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We have a working title for the third DVD movie - Revolution. As reported earlier this year, Richard Dean Anderson will be back in the fold. Even though the production was due to start this fall, along with 'Atlantis: Extinction' film, the growing problems at MGM with its huge debts off billions, and possible auction, could delay the films for the foreseeable future. Hope they do find a way to make them.
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The script for the SG-1 movie has been written by Brad Wright and Carl Binder, who are currently serving as executive producers on Stargate Universe, with a story reportedly set sometime between Continuum and the start of SGU. Wright told fans at this year’s Vancouver Stargate convention that “I had a story idea that really worked with O’Neill. And it’s not just his character, by any means. It’s a Stargate story that brings O’Neill back in a big way.”
The third Stargate SG-1 movie would have finally revealed the top-secret Stargate program to the world, Stargate executive producer Joseph Mallozzi revealed.
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“This subject (the revelation and its many implications) would have formed the plot for the planned SG-1 movie, Stargate: Revolution,” Mallozzi said.
Written with the working title Stargate: Revolution, the movie was to heavily feature Richard Dean Anderson’s character Jack O’Neill.
The script was written by Brad Wright and Carl Binder, and of the possible Stargate projects bandied about over the past three years it came the closest to seeing the light of day. Wright was very confident in an April 2009 interview with GateWorld that they would be filming in the fall, and also said as much during his stage appearance at the official Stargate convention in Vancouver that month.
“I had a story idea that really worked with O’Neill,” Wright said. “And it’s not just his character, by any means. It’s a Stargate story that brings O’Neill back in a big way.”
Anderson confirmed on his Web site sooner thereafter that MGM had indicated its plans to go ahead with the movie. But when the DVD market continued to soften and the studio fell further into debt, plans were again put on hold.
Wright previously revealed the Stargate to the general public would be a major event in the fictional world and for the franchise — certainly a “revolution” — and was big enough that he wanted to reserve it for a movie. It was an idea that the writers enjoyed toying with in the television series, including the alternate-timeline episode “2010.” In that episode, Earth’s Stargate was kept in a public “space terminal” and available to the public for travel to other, allied worlds.
Mallozzi said that, even after those shows’ sets were taken down and key pieces auctioned off, he still held out hope that Revolution and the Atlantis movie (titled Stargate: Extinction) might still be made. (Wright announced last month that both were effectively shelved for good.)
“I still held out hope for both movies because, in the case of Stargate: Revolution, the lionshare of the action would have been off-world and ship-based while, in the case of Stargate: Extinction, although there was some action on Atlantis itself (eminently achievable through the magic of VFX), much of the story takes place on Earth and off-world,” he explained.
MGM owns the completed scripts for both movies. At this point, there is no indication from the studio as to whether fans might eventually see these stories in the form of a novel, comic book, or in another medium.
Were in trouble, things are looking up now as Bond 23 and The Hobbit movies were greenlit, but it seems there is no money to be made from the Stargate franchise.
Around $7 million doesn't sound much but it's a large figure when the other productions have been subsidised upfront by Syfy (to get TV premiere rights) and I guess despite the $500 mill bail-out the initial movies will gobble up most of that especially if they come with a $100 mill marketing budget before any money comes back into the business.
Lets remember the B5 DVD failed to do the business so the margins may be very very tight and unless the bean counters can show a significant return it's simply not worth the effort for MGM.
Around $7 million doesn't sound much but it's a large figure when the other productions have been subsidised upfront by Syfy (to get TV premiere rights) and I guess despite the $500 mill bail-out the initial movies will gobble up most of that especially if they come with a $100 mill marketing budget before any money comes back into the business.
Lets remember the B5 DVD failed to do the business so the margins may be very very tight and unless the bean counters can show a significant return it's simply not worth the effort for MGM.
That's where you're wrong the Babylon 5 DVD didn't fail to do the Business. It actually, to paraphrase JMS, performed "several orders of magnitude" better than Warner Brothers' expected. They then failed to take JMS up in quickly following up before the writers' strike. At which point JMS said he wasn't going to do another DVD and would only do a big-budget movie. The timing also coincided with JMS being offered lots of jobs on big screen movies.
JMS QUOTE
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The problem with any studio is that they're terrified of losing money
on something, anything, so they hedge their bets...they don't give the
ad money you want because they're afraid sales won't support it, and
end p with a self-fulfilling prophecy more times than not.
Your appraisal of the situation with WB is spot on.
However, despite this, they are most pleased as sales have been
several orders of magnitude beyond what they anticipated.
More on this when I know more about what this actually *means*.
Thanks for the clairification, it did however fail to provide a return that would justify the investment required to take the show to the next step so a thank you to the fans who lined the studios and creators pockets but you still won't get more content.
That perhaps is even more annoying than the DVD market simply not being strong enough in the first place, the market is there to support a product at $2 or $3 million dollars (SyFy saturday movie budgets) but not any higher.
The end result is the same in both cases, there is no more B5 at the budgets the studio was happy with and no more SG at the level that studio and broadcast partners were probably willing to invest.
Thanks for the clairification, it did however fail to provide a return that would justify the investment required to take the show to the next step so a thank you to the fans who lined the studios and creators pockets but you still won't get more content.
That perhaps is even more annoying than the DVD market simply not being strong enough in the first place, the market is there to support a product at $2 or $3 million dollars (SyFy saturday movie budgets) but not any higher.
The end result is the same in both cases, there is no more B5 at the budgets the studio was happy with and no more SG at the level that studio and broadcast partners were probably willing to invest.
Clearly the market is (or at least was) strong enough at least in Babylon 5 's case, it's just Warner Brothers home video missed their opportunity. I suspect that the Stargate fan base is also strong enough to support further releases. However like you said it's more a problem with MGM and their finance.
I must admit I'm disappointed that more Babylon 5 releases didn't happen given how strongly the DVD sold. I was hoping for a series of releases maybe three or four per year with the stories threading together much like the original series. Still at least something from the Babylon 5 universe is coming in the near future. Whether it's a big screen movie or a spin-off TV series, who knows? Whatever it is I can't wait to hear JMS announce it!
26-05-2011, 4:42 PM
E. & O.E.
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