Dreamworks/Paramount's Ghost In The Shell - Part 3

[2kt09]

And how many watch cartoons compared to going to see the new Marvel and DC movies in the US?

Enough to have industries built out of it.
Enough to have vfx studios built around it.

 

[TheVileOne]

Some Anime is niche but there has been memorable anime shows and films that generations of people in the west grew up watching. Dragonball, Robotech, Astro Boy, Speed Racer, Samurai Pizza Cats, Sailor Moon, Pokemon, Gundam Wing and Battle of the Planets for example.

Studio Ghibli movies like Spirited Away and Howl's Moving Castle have also received acclaim in the west. Spirited Away was distributed by Disney and won an academy award. Studio Ghibli movies are regularly aired on film4 in the UK.

Most of the Anime I saw as a kid was on the Syfy network which aired Anime films and movies at night and the early morning from the 90s to around 2011.

Anime can have a negative stigma due to the weebo types just like superheroes can have a negative stigma due to the overzealous nerdy fanboy types.

Studio Ghibli movies have found an audience and received acclaim, but their audience and scope are still fairly limited. I think Spirited Away made what, $11 million or so in the US? Dragon Ball is pretty popular over here. In fact, in the early 00s, it got so popular on Toonami that 20th Century Fox bought the movie rights. 9 years later, they finally made a movie. We saw how that turned out. But Dragon Ball is just one show. Even Ghost in the Shell, while it was one of the more notable anime titles out there was hardly some huge phenomenon. It received a nice level of recognition, but it wasn't probably raking in serious Hollywood money.

So yeah, anime has a fanbase, and the industry seems to be in a better place now than where it was 10 years ago with a lot of companies shutting down and going bankrupt. But it's still a niche demographic with a few exceptions.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Enough to have industries built out of it.
Enough to have vfx studios built around it.

You are avoiding the question on purpose.

 

[2kt09]

You are avoiding the question on purpose.

I've answered it.
Way more studios are involved in the making of cartoons for a reason.

Plus, you need people who've had experience animating to keep this contemporary blockbuster market afloat.

 

[TheVileOne]

What's available for theatrical animation stateside is still pretty lacking. There isn't really a market for theatrical animation unless it's comedic or family oriented from one of the major studios.

 

[Sithborg]

Also, most of them have transferred to CGI.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

I've answered it.
Way more studios are involved in the making of cartoons for a reason.

Plus, you need people who've had experience animating to keep this contemporary blockbuster market afloat.

You said it was easier to be exposed to and thus see anime as opposed to a DC or Marvel movie in the US. That just isn't true.

 

[2kt09]

You said it was easier to be exposed to and thus see anime as opposed to a DC or Marvel movie in the US. That just isn't true.

Yeah, go back to my previous post.
We then broadened it to cartoons and that's even more readily available.

In any case, good adaptations of the more popular anime titles should be able to make bank
given for w/e reason movies "inspired by [niche] anime" push the industry forward like The Matrix or Inception.

 

[TheVileOne]

In theory, but in execution, it's not happening.

Case in point, Speed Racer, Dragon Ball Evolution, Ghost in the Shell.

 

[Raiden]

If GITS were directed by David Flincher and rated R, I think it would have been great. It could have action as well as asking some philosophical questions raised by the original GITS anime movie, but this Hollywood adaptation is just another action-adventure movie imo.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Yeah, go back to my previous post.
We then broadened it to cartoons and that's even more readily available.

In any case, good adaptations of the more popular anime titles should be able to make bank
given for w/e reason movies "inspired by [niche] anime" push the industry forward like The Matrix or Inception.

Being inspired by, does not make it the same. It is why you could bring over Kurosawa films but they never made as much as Star Wars.

 

[Binker]

Do you think anime to film adaptations now, like comic book to film adaptations were then, have a "wrong" POV of what they are, that its applied onto those films? As in their cheap entertainment, as well as silly kids stuff. Could that be people's POV of anime to film adaptations? If so, how can we change that?

I just want the next adaptation from an anime to be great and be a hit, but there seems to be alot of factors in order for it to work that go beyond the film itself. Hell, I played a what if on a live action-Hollywood produced version of Sailor Moon, but man, would that work given my pitch?! IDK...

 

[zephyrinthesky]

If GITS were directed by David Flincher and rated R, I think it would have been great. It could have action as well as asking some philosophical questions raised by the original GITS anime movie, but this Hollywood adaptation is just another action-adventure movie imo.

I feel like it wouldn't be hard to name someone who would've handled it better than Sanders and co.

Denis Villeneuve proved he can do both tense cop-thriller with Sicario and EDIT: Prisoners, and thoughtful sci-fi with Arrival. And now he's doing Blade Runner 2049 and Dune of all things.

Heck, you could have handed the GITS IP to Disney and their PG-13 movie would likely have had a better script than what we got.

 

[PacificBoy]

I think it's possibly easier to find success with lesser-known anime/manga properties first, like having Scarjo headline Edge of Tomorrow instead playing either Rita Vrataski or an original character set in the same adapted universe
(with much better marketing included, of course), than adapting properties with iconic characters. That way, Hollywood as a whole would be more amenable to such properties and grant them access to greater resources and talent.

 

[MbJ]

In theory, but in execution, it's not happening.

Case in point, Speed Racer, Dragon Ball Evolution, Ghost in the Shell.

They said good anime movies would be able to leave a mark. All three of the movies you just mentioned were panned or got at best, mixed reviews.

 

[MbJ]

Do you think anime to film adaptations now, like comic book to film adaptations were then, have a "wrong" POV of what they are, that its applied onto those films? As in their cheap entertainment, as well as silly kids stuff. Could that be people's POV of anime to film adaptations? If so, how can we change that?

Dragonball Z was the one that was closest to an early comic book movie in terms of problems. Horrible casting aside, it felt very reminiscent of the early mindset that you could change everything people actually liked about it and still get people to see it based on the name, even though the end result was now nothing like the work it was adapting. Heck the horrible take on Goku was very obviously them attempting to "reimagine" him in the mould of Peter Parker.

Also, it was really cheap. A well done DBZ movie would be fairly expensive, like close to comic book movie levels in terms of budget.

Speed Racer ironically had the exact opposite problem. It tried very hard to adapt the original show as closely as possible, even though it probably should have gone a more modernized route in that case.

 

[Slade W]

I am sure DBZ could be a successful live-action adaption if it had the right people in charge.

 

[PacificBoy]

I feel a good Dragonball Z adaptation is a difficult proposition given that Goku pretty much is Dragonball Z and the general uninspired casting choices for such Asian roles in Hollywood.

 

[mikeboydus]

If GITS were directed by David Flincher and rated R, I think it would have been great. It could have action as well as asking some philosophical questions raised by the original GITS anime movie, but this Hollywood adaptation is just another action-adventure movie imo.

I hate to say it, but I think even Paul Anderson would have done a better job, even if it turned out to be a mindless popcorn flick with Kate Beckinsale playing the Major.

 

[2kt09]

Denis Villeneuve proved he can do both tense cop-thriller with Sicario and thoughtful sci-fi with Arrival. And now he's doing Blade Runner 2049 and Dune of all things.

Someone gets it.

 

[OutOfBoose]

I'm glad Sanders isn't doing Blade Runner 2049, at least.

 

[2kt09]

I feel a good Dragonball Z adaptation is a difficult proposition given that Goku pretty much is Dragonball Z and the general uninspired casting choices for such Asian roles in Hollywood.

The casting will be the least of the problem if Hollywood can't do a movie
in the vein of what Stephen Chow's already done...and he did those at 1/5 of the expected DBZ budget.

 

[PacificBoy]

The casting will be the least of the problem if Hollywood can't do a movie
in the vein of what Stephen Chow's already done...and he did those at 1/5 of the expected DBZ budget.

You're referring to Chow's Journey to the West movies, yes? Those might be effects-laden flicks, but they aren't effects-driven and are essentially Chow vehicles, whose (already popular) selling point is his brand of 'moy len tau' or absurdist comedy.

 

[culver3vlr22]

Few of my friends are huge DBZ fans they've explained it to me I've watched a few episodes with them... no chance in hell you can properly adapt that to film.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Few of my friends are huge DBZ fans they've explained it to me I've watched a few episodes with them... no chance in hell you can properly adapt that to film.

You totally could, but it would take work and a lot of money.