Fandom Isn't Broken, But It May Have Road Rage

[Da Boat]

That's kind of my point though, that that notion if somewhat debatable. When you're talking something like Ghostbusters that was a huge mainstream sensation? Sure. But Iron Man 3 is currently Marvel's highest grossing solo film (over 1 billion dollars) and has a decent 75 percent at Rotten Tomatoes. Clearly the angry fans couldn't do much to hurt the movie.

The same thing could be said for a lot of superhero films that have controversial elements. You named Batman v. Superman. Yeah, it had a positively atrocious version of Superman that pissed off a lot of fans, but it also just wasn't a very good movie. That Zack Snyder wiped his ass with the characters is just one of many reasons why it didn't work, just like Fantastic Four. The movie had on set drama from the beginning and got savaged by critics upon release. That wasn't fans destroying the movie, it was everyone destroying the movie.

Iron Man 3 was a big exception though. Cause it was a jointed effort cross-promoted in China where the movie was launched in China and it opened big over there (cause China there's a sort of quota where there's a limited number of movies that are chose to be shown there).

So basically Marvel calculated that they could take the hit with the hardcore fans as long as the China box office would be big and it was huge. And for that I say fuck them!

[GreenLanternRanger]

I think another problem with fans/people these days in general is alot of people arguably dont have the emotional maturity not to take everything personally. Thus when something they dont like happens, they take it as a personal attack.

And dont get me wrong, I know stories are supposed to stir up emotions in us, and we humans are by nature emotional creatures. But I think alot of the time people let their negative emotions have too much control over them.


As for the social justice crowd. There is nothing wrong with wanting to make positive change in society, but attacking and calling people names for not agreeing with your views is just childish and doesn't help a cause. And making silly petitions/ twitter hashtags like "#givecapaboyfriend" doesnt help either.

[Holt]

So basically Marvel calculated that they could take the hit with the hardcore fans as long as the China box office would be big and it was huge. And for that I say fuck them!

That's actually not true. It made 408 million domestically, which is more than the domestic totals for Iron Man, Iron Man 2, either of the first two Captain America movies, any of the Thor movies, Ant-Man, and Guardians of the Galaxy. The truth is that "hardcore" Mandarin fans simply aren't that huge a group. He's not a well known character. That's what I've been saying from the beginning here, that a lot of these characters are far too obscure to actually make much of a difference.

I think another problem with fans/people these days in general is alot of people arguably dont have the emotional maturity not to take everything personally. Thus when something they dont like happens, they take it as a personal attack.

I agree. This goes into what I was saying before, which is that nothing can be considered just a story development anymore. Now it has to be considered an attack on me and my values if I don't agree with it.

[trooper_thorn]

I agree. This goes into what I was saying before, which is that nothing can be considered just a story development anymore. Now it has to be considered an attack on me and my values if I don't agree with it.

When the supporters are constantly claiming that those opposed to a movie hate women I think we can all agree that we've gone past story development to personal attacks.

[Holt]

When the supporters are constantly claiming that those opposed to a movie hate women I think we can all agree that we've gone past story development to personal attacks.

In this case there were idiots on both sides like Judd Apatow who absolutely fanned the flames and just made things worse. But I'm talking more in general. It's a trend I've been noticing for the past decade or so that I've been into comics. A gay or lesbian character existing is corporations shoving political correctness down our throats. Anything bad happening to a member of any minority group (regardless of context) is racism or misogyny. It just gets too heated and sometimes people need to accept that not everything is an attack on them. A bad guy with views vaguely paralleling any real world political faction is a sign that Marvel hates said political group.

[trooper_thorn]

In this case there were idiots on both sides like Judd Apatow who absolutely fanned the flames and just made things worse. But I'm talking more in general. It's a trend I've been noticing for the past decade or so that I've been into comics. A gay or lesbian character existing is corporations shoving political correctness down our throats. Anything bad happening to a member of any minority group (regardless of context) is racism or misogyny. It just gets too heated and sometimes people need to accept that not everything is an attack on them. A bad guy with views vaguely paralleling any real world political faction is a sign that Marvel hates said political group.

Oh I fully agree with the belief that people need to accept that not everything is personal, trust me I'm a political junkie and I am very familiar with this concept. But I think we can both accept that sometimes the statements/portrayals are so obvious that it's not just an issue of over-sensitivity.

The actions of Sony and the supporters of this movie have done nothing but piss off the people who have been critical of the new Ghostbusters trailers. They make absurd claims about popular reviewers, they deceptively edit comments on their videos leaving only the most incendiary stuff, and they post article after article accusing the critics of all sorts of horrible things. I think at this point we can assume it's an intentional tactic.

[Deadxman]

Screw with Ewoks hater! Jedi was great.

No screw You!
This was the first sign Lacus was nuts!

They were originally to be Wookies!

[minuialear]

It's a symptom of the culture wars. Every victory made by a group has to be framed as them taking away something from someone else, which is why we have ridiculous controversies like people claiming gay people getting married somehow infringes on their rights. Fandom is the same way. Instead of just dismissing or ignoring a story direction or character you don't like, people have to act as though it's a personal attack on them and their beliefs. Instead of being a rationale adult and saying "Oh, good for them," it becomes "Those bastards are stealing my rights!"

More than that, people look for stuff to be angry about. If you make changes to a C or D list hero or heroine now, suddenly everyone comes out of the wood work to complain about how their favorite character is "ruined" or is being stolen from them. I've seen people feign outrage over something happening to a character they profess to like, and then not knowing much, if anything about them. How many times has there been a newly announced character who suddenly becomes the subject of controversy from a bunch of people who have probably never touched a comic book, but suddenly have a violent opinion on them?

100% agree.

Heck, look at all the Johnny Storm outrage; Fantastic Four sales were so bad Marvel gave up on a comic starring them, and all of a sudden people are coming out of the woodwork to complain about the fact that a black dude was playing the role, as if their favorite character of all time was being ruined. Maybe ten people were buying those comics; how could thousands of people actually claim they're personally affected by a casting move like that?


Not to mention: okay, so if they ruined Batman for a guy in Comic line A, Batman isn't ruined forever for him. It's not like they're burning all the old comics and replacing them with the new Batman he doesn't like. Just skip the Batman comics you don't like, and refer back to the ones you do. It's what every grown adult has had to do in their lifetime of reading comics, at one point or another. Yeah you can be disappointed; yeah you can be angry that you can no longer enjoy comics anymore. But after that? Vote with your wallet; not with threats.

And making silly petitions/ twitter hashtags like "#givecapaboyfriend" doesnt help either.

I would agree that, say, calling people homophobic if they aren't actively pushing to make a straight character gay is/would be a poor way to address diversity in films/comics. I don't really see the problem with making hashtags asking a producer/writer/whomever to consider making a character black/Asian/gay/whatever, though. It's not going to happen unless fans ask for it; so long as they don't insult anyone who doesn't want to support the hashtag (and remain civil to those who actively oppose it), I don't really see how they're hurting anyone or anything.

[chamber-music]

Respect your audience you won't get backlash.

Amy Pascal got rid of Ivan Reitman as advisor for Ghostbusters cause she didn't want to honor the franchise, she wanted to use an existing franchise to promote a female-centric franchise. This was in the Sony leaks. When you go with an agenda instead of doing good movies don't be surprised if the fans are not going to like it. Cause you are not doing it for them.

Same thing with the non-Asian Mandarin and Ancient One. They went with a "who cares about the fans of these characters" mentality so fans are gonna feel disrespected.

Act with class, honor the fans and they'll kiss your feet. I promise you.

Non-Asian Mandarin and Ancient One choices was more to do with Marvel being scared of offending Asian people and any backlash causing a drop in the movies profits.

Shane Black said the 'All Hail The King' one shot was to appease the fans

[neonrideraryeh]

Sooner or later your BOSS is going to look at that other ignored audience and see how much money they put into your industry.

If you only toss out straight white male lovefest films and the top box office films for the year are those with POC & women. Someone is going to ask why are not we trying to get those folks.

I don't need a black Johnny Storm when I can have Static.

I don't need a female Ghostbusters when I can get the movie right to the legion of female lead books and comics.

I don't need a gay Captain America when I have LGBT Marvel heroes already around.

I don't need 99+ excuse as to why I can't have a Static film. I don't need 200 million for it, I'll take $35 million. I'll use the rest to make Lumberjanes, Kevin Keller, Vixen, Ironfist and others.

If I address their needs ELSEWHERE I won't have to touch Captain America or Thor or Iron Man.

The backlash is from a tired group of hearing excuses.

You have a point that people should think about. Things don't have to be previously mainstream like Batman to be successful now. Look at GotG for example as a property. Or any the movies that aren't adaptations that don't have a built in fanbase in the first place. If only mainstream things got movies, then nothing else could become mainstream and they'd have no movies. They have no excuse to not do these kinds of movies that feature anybody with potential. To give women and PoC the quality movies they deserve instead of what a lot of people may consider lazy copypaste jobs. By taking a white male character and then just editing him, that essentially says they have to make the women/PoC into the white male character to work. It's a half measure. That could be considered offensive on its own. If they gave already diverse content a shot, then more people would be happy. The Captain America # is already taking things too far and just inflames things and I think a lot of people will agree that isn't the way to do this in a reasonable way.
I'd like to see more diversity in movies, but why bother with all the bother from people who don't like character edits when they could be giving real diversity a chance. They say you can't please everyone, but they could probably please a lot more people than they currently are.

[letterfounder]

i think we naturally seek out information, as a species. we DO desire fan culture. but the rage is here, there, everywhere. it's a whole separate issue from any creative medium. and it wants to be discussed, and needs to be, but we don't know how to articulate it yet.

[SoupStainedTie]

I think another problem with fans/people these days in general is alot of people arguably dont have the emotional maturity not to take everything personally.

This is important part of it. Combine this fact with the delaying of "adulthood" in many young people, and you get what we're seeing today.

We have hordes of young men who just a few short decades ago, would be busy raising a family and working 9-5, now sitting on their butts all day playing video games and watching YouTube videos.

The adults of the past simply didn't have time for this sh*t.

[JKtheMac]

You seem to suggest that if they stuck to how these characters are in the comics that it would be a failure cause "they would not be bold enough".

For example, has changing Red Skull from being a Nazi to Hydra make the character "bolder" or "better"? I will think not. Cause it amputed at least 50% of what makes him Evil and scary and his whole take of "destroying America's way of life" and what Cap stands for.

Does making Baron Zemo a surviving guy from Sykoria bent on revenge makes him more interesting and go into "bold storytelling"? I will say no. It's using a completely unrelated character and naming him "Zemo" for pointless reasons.

I am specifically saying writers should be left to get on and write stories and we don't get to decide what is good and bad individually unless we apply some kind of objective process. We consume or we don't.

That is what is lacking in social media outrage, objectivity and an understanding of how the industries responsible for the material work. If enough people cry foul over something they begin to believe their own misunderstandings or subjective viewpoints are factual. Comic companies are in the business of telling stories and they live or die by selling them, they have a collection of IP that they turn over to writers based on editorial choices and sometimes editorial direction, they take the risks editorially and financially and they reap any rewards, shared as per their contracts. That's it, nothing more. What one thousand angry voices on Twitter add to the argument is nothing compared to sales.

You yourself list two highly subjective thoughts and somehow expect there to be an objective answer. That isn't how commercial art works. We could argue about the relative merits of how controversial German political movements in the thirties and forties are reflected in modern comics and media in general but that is not the discussion here and it would be so controversial we would probably get told to stop quite quickly because these issues are neither simple nor objective. But complex and subjective issues are very good material for stories.

[JKtheMac]

Sooner or later your BOSS is going to look at that other ignored audience and see how much money they put into your industry.

If you only toss out straight white male lovefest films and the top box office films for the year are those with POC & women. Someone is going to ask why are not we trying to get those folks.

I don't need a black Johnny Storm when I can have Static.

I don't need a female Ghostbusters when I can get the movie right to the legion of female lead books and comics.

I don't need a gay Captain America when I have LGBT Marvel heroes already around.

I don't need 99+ excuse as to why I can't have a Static film. I don't need 200 million for it, I'll take $35 million. I'll use the rest to make Lumberjanes, Kevin Keller, Vixen, Ironfist and others.

If I address their needs ELSEWHERE I won't have to touch Captain America or Thor or Iron Man.

The backlash is from a tired group of hearing excuses.

I have no idea if you are agreeing with me or not. But in general you don't get to decide what goes into a Captain America comic. But be assured the editors will be very aware of the IP and will not want to devalue it, so they won't do anything too controversial with the properties they consider valuable. They may move things in directions they see as adding value, and sometimes they may misjudge that direction, but they are not sitting there thinking how can we mutate our IP for politically correct reasons.

[ChrisIII]

Michael Jordan was far, far from Fantastic Four's problems. If anything, he was one of the film's actual highlights! (In fact the cast is fairly talented, the material was just all wrong).