Theory about why WOT on Amazon is the way it is
Long post about Wheel of Time TV show, no real spoilers, and inspired by a conversation I had with my friend Kit Kindred earlier this week, and after the hot mess of S1E6.
So, I have a theory about the WOT TV show. Amazon bought it to bury it, & are making their contractually obligated series before any rights revert, etc. They snapped it up so that it could not compete with the property they plan to heavily market & promote: LOTR.
Hear me out. Several years back, Disney made the John Carter movie. Despite having an acclaimed cast & director: no publicity tours, limited marketing, almost no tie in merchandise. Articles about how it was a flop were printed the week it premiered.
The movie got generally good reviews, even from die hard fans of the novels. It was clearly lining up several sequels, but .... Kit and I said at the time that Disney was sabotaging it & had bought it to bury it, and were roundly poo-poo'd.
We said that 1 year we would see Disney bring out a competing space franchise. And Lo and Behold, Disney announces they had acquired Star Wars.
But ... you say, Disney wouldn't spend Millions of $$$$ to kill their own property!
Disney spent/lost about 1% of its annual revenue on John Carter. It was chump change to them. A tax write off.
Don't believe me? There's a whole, excruciatingly well documented book about Disney and John Carter -- John Carter and the Gods of Hollywood -- that bore out everything we said, plus some more.
So now, let's take a look at WOT, shall we? The showrunner, Rafe Judkins did some work behind the scenes on Chuck & (the astoundingly mediocre) Agents of Shield.
Hoo boy does that lack of experience show, as well as do his ideas about telling a coherent story. WOT is full of "we made it up as we went along" changes that have profound logical inconsistencies and impact on the future story.
Moreover the WOT show looks and feels cheap. Many critics have compared it to looking and feeling like Xena and Legend of the Seeker.
Books and Bianca goes into detail over on Youtube about what is wrong with the series on a technical level.
The WOT store over on Amazon is an unfunny joke. A few crummy Tshirts that any ass with a CafePress account could make. A bookbag or three. No art of book, no funko pops, no jewelry, no cups, lanyards, statues.
US only at launch, for an international show!
And the store was announced/opened late in the day on Black Friday.
Despite the fact that the show was announced 2 years ago, licenses for jewelry and prop weapons were only negotiated and finalized in the past 6 weeks for two key vendors, and Funko has made no announcement that I know of.
So, we have:
(1) an inexperienced helmsman.
(2) cut rate production values (intresting that the Aes Sedai seem to have 1 set of clothes, few servants, and no army. TarValon is painfully clearly the repurposed Shadar Logoth set).
(3) bungled merchandising.
Amazon is going through the motions here, folks. There is, at this time, a show of support. Keyword: show.
I'm telling you now, there is no substance to this support. It's a show by Amazon until LOTR launches.
Yes, seasons two and three have been approved. Do not count on seasons 4-8 or an increased budget.
And the money spent so far?
$90 million + incidentals is chump change for Amazon. (I'm an Amazon shareholder, so believe me, I know.) Rafe Judkins, the showrunner, has commented that his budget is small compared to the upcoming LOTR show from Amazon.
And, I can guarantee you, the merchandise for that show will not be an afterthought with a halfbaked store rolled out last minute, nor will it be shot and run by a bunch of first timers.
It's a variation of the John Carter playbook. The specific plays are different, but the pattern of all this "happenstance" incompetence, oversights, cheaping out, and bungling surrounding the whole enterprise is the same.
Amazon grabbed WoT to sit on it.
I would love to be proven wrong on this, but I don't think I will be, not unless somebody at Amazon changes their mind.
And the first sign of that will be a new showrunner, one with experience of working on a major project with a lot of moving pieces and delivering the goods.
So, I have a theory about the WOT TV show. Amazon bought it to bury it, & are making their contractually obligated series before any rights revert, etc. They snapped it up so that it could not compete with the property they plan to heavily market & promote: LOTR.
Hear me out. Several years back, Disney made the John Carter movie. Despite having an acclaimed cast & director: no publicity tours, limited marketing, almost no tie in merchandise. Articles about how it was a flop were printed the week it premiered.
The movie got generally good reviews, even from die hard fans of the novels. It was clearly lining up several sequels, but .... Kit and I said at the time that Disney was sabotaging it & had bought it to bury it, and were roundly poo-poo'd.
We said that 1 year we would see Disney bring out a competing space franchise. And Lo and Behold, Disney announces they had acquired Star Wars.
But ... you say, Disney wouldn't spend Millions of $$$$ to kill their own property!
Disney spent/lost about 1% of its annual revenue on John Carter. It was chump change to them. A tax write off.
Don't believe me? There's a whole, excruciatingly well documented book about Disney and John Carter -- John Carter and the Gods of Hollywood -- that bore out everything we said, plus some more.
So now, let's take a look at WOT, shall we? The showrunner, Rafe Judkins did some work behind the scenes on Chuck & (the astoundingly mediocre) Agents of Shield.
Hoo boy does that lack of experience show, as well as do his ideas about telling a coherent story. WOT is full of "we made it up as we went along" changes that have profound logical inconsistencies and impact on the future story.
Moreover the WOT show looks and feels cheap. Many critics have compared it to looking and feeling like Xena and Legend of the Seeker.
Books and Bianca goes into detail over on Youtube about what is wrong with the series on a technical level.
The WOT store over on Amazon is an unfunny joke. A few crummy Tshirts that any ass with a CafePress account could make. A bookbag or three. No art of book, no funko pops, no jewelry, no cups, lanyards, statues.
US only at launch, for an international show!
And the store was announced/opened late in the day on Black Friday.
Despite the fact that the show was announced 2 years ago, licenses for jewelry and prop weapons were only negotiated and finalized in the past 6 weeks for two key vendors, and Funko has made no announcement that I know of.
So, we have:
(1) an inexperienced helmsman.
(2) cut rate production values (intresting that the Aes Sedai seem to have 1 set of clothes, few servants, and no army. TarValon is painfully clearly the repurposed Shadar Logoth set).
(3) bungled merchandising.
Amazon is going through the motions here, folks. There is, at this time, a show of support. Keyword: show.
I'm telling you now, there is no substance to this support. It's a show by Amazon until LOTR launches.
Yes, seasons two and three have been approved. Do not count on seasons 4-8 or an increased budget.
And the money spent so far?
$90 million + incidentals is chump change for Amazon. (I'm an Amazon shareholder, so believe me, I know.) Rafe Judkins, the showrunner, has commented that his budget is small compared to the upcoming LOTR show from Amazon.
And, I can guarantee you, the merchandise for that show will not be an afterthought with a halfbaked store rolled out last minute, nor will it be shot and run by a bunch of first timers.
It's a variation of the John Carter playbook. The specific plays are different, but the pattern of all this "happenstance" incompetence, oversights, cheaping out, and bungling surrounding the whole enterprise is the same.
Amazon grabbed WoT to sit on it.
I would love to be proven wrong on this, but I don't think I will be, not unless somebody at Amazon changes their mind.
And the first sign of that will be a new showrunner, one with experience of working on a major project with a lot of moving pieces and delivering the goods.