those recent Star Wars movies, I see they have a good Rotten Tomato score but I think they are terrible.

I haven't seen the actress who plays Captain Marvel in anything else. But it's known that many movies are for the white male. If she really said there too many white male film reporters at this interview. Then I don't know, maybe she's trying to point it out like I believe others have said similar things before her. That actress that played in that so so Sucker Punch movie (good action scenes but pretty bad story line) said something similar about taking roles in movies that were for white males.

[cheebacheeba]

So...has anyone heard about this?

Opening weekend the movie is meant to have done quite well.
At the same time, there was people posting pictures from inside Captain Marvel sessions...and the cinemas are pretty empty?

There's been some (cinema) insiders claiming that for every session "x-amount" of tickets have been pre-purchased, for sessions that have been left relatively empty, and nobody has claimed any of these tickets for refund.
Another insider who wanted to remain anonymous said that in his smell cinema, for every session at least 25 of these no-show tickets had occurred. Again. No refund.

That and the weirdness that's been going on with a lot of cinemas on opening weekend bringing showings of all other films down to a bare minimum, or in some cases, cancelling all other sessions.

So the theory is, Disney may have been both coercing cinemas into making it largely the "only film available, and manipulating the box office perception of this movie on opening weekend as a face saving move.
I mean, not sure how this would help them financially...so if it's true, this is really not good.

[Sculpt]

So...has anyone heard about this?

Opening weekend the movie is meant to have done quite well.
At the same time, there was people posting pictures from inside Captain Marvel sessions...and the cinemas are pretty empty?

There's been some (cinema) insiders claiming that for every session "x-amount" of tickets have been pre-purchased, for sessions that have been left relatively empty, and nobody has claimed any of these tickets for refund.
Another insider who wanted to remain anonymous said that in his smell cinema, for every session at least 25 of these no-show tickets had occurred. Again. No refund.

That and the weirdness that's been going on with a lot of cinemas on opening weekend bringing showings of all other films down to a bare minimum, or in some cases, cancelling all other sessions.

So the theory is, Disney may have been both coercing cinemas into making it largely the "only film available, and manipulating the box office perception of this movie on opening weekend as a face saving move.
I mean, not sure how this would help them financially...so if it's true, this is really not good.
Who would be purchasing these tickets where 25 folks wouldn't show and not get refund??? Disney? That's a lot of money to spend just to have it announced Marvel was had a good opening weekend... unless the Marvel project was still trying to take in investors, which I don't think happens at this point. Of course Disney wants to keep Disney stock up (and sell more), but I'm not sure how much would really hinge on one film's opening weekend... Some, but not to spend millions on buying tickets, I wouldn't think.

I think there's naturally a fair number of no shows, and people just don't get the refund before the show starts, or never if it's too late to get a refund. Just guessing.

But it would be interesting if there was something to Disney pressuring theatres to remove film competition. Again, I don't see Disney giving them money for that... Plus I don't think Disney produces such a great percentage of films that they could scare theatre chains into doing this.

[cheebacheeba]

Who would be purchasing these tickets where 25 folks wouldn't show and not get refund??? Disney?
That's the theory.

not sure how much would really hinge on one film's opening weekend... Some, but not to spend millions on buying tickets, I wouldn't think.

Well, this is a character that they've announced that they want to be the new "face of the MCU" going forwards...so it might might just be one film and it's opening weekend, rather...could negatively effect other films going forward, to a point.
That, and the overall perception of the whole Disney/Marvel saga is already not looking so shiny for them, damage control is understandable. Methods seem questionable if there's anything to all this.

I know there was a big point made that people were unfairly trashing and "trolling" the movie prior to it's release, though most I ever saw was people saying "ok then, fuck it, I won't go".
But yeah apparently this huge opening weekend for them was "defeating the trolls", but if it wasn't a win...it wasn't a win...people know this.


I think there's naturally a fair number of no shows, and people just don't get the refund before the show starts, or never if it's too late to get a refund. Just guessing.
That I get, but the specificity of "25 per show", not returned, lends itself to the theory that these tickets have been kept, in order to artificially boost their numbers.

But it would be interesting if there was something to Disney pressuring theatres to remove film competition. Again, I don't see Disney giving them money for that...
I absolutely do.

Plus I don't think Disney produces such a great percentage of films that they could scare theatre chains into doing this.
They do make a fair amount of films, and I'm not just talking about Disney brand Disney. There's now all the Marvel and Lucasfilm stuff too, and Pixar if you wanna seperate that from the mother brand. It's all linked in, it's all a money making machine. The movies. The shows. The clothing. The toys.
They've got MONEY behind them...and a lot.
CCA coerces shops into only carrying their drink brands all the time.
Pepsico on the other side of that.
Big/popular brands CAN exert pressure to maintain exclusivity or to outweigh the competition. Products pay for shelf space and prominence - a multimedia giant could definitely do the same on a larger scale.
I mean did they?
Did they not?
Who knows...but the evidence was there for anyone looking online at a movie cinema guide on opening weekend. The cases I've seen are everywhere and on multiple cinema sites - other movies have had WAY less screenings in way less cinemas, in some it was nothing BUT Captain Marvel showing, and they weren't just little independent one-screen cinemas either.

That and hundreds of bot accounts giving the exact same positive review all over the place, word for word, under different names.

I don't think the truth will ever fully come out...but I believe people have been paid off, yes, and both the box office numbers of this movie and the ratings it's been given have been for the larger part a huge farce.

I honestly believe this might be one of the biggest face saving cover ups in movie history...and not because it's a "bad" film.
Nobody has really given it horrible reviews, most are "it's ok, but not great"...
It's fallout - and they don't want it known that people ARE actually in control of how well a film does, they won't be disrespected and if they are, it's dollars down the drain.
No, rather...they pull this shit so they can say "We didn't need you anyway, look at the numbers", and evidently, this might keep their shareholders happy?

This is a slippery slope here...the audience should be able to speak, and the public should be able to voice concerns or comment about conduct of those involved without being auto-labelled as a misogynist/sexist/troll.

Whole thing is a joke and I think this is the beginning of the end for whatever good was left in the MCU.

[Sculpt]

If there's something to it, sounds like a hot story. Plus, it's free adv for the film either way. If you see a news story about it, give us a link

I'm no fan of disney or Cap Marvel, but it looks like the film is doing fairly well, wiki shows close to $600m worldwide already on the mild budget of $175m... but it also reads an ad budet of $300m, and they'll need $750m worldwide to break even. Breaking even is fine for the movie makers, but not great for investors.

Wiki includes this about the RT 'want to see' issue:

Ahead of the film's release, Captain Marvel's "Want to See" score—an audience anticipation poll on Rotten Tomatoes—had fallen to 28%.[169] Reports described the decline as an effort by some to review-bomb the film's page with negative comments attacking the film and Larson for their perceived feminism.[170] Rotten Tomatoes changed the "Want to See" feature shortly after, showing only the number of people indicating interest in the film instead of a percentage. The announcement said this was part of a larger redesign of the site.[171][169] By 8 am on opening day in the United States, the film held a 33% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes from more than 58,000 reviews, which was more audience reviews than Avengers: Infinity War had during its entire theatrical run. Analysts attributed the low score and sheer number of reviews to online trolling. Rotten Tomatoes later stated a bug was responsible for the high count of reviews, and by 1 pm the number of counted ratings was down to 7,000 with an audience score of 35%.[172] As of March 15, 2019, the audience score was at 62% based on 66,928 reviews.[158]

RT has critics 79, audience 62.