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May 18, 2003
NYT profiles Marvel. Turns out
NYT profiles Marvel. Turns out that only 21% of their revenues comes from comic books. 50% of it comes from toys, and the remainder is from movie deals/licensing. Although their business model seems more solid than it did in the early 90s, I predict the bottom will fall out of Marvel again. As the article points out, frenetic interests in things like superheroes are faddish. Marvel is already down to making movies out of secondary and tertiary characters ("Ghost Rider", anyone?) and it dilutes the brand every time they make a sub-par movie (like Daredevil, which was successful but didn't exactly have people clamoring for a sequel). I think maybe they'd be better off choosing 2 or 3 franchises (X-Men, Spidey, maybe one other) and concentrating on those, instead of trying to get all these characters on screen.
Anyway, the article confirms that they're making The Punisher. Don't forget they already made that movie once. With Dolph Lundgren. It doesn't seem like they've learned from their mistakes: this time around, they're using a first-time director and Thomas Jane will star. Do you know who he is? Exactly.* Punisher is a compelling character -- he has Batman's motivation and Wolverine's attitude -- and could probably catch on. So why not get a name director and a big deal actor to play him? Well, we'll see how it goes.
*He was good in Boogie Nights as Marky Mark's coked-up friend in the second half of the movie.
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posted by adm at 2:51 PM | #
