Star Wars The Last Jedi *SPOILERS*

[ChrisIII]

So there's a deleted scene involving Luke's third lesson to Rey.

spoilers:

When Rey sees smoke in the distance, Luke tells her that raiders frequently attack the fish-nuns. When she insists they come to the aid of the fish-nuns, Luke forbids her, saying the raiders would only come back in stronger numbers the next time when she's not there to help. Rey leaps into action anyway only to find the smoke is coming from a party the fish-nuns are having with Chewbacca and BB-8. Rey is pissed because Luke is wasting her time when the Resistance needs their help. Luke tells her he wanted her to disobey him, because the world needs an independent thinker more than someone attached to a rigid Jedi code.

end of spoilers

The scene was cut because it was deemed to make Luke too unlikeable. I can see that, but it also highlights that Luke genuinely wants Rey to learn something, and he supports her going back out into the world to make a difference--just not in the manner of the Jedi. This also gets into the idea that the Jedi were too bureaucratic in the PT era.

I was wondering about that-there's a page in the visual dictionary showing male versions of the nuns and more of their village which I didn't recognize from the film.

[ChrisIII]

Maybe the actual lightsaber/force training actually doesn't take that long anyway, hence Luke and Rey's quick learning. In the prequels, it's strongly implied it takes the first twenty years or more for a Jedi to become a knight....

I'm guessing it that in addition to the force powers/lightsaber stuff, they'd probably also have other, more normal disciplines as well-remember they're basically a sort of peacekeeping/diplomatic force too rather than just good fighters with powers. Chronologically the first thing the Jedi do in the series is basically try to negoatiate a trade dispute!

[Serpico Jones]

They gave him a trilogy ...

They’ll take it away.

[Serpico Jones]

He's creating the new trilogy and absolutely nothing about this film's performance suggests Disney's going to sour on him. Hardcore fan blame on things they didn't like only goes so far when compared to the bottom line. Performance will always win out when there's a discrepancy between fan outcry and revenue. The movie is a smashing financial success. He's not going anywhere.

The movie dropped 69% in it’s second weekend at the box office, it has also caused major fan backlash. Bob Iger will want nothing to do with him moving forward, imo.

[Sacred Knight]

Those numbers, if accurate, don't matter as much as people who hate the film want them to matter. What matters is how much Disney anticipated making vs. what it ends up actually making. And you don't know the former. So there's no basis to make the claim that its underperforming. Considering has been absolutely no rumblings of any dissatisfaction on Disney's end by now, quite contrarily the chances are high that its not falling short in their expectations, at least not nearly enough to actually make a dent in their decision to let Johnson helm the new trilogy. The narrative of dire straits is just a false narrative peddled by the part of the fandom that hates the film but also desperately wanted to see it commercially fail as much as it failed in their own personal eyes. But that's simply not reality. By any stretch of the imagination. The reality is Rian Johnson made a smash hit financially and critically and will be helming a new trilogy.

[BeastieRunner]

They’ll take it away.

The movie dropped 69% in it’s second weekend at the box office, it has also caused major fan backlash. Bob Iger will want nothing to do with him moving forward, imo.

See you opening night of Rian's trilogy! He made the Mouse $1B ... argh people! Empire was divisive, too. Look up the articles from the time.

Jokes aside, he could easily walk away like Colin did.

[SuperiorIronman]

The movie dropped 69% in it’s second weekend at the box office, it has also caused major fan backlash. Bob Iger will want nothing to do with him moving forward, imo.

$1,229,695,635 (via Box office Mojo estimates)
The movie broke a billion dollars and had a budget of only 200 million. There's no reason to bother even adding a marketing budget to this, it's profitable.
Whatever drop occurred be it due to divisiveness, winter holidays, early fatigue, or just a general lack of interest means almost nothing when you consider that it made money to beat it's predecessor.

It's profitable for the company, Bob Iger wouldn't worry about it and sincerely doubt he is. TFA was a long awaited cinematic return, not to mention that this kind of thing has precedent among other franchises like Jurassic World. There was no way any follow up would make any more money. A billion is a good thing.

[Vegeta]

I think the real question is how is the merchandise moving? Disney had a hit with both critics and fans when they released "Up" but it didn't bring the cash in toys and other related products. That's why they had Pixar focus more on those terrible "Cars" sequels.

[Serpico Jones]

I think the real question is how is the merchandise moving? Disney had a hit with both critics and fans when they released "Up" but it didn't bring the cash in toys and other related products. That's why they had Pixar focus more on those terrible "Cars" sequels.

TLJ toy sales were down 47% from last year. That’s another major reason why I don’t think they’ll bring Rian back.

[WebLurker]

The movie dropped 69% in it’s second weekend at the box office, it has also caused major fan backlash. Bob Iger will want nothing to do with him moving forward, imo.

As far as I can tell, the movie has been overall financially successful and the "major" fan backlash is primarily one loud subset that's getting publicity because of the click bait potential and the way the web tends to create echo chambers. (Besides, historically, LucasFilm has been proven to not be worried about fan backlash.)

[Soubhagya]

The movie dropped 69% in it’s second weekend at the box office, it has also caused major fan backlash. Bob Iger will want nothing to do with him moving forward, imo.

That drop is due to many reasons.

1. It faced a lot of competition. There was Jumanji, Greatest Showman, Pitch Perfect 3. Each had a hook of big stars or sequel to a successful film.

2. It earned 220 million in the first place. If a film earns that kind of money in the first weekend surely a drop would look worse then what it should be. (It is still the 13th largest second weekend of all time).

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/alltime...?page=2&p=.htm

3. There is a significant number of people who were unhappy with the film. They are not the majority. But they are pretty vocal. It had an effect.

There is more to this story. In its third weekend it dropped by 26% compared to its second weekend. That is the second smallest drop in the third weekend after Rogue One's 22% drop. In the weekdays after that second weekend it jumped by a lot in comparison to previous days of the last weekdays when holidays finally kicked in. Observe from 25th to 28th in the link. It had an unusual schedule that Christmas fell on Monday.

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/...=starwars8.htm

A link by Scott Mendelson of Forbes.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottme.../#2e356f4e4c02

A video by John Campea who predicted the drop in the the first weekend itself. He gave four reasons. From which i have cited three.



If a film which has earned 1.2 billion worldwide within a month is still a disappointment due to falling short of expectations, maybe the problem is with expectations. It has earned quite a lot. And most of its metrics: critical scores and audience scores are pretty good.

People cite the Rotten Tomatoes audience rating. There are three major metrics for audiences. IMDB and Cinemascore are the others. Among the three, Cinemascore is the only reliable one because they actually ask the audiences who have seen it. IMDB and RT audience scores can be given by someone who has not watched the film. And vote for it multiple times by using different accounts. Both are not reliable. But if we take RT audience score the other two must be looked too. IMDB has 7.5. Cinemascore is at A.

So, as of now there is nothing to alarm the execs in Disney.

[ChrisIII]

I remember that after TPM a lot of people were begging George Lucas to quit, too.

I also remember a lot of misdirected hatred toward Lucas for the "Clone Wars" movie, a film he didn't really have any directorial or story involvement in, just some creative input. (and of course the following series turned out to be pretty good, and has certainly had a big impact on Disney's handling)

I'm pretty sure no Star Wars 'middle' movie has ever surpassed the trilogy starter in terms of gross. Star Wars and Phantom Menace are both the top in their trilogies.

[David Walton]

I think TLJ will sell really well in the home entertainment market and generate excitement about Ep IX.

I also think Disney will have optimistic Luke force-ghost figure prominently in the final installment. This will go a long way towards winning people back who didn't like his depiction in TLJ.

[Buried Alien]

I think TLJ will sell really well in the home entertainment market and generate excitement about Ep IX.

I also think Disney will have optimistic Luke force-ghost figure prominently in the final installment. This will go a long way towards winning people back who didn't like his depiction in TLJ.

With Carrie Fisher having passed and thus, any possibility for Leia's on-screen role for EPISODE IX extremely limited, Mark Hamill/Luke Skywalker might become a much bigger part of IX's plan than originally intended.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[ClanAskani]

The movie dropped 69% in it’s second weekend at the box office, it has also caused major fan backlash. Bob Iger will want nothing to do with him moving forward, imo.

TLJ has underperformed domestically. However, there are far more reasons than the backlash for the lack of box office legs:

1) Longer run time. Theaters can't show the movie as often and showings off of peak hours haven't done as well as TFA. Theaters with in-theater meal service were making a killing off of breakfast/brunch showings of TFA and Rogue One. Studio Movie Grill's breakfast/brunch menu is still Star Wars themed because this was huge for them.

2) Lack of family-friendliness. - Families wanting to take younger kids plus grandparents to movies over the holidays chose Jumanji over TFA. Demands for ticket refunds haven't been angry fanboys, it's been families walking out after about 20 minutes because they thought a 6 year old could see the movie and realized it's not a kids' movie.

3) Discounted Showings - Theaters have far more discounts for movies after their first 2 weeks of release. Frequently these deals are on Tuesdays, so people who want to see it again know they can just go on Tuesday and get a cheap tickets. Reserve seating makes it even easier and people are buying tickets weeks in advance to get a good seat for $5. Many of these discounts have only started in the last year.

Deadline's Friday preview of the weekend's box office (http://deadline.com/2018/01/the-comm...ce-1202241724/) has no mention of TLJ and Jumanji is expected to once again be the top movie. TLJ is a non-factor for this weekend's box office. It will likely be outside of the top 5.

Here's their Friday preview for MLK day weekend from last year: http://deadline.com/2017/01/patriots...ce-1201883066/ "Over four days, Fox’s Hidden Figures, Disney/Lucasfilm’s Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and CBS/Lionsgate’s wide break on Peter Berg’s Patriots Day are all in contention to gross between $20M-$22M to take the top three slots on the chart."

In terms of weekly box office, Rogue One and The Last Jedi will be about the same for week 4 (http://www.boxofficemojo.com/showdow...oguevforce.htm). Mojo hasn't updated yet today, but the last few days TLJ has been pulling in very similar numbers to Rogue One. It's only 30% above Rogue One because of the opening. The numbers now are exactly the same.

Scott's Mendelsohn's Forbes article about TLJ having more legs than Rogue One was completely off since it's not academy awards movies that TLJ has to deal with, it's far more competition which is taking screens. Disney required theaters showing TLJ to put the movie in their largest theater for 4 weeks and 65% of box office revenue went to Disney. If theaters broke Disney's rules, that went to 70% of revenue. Jumanji was doing better than Last Jedi and Last Jedi was longer, so some theaters decided that it was worth it to break Disney's rules.

The reason Disney could demand such terms was because TFA did so well and SW have such high multipliers. They're expected to keep bringing in ticket sales through January. When it comes to making demands to theaters about Episode IX, Disney is not going to be able to ask for that amount of the profits nor the same amount of demands. Disney will make far more money off TLJ because of the deal with theaters, but even if Episode IX makes more at the domestic box office, Disney will make less profits because they won't be able to make such ridiculous demands.

So, Bob Iger will not be happy because TLJ hurts Disney in the long term since they won't be able to make insanely ridiculous demands of theaters showing Star Wars movies in the
future. Ultimately, that's a good thing since it helps theaters be more profitable. But he's going to be upset that the movie wasn't more family friendly and shorter, and why Jumanji is taking that business away from SW.