You have to ask, how could eBay have been so incredibly stupid to spend billions of dollars on essentially nothing? Well, it appears that Disney did the exact same thing.
As we’ve all heard by now, Disney bought Marvel for about 4 billion dollars. At first blush it seems like a deal made in heaven. Disney makes movies and superhero movies are hot right now.
However, due to prior contracts Marvel had with other movie studios, Disney is essentially unable to make any Marvel superhero movies for a very long time, maybe even forever.
For example, Sony has a perpetual right to make Spider-Man and Ghost Rider movies.
20th Century Fox has a perpetual right to make movies involving the Fantastic Four, Daredevil, Elektra, Silver Surfer, Kingpin, Dr. Doom, Bullseye, and all of the mutants who have appeared in the X-Men movies.
Universal Pictures has a perpetual right to make Hulk movies. (And if you think Disney can use Marvel characters in its theme parks, think again. Universal has that right, in perpetuity, for its own theme parks.)
So who’s left? Paramount Pictures only has the right to distribute the upcoming Iron Man 2, The Avengers, Captain America, Thor, and Iron Man 3 movies. So in about ten years Disney would be set to go on its own. If superhero movies are still popular in ten years.
And that’s a big if. If Disney bought Marvel for the long haul, in hopes of making Superhero movies way off in the future, I think the plan will fail. Superheroes are big now because the baby boomers grew up with them. That’s why superhero movies are always rated R and hard PG-13. Because they’re made for adults. The adults who grew up with them.
In ten, twenty years no one is going to give a rip about Spider-Man. Much in the same way no one gives a rip about Cowboy and Indian movies. Genres die. It’s a fact of life in Hollywood.
Still, if Disney doesn’t want to wait it can dig deep in Marvel’s vault and release a Doctor Bong movie. How about Forbush Man? Ruby Thursday?
Let’s face it, Disney got screwed.
Sounds like the get the other studios to do the work while they sit back and cash checks. Not bad work if you can get it.
But I think the bigger deal for Disney is video games. They really don’t have much of a presence in that market, and don’t have much of a catalog of characters that could translate into a videogame for anyone over 6 years old.
Hmm. Howard the Duck II?
Not a totally accurate account (Marvel created Marvel Studios to retain movie rights to Hulk, Iron Man and the other Avengers, but indeed distribution rights have already been negotiated for those films).
But, and laugh if you will, these are COMIC characters and COMIC books are where they will live forever. Countless writers and artists will continue to take on these iconic figures and fans old and new will continue to read them. Comic sales are a drop in the bucket, obviously, but that’s the source where every other money-making venture is derived from.
1. Eric said, “Sounds like the get the other studios to do the work while they sit back and cash checks. Not bad work if you can get it.”
God, get a clue. Marvel didn’t sit back and collect checks, it got royally screwed on its movie deals. That’s why it produced the Iron Man movie itself. It was tired of getting its ass reamed.
3. JFStan said: But, and laugh if you will, these are COMIC characters and COMIC books are where they will live forever”
Are you really that naive? Way back in the old days (before my time) kids grew up watching cowboy and indian movies. Those movies were produced solely for kids.
Those kids grew up so westerns were made for those adults. Those movies had very adult themes and were not for kids.
Now, no one makes westerns anymore. The genre is dead.
The same is true of super hero movies. They started off making them for kids, such as in the old Superman and Batman serials in the 40s. The tv shows in the 50s and 60s. And all the animated cartoons of the 60s, 70s, and 80s.
Those kids grew up. So grown-up superhero movies were made for adults. TV shows such as the Justice League were made for adults. And graphic novels were made for adults.
What’s going to happen when those superhero loving “kids” die from old age? By then Hollywood will have moved on to some other genre.
Spider-man alone was worth the purchase. Super hero’s are not cowboys and indians. Show any kid on the street any age a picture of Spider-man and ask them who it is?
6. Higghawker wrote: “Spider-man alone was worth the purchase”
God, did you even read what I wrote?! Disney cannot make any Spider-man movie. And according to the article I linked, Disney cannot even use Spider-man in its theme parks.
Is it really that hard to read and then think before mashing your fingers on the keyboard?!
Higghawker continued his keyboard mashing….Show any kid on the street any age a picture of Spider-man and ask them who it is?
You could have done the same thing with a picture of John Wayne up through the 70s. After that, no kid knows who he is. My point is proved. The problem you have is that you think very short term. You think everything you love will be loved forever. You’re utterly and completely wrong.
And by the way, when was the last time they made a Flash Gordon movie? Buck Rogers? Oh yeah, those extremely huge and beloved characters died off. Because no no one gives a rat’s ass about them. In the exact same way no one is going to give a rat’s ass about Spider-man in forty years.
I have to go with SN on this.
The big question is, “are all those royalties worth $4 billion”?
One of the things that killed cowboy movies was finding a place you could make them without having to do it inside the computer.
Another was most of the real cowboys are dead. What percentage of people can actually ride a horse running full out across country now without killing themselves?
Last and not least most of the cowboy movies were b westerns made for boys under 12 and contained violence. The black hat got shot/whatever.
Every generation is going to want its own super heroes. Paul Bunyon, Mike Fink, David Crockett Pacus Bill were the super heroes of a previous generation.
You also had train engineers, Casey Jones, and steel driving men, and men that worked the steel mills, and Rosy the Riveter, GI Joe.
I still like Gilgamesh the mighty, Samson and Hercules and his buddies but not many have even heard of those. Of course those are really ancient and guess what? Ooops I was wrong. We do have movies about some of them.
In fact I think I’ve seen movies about most of the people? named and Disney Studios made some of those movies.
I’m not sure Marvel is worth 4 billion though.
All Disney has to do is buy out the contracts. Not a hard thing to do.
The real reason that Disney bought Marvel isn’t for movies but for television. With the Disney Channel being dominated by girl-oriented programming Disney recently rebranded their Toon Disney channel as Disney XD and made it a boy-oriented channel. Currently that channel shows pretty much every Marvel superhero cartoon made in recent years. So why not buy the company that owns the majority of their programming?
9. Deowll wrote: Every generation is going to want its own super heroes”
Couldn’t have put it better myself. Kids and adults in forty years will have their own superheroes, not ours.
Actually, cowboys and Indians are back in. Lone Ranger comics are out and the Lone Ranger movie is in the works. Genres don’t die, marketers do. It just takes that one person who thinks that he/she can re-invent a genre to bring it back to life with examples such as; Battlestar Galactica, Stargate Universe, or 3:10 to Yuma.
Enjoyed the article.
10. “All Disney has to do is buy out the contracts.”
But that increases the cost of buying Marvel by a wide margin. The three Spider-man movies brought in 2.5 billion dollars for Sony. How much will it cost Disney to buy the rights back just for Spider-man, another four billion? How much for the X-men, another four billion?
“The real reason that Disney bought Marvel isn’t for movies but for television.”
When was the last time there was a hit Spider-man TV show? They keep trying them and they keep failing.
12. “3:10 to Yuma”
You do realize that was a remake, right?
“Enjoyed the article.”
Thanks for taking the time to actually read it. I wish everyone else who commented did that.
None of the movies you mention are rated R, and are any of them even a ‘hard’ PG-13?
If they were screwed, they were willingly screwed. They knew which franchises they could take now and which they couldn’t. Which is kinda baffling… unless they know something we don’t
SN, If you don’t want comments or people’s opinions, turn off the comment box. Yours and the links opinion are this purchase was a mistake, and that may be so?
My opinion is that YOU may be wrong? My opinion is even in 10 years these movies will still be going strong. There are endless possibilities that have only scratched the surface with these characters.
In 10 years you can flame me!
“Flash Gordon movie? Buck Rogers? Oh yeah, those extremely huge and beloved characters died off. Because no no one gives a rat’s ass about them.”
I disagree. Hollywood has always been able to take the old, gloss it up with special effects, and make it new again.
Example 1: Superman. When they did the Christopher Reeves film, Superman was dead. I was a young teenager then and I couldn’t stand the stupid Superman comic. Yet they still managed to reinvigorate it.
Example 2: King Kong. Who woulda thunk they could have redone that?
Example 3: Star Trek. When they did the first Star Trek film, who would have guess that they could take a cheap, silly, cancelled sci-fi tv show and make major films out of them.
You mention remakes. Most everything is a remake. I remember reading that there are basically 7 stories, and every film, book, and play is just a variation on those.
And you also forget that there are new humans on the planet that haven’t experienced what you have. So these characters, plots, and genres are new to them. Give it enough time, and everything is new.
Ok, a bunch of movie studios have the perpetual rights to make movies about the Marvel characters.
But movies are expensive and sometimes (thanks to Hollywood accounting) don’t make money. All the real money is in the merchandising. The movie is just a 2-hour (or shorter) commercial for the toys.
So who owns the merchandise rights? If it’s Disney, then they’ve scored: The movie studios spend all the money making the movies – and Disney sells the toys.
Thanks for posting. I had failed to undestand why buy at such a price. Prior articles stated the Disney TV channel needing more boy marketing – but $4 billion’s worth? Maybe Steve Jobs is just a comic book fan…