Category: Television

Why I’m Terrified Of The Veronica Mars Kickstarter

If you haven’t heard, Rob Thomas (creator of the television show Veronica Mars) launched a Kickstarter campaign yesterday to raise funding to shoot a Veronica Mars movie, with as much of the original cast as he can wrangle. In just about ten hours, they reached their 2 million dollar goal, thus meaning that they will get their funding and presumably will make the movie.

Today’s a victory for crowdsourcing, right? A much-beloved show will get an ending. Fans get to contribute to help make this dream a reality. I should be enjoying this moment. Instead I’m terrified. Here’s why.

1. A Successful Kickstarter Doesn’t Guarantee Anything.

Kickstarter doesn’t guarantee receipt of goods or that the money that you donate to a project will actually be spent on the given project, which, of course, makes sense – they’re just a middleman in the crowdsourcing world. But a lot of Kickstarter projects never actually get completed. Instead, the funds are taken and whatever the product was (video game, movie, book, etc.) just vanishes along with your money.

Now, of course, I’m not suggesting that someone as high-profile as Rob Thomas would pull something like that – after all, one of the reasons why projects helmed by successful people in their chosen field often can attract high levels of funding is precisely because of their visibility, and the implicit guarantee that they can deliver.

But in this instance, things are MUCH more complicated – in particular, with regard to Warner Bros., who owns the rights to Veronica Mars.

The Kickstarter page is pretty vague on what the deal with WB actually is – Rob writes:

Of course, Warner Bros. still owns Veronica Mars and we would need their blessing and cooperation to pull this off. Kristen and I met with the Warner Bros. brass, and they agreed to allow us to take this shot. They were extremely cool about it, as a matter of fact. Their reaction was, if you can show there’s enough fan interest to warrant a movie, we’re on board.

But what kind of deal is that? What constitutes “enough fan interest”? The implication of a successful Kickstarter campaign is that, well, 2 million dollars worth is “enough fan interest”, but to Warner Bros. that might not be enough. How much is enough? 5 million? 10? And what guarantees are there of distribution? Films get shelved – sometimes for years – and without knowing what kind of deal has been struck, there’s no way we can know if the film will ever see the light of day. And even if there were some kind of contractual agreement that kicked in at the completion of a successful Kickstarter campaign, do you think that the giant conglomerate couldn’t find a way to shelve the film if they wanted to?

2. What Is Going To Happen To Non-Blockbuster Film?

Even though there are a number of ways that the Veronica Mars movie could end up being screwed up and causing people to lose faith in Kickstarter forever, that, to be honest, is the best case scenario.

Much more terrifying is that this could easily become the new normal for non-blockbuster film development from the studio side. Want a sequel to that cult movie? All you have to do is generate millions of dollars upfront from the die-hard fans to mitigate the studio’s risk. It has the potential to become a vicious new type of pre-sale for the film industry – except that unlike the way things are currently done, the people who usually pay upfront before a movie has been made is getting something in return, like territorial rights to distribution.

All the while, the big studios can sit back and greenlight/kill a project based on the public’s response to their kickstarter campaign. Why fund small projects when the diehards will fund it for them? And if the funding campaign fails, it just bolsters their view that the project wasn’t going to succeed anyway.

3. % Of Hipsters Bitching About How “This Is What’s Wrong With America” Will Increase Tenfold.

I’ve already seen a bunch of posts from people I know saying roughly: “Hey, instead of giving our money to this why don’t we solve a problem like poverty or getting ourselves out of debt.”

To which I say: I’m glad you’re so socially conscious. I’m sure that on top of posting your sanctimonious rant on Facebook, you’re also gifting your tax return to the government to help pay down the deficit, or have donated it to a local charity.

4. Where Does Really Independent Film Turn To Next?

There’s “independent” film (you know, the kind that look like they were filmed pretty quickly, but also have five or more recognizable actors in it. See Joss Whedon’s upcoming Much Ado About Nothing for an example), and independent film – the kind that tends to find their funding on crowdsourcing sites like Kickstarter or IndieGoGo.

There was a time when independent film was supported by arms of the big studios – but those were eventually crowded out by “independent” film. Now they’ve moved to crowdfunding – but with the success of this project, it’s possible that “independent” film will soon dominate this space, too, pushing the films that probably need the backing more (i.e. have no shot at major studio backing) are going to find it tougher and tougher to compete with big names.

This is already happening in the gaming sector of crowdfunding – projects created by “name” developers can raise hundreds of thousands of dollars. Truly independent projects are lucky if they can get to five digits.

Naturally, all of these fears could be overblown. Maybe the movie will be a big hit. Maybe it will be regarded as a unique experience, rather than as something that should replace (and thus displace) traditional film development. Maybe as crowdfunding grows, there will remain room for both truly independent film and the studio films that otherwise wouldn’t get made.

But I have my doubts. Which will make the next year very interesting to see what happens after the Veronica Mars movie is delivered.

March 14, 2013 Dan 0

Dear Grantland: Please Do Not Spoil Shit For Us

Dear Grantland,

I enjoy reading your work. You hire talented writers who make me laugh and make me think on a daily basis.

However, I have a humble request that, in the future, you do not do what you did with your Justified recap of March 6, 2013 (which is pictured below, with POTENTIAL SPOILERS BLACKED OUT):

I understand that the spoiler in question was a big moment for the episode, and, for that matter, the season (it concerns the season-long mystery that the long arc has been focused on), and that therefore the recap would likely be built around said reveal.

However, for that very reason, I hope that you will suggest to your writers in the future that they hold spoilers until after the jump, so that someone who hasn’t seen the episode yet and is just scrolling down the page to see what post he/she wants to read doesn’t accidentally glimpse enough of the spoiler to ruin the episode for him/herself.

If I had clicked on “Read Full Post” and then spoiled the episode for myself, then great, fine. That’s my fault. But this is on the front of the Hollywood Prospectus page. I was trying to scroll down to the late Tuesday posts to see if there was anything I missed from yesterday that I wanted to read, and instead, I learned a crucial detail that I was planning on enjoying discovering when I watched the episode of Justified tonight.

In exchange for this consideration, I hereby pledge that for any show I would like to read the recap of, I will absolutely click on “Read Full Post”. I won’t skip it. Promise!

Just don’t make it harder to watch an episode of television unspoiled, please. Twitter and Facebook don’t need the help.

That is all. Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

Dan

March 7, 2013 Dan 0

The Inherent Beauty Of “The Walking Dead”

(Note: I generally don’t like the idea of doing individual episode recaps, and this isn’t supposed to be that, although it may drift into recap territory at times, so be forewarned. Also, spoilers.)

It seems strange to consider that an episode of The Walking Dead could be described as beautiful, but last night’s episode, “Clear”, was that. Unlike most of this season (which has moved through storylines and characters at a breakneck pace), last night’s episode focused solely on one storyline, in one small town, with just four characters (five, if you count the unnamed hiker who bookends the episode): Rick, Carl, Michonne, and Morgan (who, if you don’t recall, was the man who saved Rick’s life in the pilot, along with his young son, Duane. Morgan was the one who Rick gave the radio to, and promised to try and stay in contact.).

With just four characters, and incredibly basic wants from a narrative perspective (Rick and the gang are looking for weapons, and then come upon Morgan; later, Carl decides that he wants to get something for his sister from another part of town), the episode is able to break into two two-person relationships: Rick and Morgan, and Carl and Michonne.

With the history that Rick and Morgan share, it makes sense that Rick would want to save his first friend in the apocalypse. What follows over the course of the hour is a long, emotional exploration of two men who have managed to survive thus far, but at great personal cost, and the difference between the one who still has some sense of hope (although as Rick and company demonstrate with the unnamed hiker, not as much empathy for strangers as before) and the one who has lost all hope, to the point where he won’t even kill himself, because he feels that he still deserves punishment for his failures.

In the other story, Carl and Michonne go on what seems like a simple errand – Carl wants to retrieve a photo of his family from a small diner nearby, because he wants his sister to have a photo of her mother – although this task, also, reminds us that Carl is still a child who misses his mother, despite his best efforts to remain emotionally distant for much of the season. It also finally gives us a little bit of humanity from Michonne, who up to this point has generally tried to make herself the most unlikeable person in the history of the apocalypse.

Given the simplicity of the narrative in the episode, and the need for long, emotional, focused two person scenes, it makes perfect sense that Scott Gimple (who has written some of the best episodes over the course of the three seasons, and has been named the new showrunner for season 4) was tapped to write the episode, and he’s able to construct a compelling, entertaining, and yes, beautiful episode out of essentially two relationships.

On a larger level, the episode succeeds because it is a reminder of what the show can represent – it’s an episode with little zombie threat; indeed, most of the zombie attacks are off-screen – the first is cut away from once Rick fires the first bullet, and the second primarily happens with Michonne inside a diner, again, off-screen – we don’t need to see the actual gore and action to know that our protagonists are capable of handling these threats, and instead gives more room for character moments to occur. At its best, The Walking Dead has always been a show about people and their relationships – not the preachy moral questions of Dale or the evil vs. less evil shootout that we’re leading up to in the final episodes of season 3, but this. Two men, in a room. One still has hope, at least for now. The other has lost his, possibly never to return. It’s a reminder that amidst all the horror, the blood, the gore, the endless headshots, deep down, these are still people, and that their problems, their moral qualms, heightened though they may be, aren’t nearly as different from our own as we might expect.

March 4, 2013 Dan 0