Comments on: Marvel has a Tight Budget on The Avengers

By: BobaFett

BobaFett — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 00:18:48 +0000

Have to wait to see how Thor (meh) and Captain America (meh) do before pronouncing anything a sure hit…

I think $300m domestic will be fairly easy though.

By: knossis

knossis — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 08:13:14 +0000

I don’t think Avengers is going to be the biggest Superhero movie of all time. That honor will still belong to the Dark Knight. Although I love Thor and Captain America, I don’t believe either will translate well to the screen and pull in the average movie going public. Much like the Watchmen, mostly fan boy’s (like me) will go see these. Each will bring in around 150 million in the domestic market if they are lucky. When the Avengers finally arrive the public will still be unaware of the product and so there will be no huge lines to see it. I don’t think Marvel did a good job cross promoting these films in either one of the Iron Man or Hulk movies. Placing key scenes that tie the movies together after the credits is a sure fire way for most of the public to miss these plot points. Nick Fury’s appearence in Iron Man 2 almost made no sense due to this and I’m sure many people were saying,”Who the hell is this guy and what the hell is he talking about?” If they noticed it at all. Marvel would have done better if they made these plot points crucial to the stories of Iron Man and the Hulk and left them as cliff hangers for people to chew on for a few years till Captain America or Thor arrived.They never mentioned the Super Soldier program or Captain America in either movie. I think Thor and Captain America will be hard sells and the Avengers even more so after the Cap and Thor movies will have left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth. Love these character’s but I have a real bad feeling about both movies.

By: Ben

Ben — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 14:07:41 +0000

Watching their pennies is a smart move, hopefully the movie doesn’t suffers from it. Personally I think it won’t.

Hell, maybe the price of the theatre tickets will decrease….Probably not.

By: Ryan

Ryan — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 04:07:19 +0000

I don’t know if we can really consider $140 million a “tight” budget. It’s more like the budget just isn’t “insane.” I, for one, also think this movie is slightly more risky than, say, Batman 3 — there’s a fairly decent chance a movie like this could flop, even if it is good, particularly if Thor and Captain America don’t do particularly well — and is anyone really banking on those two doing particularly well? I’m not.

Finally, I think movies with $200 million + budgets have a really, really mixed track record. Who thinks the budget for Alice in Wonderland, for example, couldn’t have been cut in half and still have been a *better* movie than it was? Sometimes, I think having a means to edit the ‘complete’ vision of the director can be a good thing — a vast budget has, in some cases, been at least a contributing factor to movies being ruined. I’d put Alice in Wonderland in that category, as well as the Star Wars prequels, as well as numerous other movies. And I wish good action flicks like Taken and The Town would prove that you don’t need the vast budgets and huge special effects to make good, exciting and even action-packed movies. Part of me thinks this news of Marvel “only” giving Avengers a $140 million budget is made with these things in mind.

By: 420BAND

420BAND — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 23:12:56 +0000

In reply to Kevin. Yeah right! even on Blu-Ray I feel like I got to squint my eyes during those action scenes (2 out of 3!) Bollucks!

By: Kevin

Kevin — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 22:49:03 +0000

Thanks for answering my question Rodney. I do think your right that as long as they do it right it will turn out sweet. I also agree with you 420band as much as I liked IM2 they better not do that nighttime shit with the avengers. That was one of the things about IM2 that drive me crazy.

By: Lawrence

Lawrence — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 20:47:10 +0000

Perhaps Disney feels that there’s no need for promoting Avengers, thus lowering the budget to 140 million. The 140 million will be devoted to special effects and production costs instead.

By: 420BAND

420BAND — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 20:36:42 +0000

Better not Short Change us on the action with alot of Night scenes (IM2)
this deserves the “Blow the Wad” treatment.

Lets see.

I really dont need a McDonalds tie-in either, Just the money on screen thanks

By: KenAkuma

KenAkuma — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 20:15:28 +0000

Even with Disney supposedly backing it? Wow.

By: Rodney

Rodney — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 16:51:11 +0000

In reply to Kevin. Honestly I dont see much that they cant do with CG now. As long as it is done well, they could film this in my living room and a computer can put them on the bridge of a super high tech flying aircraft carrier.

By: Roman

Roman — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 16:31:29 +0000

I like how you broke it down because I was initially scared when I read this post. I do think they can skimp on marketing but at the same time to create a world that needs defending from a group as large as the avengers all i see is $$$$$. I hope they can pull it off but Joss is good at working with low tech and still making magic.

By: Kevin

Kevin — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 16:29:30 +0000

Rodney do you think with this budget that they will have to sacrafice some action scenes that they might have wanted to do. I remember that concept art for the helicarrier that came out a couple weeks ago and it would seem that is going to cost a pretty penny to do.