AVATAR progress

Jimmy Thick

Jimmy Thick

Well-Known Member
MerlinTheGoat said:
His perfectionism pays off when he's actually left to his own devices and allowed to not do things cheaply. He is often allowed this leeway when he's making his own movies. That's not the case here. Disney corporate heads are in charge of approving the budget. And besides being stingy in the first place, their incredible bloat and wastefulness cause projects to cost immensely more than it should for their relative quality. Going over budget is not something Disney (modern Disney anyways) is going to allow him to do. And whatever Cameron wants to do is inevitably going to cost way more than Disney will allow. We already know from the insiders here that the expansion has shrunk a lot from some of the original concepts and proposals.
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Where is any actual proof beyond what supposed "insiders" have speculated? Only thing I could find was this statement from Tom Staggs made in Dec 2012:

"We've gotten more excited about Avatar as we've gone through development. Because we are finding that really playing around with this notion of allowing guests to visit Pandora can be very magical," Staggs said during a brief interview after a grand opening event for "New Fantasyland," which will remain under construction until 2014. "We're not in construction yet. We're still in development. And we're still honing exactly what we're going to do. But it's going to be big."
When Disney first announced the project in September 2011, company officials signaled they would spend between $400 million and $500 million. Asked if Disney still intends to invest the same amount in Avatar Land, Staggs responded, "Yes."

http://articles.orlandosentinel.com...tar-land-cars-land-resorts-chairman-tom-stags

That hardly looks like the budget has been cut, designs have been tampered with or what ever blue pill you think people should try to choke down in the name of supposed conjecture, save it for the gullible, facts strongly suggest otherwise.

But lets pursue this just to crystalize the playing field.

Cameron is huge.

Avatar is huge.

If there was any kind of situation where Cameron would be kowtowing to Disney, and Cameron is not the most liked person in Hollywood, that would be legitimate news, if not on American television, it would make Hollywood trade magazines. TMZ would have a field day with such dirt.

I have seen nothing about it anywhere, do a Google search, its not there. You really expect people to believe "insiders" here have this kind of information when people who do nothing but snoop around Hollywood don't even have this information about the number one director in Hollywood? That's asking an a whole heck of a lot for even the uninterested.

MerlinTheGoat said:
Cameron likely has little to no say in the matter of budget besides begging (and unlike Tony Baxter and probably Lasseter, he likely has no real political ammo/dirt to threaten them with to get his way). If a decent budget isn't approved (which is highly plausible and even likely given Disney's track record), there's really nothing he can do about cheapness. Even his role as a creative force on the project is probably very limited.
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Cameron has no say?

Cameron is like one of the worst directors to film with due to his demanding and cruel abuse of people while he makes his films, and all of a sudden, you really expect me or anyone to believe he's just going to turn that devotion to his vision off because Disney gave him a pile of cash and told him to be a good boy?

Could there be a possibility we have not seen anything from Disney about Avatar-Land is because Cameron is actually involved in the project and is being demanding, which will do nothing but make a amazing theme park experience?

Or is that too much progress to comprehend?

And if Cameron wants more money for Avatar-Land, couldn't he just go to Iger and say, "Hey Bob, give me another 500 million for Avatar-Land and maybe I'll make a couple films for you?".

How quick does Iger write the cheque for the guy who made the 2 biggest grossing films of all time?


Sheesh, its always the negative, people just can't get excited...

Next thing you know, people will make comments about Avatar, the highest grossing film of all time not having a specific demographic...


Magenta Panther said:
Ehhhh, no. Children love "Cars". Families love "Cars". Children and families do not love "Avatar" in the same way. Just eye-candy-addicted fanbois and worshippers of James Cameron love "Avatar". FACT!
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Homer-Simpson-Doh.jpg


Jimmy Thick- Writing logically and influencing people.
 
danlb_2000

danlb_2000

Premium Member
twebber55 said:
usually i agree with you but when you say more people "probably saw avatar" come on...obviously merchandising lends itself to kids stuff and cars is a huge merchandising success...but if we relied just on merchandising than hello kitty is much more popular than harry potter..obviously on a disney theme park board cars is going to be more popular than a non disney product
i also think the cars environment is perfect for a theme park land..even though the first movie was good and the second ok cars land was a huge hit for WDI..quality won out...hopefully star wars, avatar, and or cars land east will be done well
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I am not sure exactly what point you are debating here. By "more people probably saw Avatar", I simply meant based on the box office numbers more people went to see Avatar then the two Cars movies combined. But I have no way of determining how many more people have seen them on TV and video. Either way, I still think if you walked up to random people on the street, Cars would have more brand recognition then Avatar, and Star Wars would each both for lunch. :)
 
danlb_2000

danlb_2000

Premium Member
Jimmy Thick said:
Where is any actual proof beyond what supposed "insiders" have speculated? Only thing I could find was this statement from Tom Staggs made in Dec 2012:

"We've gotten more excited about Avatar as we've gone through development. Because we are finding that really playing around with this notion of allowing guests to visit Pandora can be very magical," Staggs said during a brief interview after a grand opening event for "New Fantasyland," which will remain under construction until 2014. "We're not in construction yet. We're still in development. And we're still honing exactly what we're going to do. But it's going to be big."
When Disney first announced the project in September 2011, company officials signaled they would spend between $400 million and $500 million. Asked if Disney still intends to invest the same amount in Avatar Land, Staggs responded, "Yes."

http://articles.orlandosentinel.com...tar-land-cars-land-resorts-chairman-tom-stags

That hardly looks like the budget has been cut, designs have been tampered with or what ever blue pill you think people should try to choke down in the name of supposed conjecture, save it for the gullible, facts strongly suggest otherwise.

But lets pursue this just to crystalize the playing field.

Cameron is huge.

Avatar is huge.

If there was any kind of situation where Cameron would be kowtowing to Disney, and Cameron is not the most liked person in Hollywood, that would be legitimate news, if not on American television, it would make Hollywood trade magazines. TMZ would have a field day with such dirt.

I have seen nothing about it anywhere, do a Google search, its not there. You really expect people to believe "insiders" here have this kind of information when people who do nothing but snoop around Hollywood don't even have this information about the number one director in Hollywood? That's asking an a whole heck of a lot for even the uninterested.


Jimmy Thick- Writing illogically and influencing people.
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Cameron having disagreements with Disney over the development of a theme park attraction is hardly news worthy, it would actually be more news worthy if they weren't having disagreements. Now if Cameron here to get the point where he walked away from and killed the project, then if might make the news.

As for the budget being cut, we may not know this from any official source, but it's not that hard to believe. When has Disney every increased the budget on a project? Projects at this phase of development almost always start high and get cut from there.
 
Jimmy Thick

Jimmy Thick

Well-Known Member
danlb_2000 said:
Cameron having disagreements with Disney over the development of a theme park attraction is hardly news worthy, it would actually be more news worthy if they weren't having disagreements. Now if Cameron here to get the point where he walked away from and killed the project, then if might make the news.

As for the budget being cut, we may not know this from any official source, but it's not that hard to believe. When has Disney every increased the budget on a project? Projects at this phase of development almost always start high and get cut from there.
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If Cameron had to swallow his pride and kowtow to Disney, that's huge news, and industry trades would be all over it. One, its Disney and Disney is the hottest thing going right now, and two, its Cameron, who is the boy wonder for films, and notoriously cruel at times who people would like to see fail.

Avatar-Land was all over the news, any kind of problems associated with it would be fodder for TMZ and other similar outlets.

Outside of cutting budgets on opening new theme parks, which isn't a bad decision from a business perspective, what actual proof is there to Disney cutting budgets on individual attractions?


Jimmy Thick- To be honest, who really cares about such things out of the public control?
 
T

twebber55

Well-Known Member
danlb_2000 said:
I am not sure exactly what point you are debating here. By "more people probably saw Avatar", I simply meant based on the box office numbers more people went to see Avatar then the two Cars movies combined. But I have no way of determining how many more people have seen them on TV and video. Either way, I still think if you walked up to random people on the street, Cars would have more brand recognition then Avatar, and Star Wars would each both for lunch. :)
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i guess my point was in my opinion, that the only place where avatar gets low balled is on message boards like this where a small demographic is represented
no big deal

i actually read on a board (cant remember if it was this one) where somebody said wdi can pull off a nice land even though avatar was a complete failure and nobody liked it
 
T

twebber55

Well-Known Member
danlb_2000 said:
Cameron having disagreements with Disney over the development of a theme park attraction is hardly news worthy, it would actually be more news worthy if they weren't having disagreements. Now if Cameron here to get the point where he walked away from and killed the project, then if might make the news.

As for the budget being cut, we may not know this from any official source, but it's not that hard to believe. When has Disney every increased the budget on a project? Projects at this phase of development almost always start high and get cut from there.
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cars land
 
MerlinTheGoat

MerlinTheGoat

Well-Known Member
Jimmy Thick said:
Where is any actual proof beyond what supposed "insiders" have speculated? Only thing I could find was this statement from Tom Staggs made in Dec 2012:

http://articles.orlandosentinel.com...tar-land-cars-land-resorts-chairman-tom-stags

That hardly looks like the budget has been cut, designs have been tampered with or what ever blue pill you think people should try to choke down in the name of supposed conjecture, save it for the gullible, facts strongly suggest otherwise.
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Ah so this is just another of your hilariously poor attempts to insult actually respectable people here such as Lee, WDW1974, Martin and everyone else who actually know what is going on. My mistake.

Were you actually expecting Staggs to tell people that a project was having issues if it was? When was the last time you heard a person like him for an entertainment form actually come out and make public that an upcoming project has had its budget slashed and isn't going to be as good as creatives wanted? Almost every single ride ever created (even before Disney started its downward plummet in quality during the 90's) has been immensely more ambitious in the creation stage before they actually started building it. Just look at the original concept of the Little Mermaid ride now floating around the net (the one from a decade or two ago is far more ambitious and amazing), or the concept art and earlier track layouts of the Dwarf Mine Train (a large portion of the track is much shorter and apparently there are fewer show scenes and other elements from the concept art no longer happening).

For anyone who isn't completely high from snorting pixie dust, it's well known that Cameron and Disney have bumped heads on this site from what every respectable insider have told us. Their information is infinitely more useful and accurate than what a PR spokesman for a corporation will tell you.

Jimmy Thick said:
Outside of cutting budgets on opening new theme parks, which isn't a bad decision from a business perspective, what actual proof is there to Disney cutting budgets on individual attractions?
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It's well known that the last time Space Mountain at WDW went down for a substantial refurbishment (was it 2009?), its budget was absolutely mutilated. Ask @marni1971 and probably @Lee and they'll tell you all about it. The entire track was apparently going to be replaced. The ride was going to be massively overhauled until WDW management decided to cancel the plans and slash the budget to pieces.

Jimmy Thick said:
Cameron has no say?

Cameron is like one of the worst directors to film with due to his demanding and cruel abuse of people while he makes his films, and all of a sudden, you really expect me or anyone to believe he's just going to turn that devotion to his vision off because Disney gave him a pile of cash and told him to be a good boy?

Could there be a possibility we have not seen anything from Disney about Avatar-Land is because Cameron is actually involved in the project and is being demanding, which will do nothing but make a amazing theme park experience?

Or is that too much progress to comprehend?
Click to expand...
Disney are the ones approving and providing the budget, not Cameron. It doesn't matter how many temper tantrums Cameron throws to try to get his way, Disney still holds the cards and signs the checks. Even Cameron's ego isn't going to be able to do anything against Disney's own ego and stubbornness.

I have no clue how this expansion is going to turn out. I have incredibly low expectations because of how modern Disney works though. Even a huge budget might not make the expansion a hit with how wasteful and bloated Disney has become.
 

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