Monday Morning Quarterback Part II

By BOP Staff

August 5, 2008

We'll miss you, Skip.

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Somewhere John Doggett is giggling with glee.



Kim Hollis: The second weekend of X-Files: I Want to Believe saw it fall 66% to $3.4 million. The movie only beat the third weekend of Space Chimps by $600,000 and - we're serious here - is unlikely to match Space Chimps' domestic gross. Can you provide any logical explanation for how this could happen?

Pete Kilmer: Easy. Two things caused this: 1) Fox and Chris Carter jerked around with the lawsuits way too long and time passed them by. 2) Script, script, script....no one wanted to see a B-level episode as a movie. And I hated to say that.

Tim Briody: Whatever the opposite of the phrase "strike while the iron is hot" is (cold?), I Want To Believe is the epitome of it.

Jamie Ruccio: Tim is right on. Think of how this franchised ended its last few years:

1) It had an inconsistent final few years with one of the core show characters disappearing, along with an unsatisfying series ending.

2) There was a follow-on movie that disappointed the fan-base and the general public.

3) The series is barely in reruns so there's next to no awareness beyond what people remember.

The show was the definition of "going out with a whimper". Add to that the fact that they alienated the remaining fans by ignoring their desire for any sort of idea regarding the premise of the new movie, and none of this surprises me. As I mentioned, if I didn't want to see the sequel the movie was in trouble.

Brandon Scott: This is a boring movie that had no reason to be made or especially ever released into multiplexes. Audiences displayed logic in not going to see this. Sometimes as critics we overlook the buying public's ability to make the right choice on occasion and this is a prime example, I suspect. Now I must ask said public why Fool's Gold made $70 million...why, why, why!?!

Scott Lumley: It's a little known fact, but the actual working title of this film was actually The X-Files: I Want to Believe that We Didn't Completely Alienate Our Fan Base and Waste a Golden Opportunity by Waiting a DECADE for a Second Film. Marketing thought that might be a little wordy, however.




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Hey, look. It's Batman. Again.



Kim Hollis: The Dark Knight finished in first place with $42.7 million and will have crossed the $400 million mark by the time you read this. It did so in less than half the time the previous record-holder, Shrek 2 needed to accomplish this feat. Do you see it slowing down any time soon?

Calvin Trager: My 2:40 matinee on Sunday was 90% full.

Marty Doskins: It doesn't look like it'll slow down on the IMAX side either. The four Sunday showings near me were all sold out at least 4 hours before show time.

Scott Lumley: No. And I for one, wish to welcome our new Dark Knight overlords!

Brandon Scott: It does seem to be slowing down. As I mentioned, it was very close as far as the per venue average battle went with The Mummy. That being said, there appears to be a fanboy push to try to get this film to unseat Titanic. I don't see this happening or what it proves if it were to happen, really. While I am impressed with its legs, and I enjoyed the movie, I believe Gone With the Wind's adjusted gross is over $1.4 billion. Now that's impressive. So, all of this top box office champ talk is like John Ruiz being a heavyweight boxing champion. They are paper champions. It means little in the end.


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