Rings of Power Viewership Leaked, Honor of Thieves Disappointing Second Week, Shazam Flops, and More

In the midst of a long article from THR (about the disastrous state of Amazon under the guidance of Jennifer Salke), we got some real Rings of Power numbers leaked by inside sources: 45% of foreign viewers stuck with the series from start to finish, and just 37% in the US. That's abominable and while Amazon has no choice but to publicly support the expensive disaster, even less people will show up for season two and one wonders how long Jeff Bezos will underwrite this nonsense. RoP is not an isolated failure and the article goes through the laundry list of bombs that have plagued Amazon since Salke was put in charge over her MeToo'd predecessor. The positive is there's a good chance that by the time season two airs things will have changed and we won't have a third season inflicted upon us.

It appears as though fears that Honor Among Thieves would disappoint at the box office are true. After a middling opening, the film has been buried by The Super Mario Brothers (Honor's second weekend dropped 63%, from 40 to 14.5 million, even falling behind John Wick, which released a week earlier). I wonder if it can hit 200 million, but whatever the final number is this is a disaster for Paramount and Hasbro. As entertaining as Honor can be, as I said in my review, it's ultimately forgettable and whatever positive word of mouth there was did not generate much new or return traffic (I will be seeing it again with one of my gaming groups, however). What's interesting to me is the personalities in the D&D scene almost universally liked the film, which means their opinions aren't relevant to a general audience (a fascinating if not surprising revelation), and probably not even the general D&D audience. One thing I didn't go over in my review that I now think impacted the film is that aesthetically there's nothing distinctive about it--looking like every other fantasy release from the last few years--one of the things that saved Avatar 2 from its simplistic writing was its distinctive aesthetic (just like the original).

As expected, Shazam 2 has become the biggest DCEU bomb at the box office (it stands at 127 million). This doesn't inherently make it the worst DC film we've had in terms of quality, but it's not good and clearly the public is tired of terrible films from DC (so the framing brand no longer has any pull--the same thing happened at Fox with the X-Men). Will Blue Beetle bomb even harder? It's too early to say, but having the director already fighting with fans over his 'edgy' Batman-line won't help (yet another example of fan-baiting).

There was a time when I wished more shows and films followed the BBC example of hiring actors who looked like everyday people, but now that everything is cast like that, I've realized the problem in doing so. The approach only works in IP requiring that element (Bob from Bob's Burgers is an Everyman, so depicting him as something else wouldn't work). When I see actors who could be my neighbours in a context that make no sense it creates ludonarrative dissonance. One of the reasons traditional myths are stuffed full of extraordinary people is because they fantastic in the first place. The heroes are meant to inspire and entertain, so they become exaggerated--no one can actually be Superman or Beowulf--the point of the stories is to encourage what's seen as good societal behaviour, not to become the mythical person (and no well-adjusted person is literally trying to be what they see on screen). The argument against this tends to lean on representation for body positivity, but this lacks studies to back it up the cause and effect (surely if what's on screen impacts behaviour, America wouldn't be the most obese nation on earth--and if one wants to argue that's a negative result created by what's on screen, you then have to explain why the rest of the world, other than Canada/UK, don't have the same problems).

There are reasons to be concerned about programs like ChatGPT, but I derive some amusement that the first people impacted by this are likely the shills--suddenly thousands of reporters become redundant since computers can easily regurgitate corporate/government talking points. Pushing beyond the news, do you need a John Campea when a computer can do what he does for almost no cost? The problem shills have is they aren't distinctive, which makes them easily replaced by programming. Of course, the serious implications of AI go much further (Amazon--and Starbucks--are looking to replace the bulk of their employees with robots--Bezos currently has about 1.6 million employees, Starbucks 400k), and the implications of sex robots hit at the heart of human relationships, but if you can't laugh about serious things you'll go crazy.

This article was written by Peter Levi

Dragonlance Show, House of the Dragon Season Two, The Last of Us Finale, Witcher Sirius, and Honor Among Thieves Box Bombing?

I said a couple of weeks ago that what Dragonlance needs to revive the IP is a successful adaptation. Apparently an effort to adapt it is being pursued as a show (the news dropped in late February). No one has picked it up yet and we can't say what kind of show it would be. My initial guess is an abomination like Witcher, Wheel of Time, Willow, or Rings of Power, but we can't exclude the possibility it will be something good (or at least adequate). Joe Manganiello is heading the project at the behest of WotC. Does the entertainment I got out of Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves give me hope? No. The flaws in that film that I could overlook would ruin a television show. The writing would have to be much, much better, and the overall caliber of actors would have to improve. I also think an original story is the way to go, because adapting the classic trilogy is guaranteed to turn into the disasters I named above. If Honor loses money (which seems likely, see below), that makes pitching another D&D-based property that much harder, so we'll just have to keep our eyes open and see what happens.

It's interesting to hear that House of the Dragon is getting a reduced episode count for its second season (from 10 to 8) and that season three has not already been given the green light. One can try to find positives in fewer episodes, but the truth is it reflects the financial reality that the show wasn't a hit (it didn't flop, but it wasn't a smash either). HofD was not as loathsome as Rings of Power, but there was no explosion of merchandise or residual interest in Game of Thrones. Trying to succeed with a prequel to a show that failed was never going to be easy to begin with and it gets doubly hard when one of the stars of the first season (Paddy Constantine) isn't going to be in the next.

The Last of Us finale couldn't quite reach it's episode four peak with the finale (1,109 vs 1,011, about 9% lower). It's an increase over the episode six dip (15% over 943), but it couldn't recapture the buzz from the early season (matching in spirit it's Trends decline I went over previously). To provide some perspective, a forgettable teen drama (Outer Banks) crushed TLOU with its opener (2,214, more than double the peak) and plenty of other shows have peaked much, much higher. The hype around it reminds me of both Watchmen (2019) and Lovecraft Country (2020)--each the greatest show ever from HBO, which mysteriously never got second seasons (the latter was announced and then cancelled before going into production). We are getting a second season for TLOU and the showrunners have already announced it's going to be very different from The Last of Us Part II--a reminder of how badly that game flopped. I'm disappointed we won't see live action versions of all the sequel's stupidity--without towels, golf, and other silliness, there's nothing to interest me in what HBO has on offer.

I've had standalone articles on the Witcher 1 remake and Witcher 4 in progress for awhile, but on the snippet side of the news the Witcher project called Sirius has new information attached to it: the company announced it's changing it's original conception and essentially starting fresh. The rumour that's come with this news is that it's going to be a one-off Japanese-inspired take on The Witcher. Via the link above, Neon Knight goes over the rumour whose idea I don't find interesting (Geralt is already like a Samurai and CDPR just spent an entire game swimming in Japanese culture with Cyberpunk 2077). The other part of the rumour, that CDPR decided to scrap the MP part of the game, seems plasubile, but that's the most distinctive part of the project to begin with. I don't see how a move like this would help the game--turning Geralt into a Samurai is the least distinctive thing you could do with him.

For those who missed it, I posted my review of Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. To sum it up: it's a fun, dumb movie--better than I expected, but with plenty of room for improvement. In terms of the box office, the film is tracking for a better than expected opening weekend (bumping from 30-35 million to 35-40 domestically and hitting 37, 70 worldwide), but that still has it heading towards failure given its bloated 150 million budget. I suspect the fact that it looks like all the recent fantasy abominations (Rings of Power, Wheel of Time, Witcher, etc) has made casual fans skip it. That's the big problem the industry is facing, as the zeitgeist is flipping and the soft, largely imaginary market currently being pursued isn't big enough to support the industry.

Because I've been writing articles about a range of topics for a long time I get to see experts in one area express unrelated political opinions regularly. I don't mean generic expressions, but specific statements. What tends to come out of their mouths boggles the mind. There's an undercurrent of smug arrogance which neatly fits their economic bracket, and the content merely reflects headlines and whatever limited snippets of information they get spoon-fed by cable news.

This article was written by Peter Levi

Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves Review

[I've updated this after I saw it a second time April 23rd--new comments are noted via long italics]

I saw Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves with low expectations. As someone who saw the original D&D film in theaters ("Snails!"), this wasn't my first rodeo--I can still see Justin Whalin's ridiculous Jimmy Olsen haircut contrasting with literally everything else around him in that film. The 2000 movie is hilariously bad and I knew Honor would be at least competently made. So how was it? It's an entertaining film with plenty of flaws--ones that would normally ruin the experience for me-- but this is a rare case where the pacing and humour were enough to keep me going despite the problems. I'd compare it to Guardians of the Galaxy 2 if you cut most of the bloat. There's a strong Guardians templating in Honor and I'll mention it when it comes up. Let's dive into some specifics (possible spoilers ahead, but I'll do my best to be vague):

The Plot

An iteration of 'save the princess' and on paper this is fine--I approve of it not being a save-the-world scenario--personal stakes is a good choice. Unfortunately, I could not care less about the actual goal because Chloe Coleman (Kira) and the actress who plays Edgin's love interest (I can't remember the character's name) can't act. Coleman gets more screen time and it's painful watching her (the only emotion I felt was irritation). Normally when the goal of the story isn't engaging, a film becomes unwatchable, but I was able to get passed it here.

Performances

We'll go in order of best to worst:
Edgin (Chris Pine) - holds the film together and owns all the scenes he's in; while I didn't care about his wife or daughter, I did want to see Edgin succeed and whenever things shifted to, say, Holga, I wanted to get it over with and return to Edgin; I think the similarities to Peter Quill are minimal--in part because of the different ages--although there is an emotional similarity to Quill's mother's death and the death of Edgin's wife

Forge (Hugh Grant) - delightful and the film would have benefitted from more of him--his attachment to Kira makes little sense (a problem based on her bad acting and the writing), but I couldn't help but cheer for him throughout; he's definitely a riff on Yondu, but funnier with less depth

Doric (Sophia Lillis) - there's so much missed opportunity here, as Lillis is an excellent actress and she's given almost nothing to do; her backstory is as poorly executed as everyone else's, but fortunately the film spends almost no time on it; there's a muted Nebula-vibe to her (her anger and mistrust of humans while being seen as an 'other', but with the sister angle axed); until this film I had no idea how tiny Lillis is (she's 5'0)

Sofina (Daisy Head) - given almost nothing to work with, she exudes the emotions required from the role--more depth would have been nice, but that applies to all the characters; the similarities to Ronan are present (but with less depth--she has all the rage he does, but the motivation is paper thin, 'I'm eeeeeevil!')

Xenk (Rege-Jean Page) - a small role where, other than having the right attitude for a paladin, his combat/abilities don't separate him from any other fighter; were it not for interactions with Edgin, he wouldn't work (his battle against his long-time enemy has no emotional impact and is overly long); he's clearly a riff on Drax (but not nearly as effective)

Holga (Michelle Rodriguez) - she's adequate throughout, but Rodriguez has no acting range and its a strange choice to give her a number of emotional scenes (the one with her ex might be the worst in the film--the FX for halflings is quite bad)--fortunately, none of these moments last long; I believe this is meant to be a Gamora-riff (as she and Edgin have a platonic parental relationship), but Zoe Saldana is a much better actress than Rodriguez, so it doesn't work nearly as well; she also has too much time spent on her fight scenes--in a film like this there's just no reason to show her in multiple sequences (it's just bloat--we know from the initial scene how capable she is). I also could not care less if she lived or died in the film (just as I didn't care about Edgin getting his wife back), muting the emotional beat being sought at the end.

Simon (Justice Smith) - looks like he's twelve years old, which is unendingly distracting; he's adequate in what's meant to be a typical Michael Cera role (awkward); I didn't hate him, but it's easy to imagine another actor doing much more with it; there's no obvious Guardians-parallel that I can see (if anything it echoes Presto from the D&D cartoon); his 'romance' with Doric is paper thin and the two have no chemistry at all--Simon comes across as largely creepy

Character Arcs

Technically the main cast all has them (Edgin, Doric, Holga, and Simon), but none are engaging--I felt no investment whatsoever. The small nods to romance are poorly executed and there's no chemistry in any of them (none are even believable). What saves this from being a complete disaster is so little time is spent on them--they aren't given enough time to become annoying (and, at least with Simon, his journey is punctuated by humour). Of them all Holga's is the least effective, as her side trip to see her ex is overly long and pointless (yes they get the staff by doing so, but that could have been acquired in other ways)--it's simply a jarring pause that fails the emotional beat it's aiming for. Edgin's relationship with his daughter is almost as bad, in part due to the acting and because the daughter is essentially dead weight throughout (her heroic action at the end feels unearned and stapled on).

The Writing

The humour works (without it the film wouldn't), holds up on a second viewing, and the fast pacing holds it together; the pathos completely fails (some of that can be blamed on the acting, but it's largely a writing issue) and the stakes are irrelevant because I didn't care what happened to the characters or the world itself (I just wanted Edgin and Forge to succeed, because I liked both).

The Action

Adequate. The monster fights are fun, but the sword play is simply adequate and tends to drag (it's less about length than about the fights having no real emotional impact). No one is going to see this film again based purely on the action (Xenk and Holga's fight scenes are so similar that there's no distinguishing between the two--something that really hurts Xenk's potential distinctiveness). I'm not sure what was behind ignoring the magical abilities of paladins (Xenk) and bards (Edgin); clerics and healing magic are also largely ignored (presumably to help maintain dramatic tension).

World Building

No effort is made to world build (it's impossible to guess the cultural and social differences between anyone), but the Forgotten Realms is a farrago of nonsense anyway. The problem this creates is that it means what you are watching fails to be distinctive--it could slot into virtually any fantasy milieu, making it far less memorable.

FX

It's a mixed bag--none of it is excellent, but most of it isn't terrible. For me it was fine, especially for a film that leans so heavily into humour. The most jarring effects, oddly enough, were with the halflings.

80s Easter Egg

While I appreciated the nod to the 1980s cartoon, I have no idea why Eric was randomly race-swapped or why they didn't pick an actual redhead to play Shelia instead of a woman with dyed hair. It doesn't matter that much, but given how popular the IP is in Brazil, it's odd not to please that audience with what is only a memberberry. One thing it did do is reaffirm that I'm glad this was an original story rather than an adaptation.

Final thoughts

This is a fun, mindless action/comedy. As such, it fills a niche that's largely unexploited in fantasy (which tends to take itself seriously). The downside is that it also makes the film largely forgettable (no one is going to feel emotionally impacted by it). That lack of distinctiveness seems to be why the film flopped--having cost 150 million to make, it needed to crest 500 million to break even, but barely hit 200. At the end of the day, aiming for a casual audience they missed it entirely.

For those wondering/concerned about the ESG/BlackRock impact on the film: it's suffused with it (that's obvious from the casting), but tame compared to Rings of Power, She-Hulk, etc. It is a little distracting that every single relationship is interracial--you don't need a sledgehammer to pound a nail--but I don't think that impacted the reaction to the film (the irony of BlackRock is its efforts, when they have any impact at all, is the opposite that's intended). I am amused at how different the marketing is for the merchandise, as the focus is so strongly on Chris Pine you'd be forgiven if you didn't know it's an ensemble film.

I will be seeing the film again with one of my gaming group's and when I do I'll note any variation in how I feel after a second helping (now integrated above).

This article was written by Peter Levi