Oz movie is successful, Wicked movie unlikely — Page 2

I saw the movie yesterday and it is SO FAR DIFFERENT from WICKED the musical or book that there is only a "green girl," a wizard and a blond witch named Glinda involved. The story in OZ even completly contradicts that Elphaba... er Theodora...Ugh, never mind LOL

They are totally different characters, storyline... EVERYTHING about it is different.

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Updated On: 3/11/13 at 11:42 AM

"And if you didn't notice, that stupid Oz movie got some of the most crappy reviews ever."

It has a 61% "fresh" rating on RottenTomatoes.com, not bad for a CGI-filled, big Hollywood movie. Hyperbole much?

Still... "some of the most crappy reviews ever"? Only TWO of the current top 10 is even at 60% or above.

Just have a low tolerance for hysteria, I guess.

Updated On: 3/11/13 at 03:25 PM

I don't think there is a Baum estate. The book is in the public domain.

I would think just the opposite of what this thread title suggests. I think a Wicked movie would be more unlikely if the Oz movie had not done well. Being successful shows that this is the type of movie the audience wants to see. I agree that Universal was well aware of OZ when they made their decision.

^ Dripping with sarcasm...lol

In regards to its Rotten Tomatoes score, I find Metacritic, which only uses major critics, a better gauge. It's currently at 43% positive there ( http://www.metacritic.com/movie/oz-the-great-and-powerful ) For comparison to a similar project, Burton's Alice in Wonderland scored a 53% in the end.

Regardless, it's already a big hit, despite costing over $200 mill. But I don't really see it getting in the way of Wicked.

There's a fairly high budget CGI all star cast musical Oz animated film that was meant to come out this Summer, Dorothy of Oz (being based on one of the books by Baum's grandson--I haven't read them but have heard they don't really follow Oz cannon, and this is more a Return of Oz thing with Dorothy returning after the first story--although it looks far less interesting.) It has an "all star cast" (Kelsey Grammer as the Lion, Lea Michele as Dorothy, Megan Hilty as a china doll--yes another one, though of course the idea of a china doll comes from the original novel.) I believe it was pushed back to an indefinite date due to Oz's release (why they didn't plan on doing this months ago, I have no idea.)

It's interesting that Disney released this film--given how they used to have a theme park deal with MGM to use their films at Disney MGM Studios--including all the film bits, including Oz, in the Great Movie Ride which I used to love but have heard has been neglected for a while. It seems like all of that is quietly dissolving, but...

Not really sure how that gives it an edge, but yeah, they cover different material despite telling origin stories of some of the same characters. I dunno--Oz has had so many various prequels and sequels that rarely jibe together with the original Baum books anyway (and Baum himself was very inconsistant with details from book to book,) so I don't really feel it's gonna be that big of an issue.

I think there are many roadblocks ahead for a Wicked movie. We hear news of films entering development all the time- it's hardly etched in stone that they will actually occur.

I'm not entirely sure what the success of Oz the Great and Powerful portends for the property. Although studios are hardly opposed to running similar programming to their competition, I do feel like there will be a hesitation to having a sudden glut of Oz films. Oz the Great and Powerful will encourage even more big-budgeted CGI hackjobs of beloved stories, and a sequel would probably run along the same timeline of development as a Wicked film.

Wicked is not at all the same as Oz the Great and Powerful (or Alice in Wonderland, or the like), of course. It's not action-driven. But being a fantasy musical will make it a gamble- it will be very expensive to produce and despite Wicked's worldwide success, there is still a very good chance it won't catch on as a film.

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I forgot that Disney owned the book rights for so long--I know they did a Mickey Mouse Club episode (I believe?) with some Oz elements--the Rainbow Road to Oz I think, but I've only seen stills in the Oz books I used to read obsessively as a kid.

Kad wrote:
"Oz the Great and Powerful will encourage even more big-budgeted CGI hackjobs of beloved stories, and a sequel would probably run along the same timeline of development as a Wicked film.

Wicked is not at all the same as Oz the Great and Powerful (or Alice in Wonderland, or the like), of course. It's not action-driven. "

I agree with your take on the movies, but in a way I think that opens up possibilities for films like Wicked to be made sooner. Alice was a massive blockbuster, and obviously led to this movie, but for all its success the actual movie seems to have already lost much of any serious audience impact it might have ever had. To me, that just means that more adaptations (I use that word loosely) of classic properties like this will get made, and as redundant as it seems, I suspect that will make studios more eager even for one based on the same source, although obviously they probably will wanna seperate the release date of a Wicked film far from an Oz sequel.

Best, thanks for explaining the trademark vs copyright thing--I never quite understood the difference before, or how things could be trademarked that had fallen out of copyright.

Ha, thanks for that. I've probably been curious to see it for 20 years or so--was it released on one of the Mickey Mouse Club vols of Disney's limited editions DVDs?

Would have been interesting to see an Oz film had Walt managed to make one although I imagine it would have been compared to the 1939 film, was it intended to be animated or live action?

I think Universal will make and release Wicked eventually but they can afford to wait as the various productions are doing good business, I do wonder if they'll go for a Summer release date or a Holiday/Christmas release date.

The animated Dorothy of Oz with Lea Michele and Megan Hilty voicing characters, will also be released, probably soon. I don't think any of this will have an effect on Wicked being made, since it hasn't even started casting yet and really the only thing that we know is that Universal owns the rights.