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While it may not initially look it, The Karate Kid actually turned out to be strong competition. With The A-Team appealing to the Call of Duty addicted guys, The Karate Kid managed to win over the younger generation and possibly even the women (Bradley Cooper’s abs were probably not enough to get females paying for a ticket). For the guys that did want to watch The A-Team, if they had families then they were most likely swayed by their children and their partners to watch The Karate Kid, what with it being the more suitable option for a family.

The A-Team also had to contend with opening just over a month after The Losers. Based on a comic series, it seemed to have a very similar premise and did not fare well at the box office.

The show’s creator Steve J. Cannell had called the show corny and that’s probably part of the problem. If that’s how the source material is perceived, then why turn that show into a film? Carnahan did at least carve the film with a more serious edge, keeping to his word by definitely not making it cheesy. Cannell was also happy with the film. The A-Team film isn’t amazing, nor will it make one rush to the off-license. It comes across as a typical summer blockbustery, abs flashing, container dropping, explodey action flick, summed up by the rather mixed reviews, using words like “fun,” “ordinary,” “awesome” and “soulless.” While it may call itself an action comedy, I have to admit that I only laughed once when watching (during the scene when a 3D movie is screened at an army psychiatric hospital). Carnahan does tend to touch on themes such as loyalty and getting to the truth, which seem to be prevalent in his former films and it was nice to see it crop up here.

When it came to promoting the film’s DVD/Blu-Ray release, Carnahan was interviewed by Collider and spoke out about Roger Ebert’s review in particular, and that he cited Newtonian law in regards to ‘that’ flying tank sequence. “You are supposed to laugh at it,” said Carnahan. “It’s not ever supposed to be taken seriously. No, I don’t think you could fly a tank with the level of success as the A-Team but we ain’t the A-Team.” Weirdly, a video by The Escapist Magazine proved that it could actually be plausible!

In January 2012, Carnahan spoke to Collider about why the film under-performed. “We blew the marketing,” he said. “We blew it, not just Fox, I was part of it.” Timing also seemed to be an issue, as Carnahan mentioned that the film opened the day the World Cup started. “I just thought ,’You know what’s gonna happen? Dad’s gonna stay home and watch soccer, Mom’s gonna take the kids to a movie, what are they gonna see? They’re gonna go see The Karate Kid, they’re not gonna see The A-Team.’” Because mothers are more inclined to have their kids watch a film that teaches them how to fight with their bare hands rather than picking up a gun.

I was actually sold on The A-Team after seeing the shot of the tank in midair, yet I didn’t see it on the big screen, instead opting for Toy Story 3 at the time. This should have been a franchise and Carnahan did have plans for a sequel, but that’s not going to happen. Unfortunately, competition and mishandled marketing means that it barely made enough to qualify for having its own TV series.

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