'Mars Needs Moms' A Costly Disappointment; Disney CEO Stays Upbeat About Marvel - Polidicks

[img]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/08/Mars_Needs_Moms%21_Poster.jpg[/img] [quote]How costly a mistake was Mars Needs Moms? Disney says the studio lost about $70 million in release costs and in an impairment charge for a film it now calls "very disappointing." Still, CEO Bob Iger tried -- not always successfully -- to avoid sounding sour today as analysts probed him about quarterly results that seemed to have befuddled many of them. Iger talked up the prospects for Disney's upcoming sequels to Pirates of the Caribbean and Cars. He also banged the drum for The Avengers, the Marvel action film due next year. Now that Disney has negotiated an early exit from Marvel's distribution deal with Paramount, Iger says the movie will be the "first really big initiative" from Disney's acquisition of Marvel with the potential to "turn into a true franchise." He adds that Marvel is developing a block of shows for Disney XD, as well as individual programs for ABC and ABC Family. Also on the television side, Iger says the coming upfront ad market will "be a strong one" -- which is far more vague than CBS chief Les Moonves' projection of "solid-double digit increases" for his network. Iger acknowledged that the last few years were "not as great" for ABC as they were during the heyday of its hits including Lost, Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy. But while he says that ABC has made "no decisions yet" about the primetime shows it will pick up for this fall, Iger adds that he's "encouraged" by the pilots he has seen including "some really strong shows" from ABC itself. He says that ESPN will do just fine if the NFL season is scuttled by a contract dispute between team owners and players. "There'll be a mad dash for male demos," he says. Iger seemed irked, though, by a question regarding whether ESPN's ad sales would be sufficient to justify a bid for TV rights to the Olympics. ESPN needs to be "a must-have product," he said. The network hopes to persuade cable and satellite operators to pay higher fees for Olympic programming. If that falls short, Iger says, then ESPN executives must be "mindful of their margins." Iger provided a little more clarity about his digital media plans. Disney will sell shows to Netflix and other Web-streaming services even though it owns equity in Hulu. "We never believed Hulu would end up in an exclusive position," he says. In video games, he says Disney took a five-month hiatus to refocus itself on higher quality games including some that will carry the Disney, ESPN and Marvel brands. He's hoping the unit will break even in 2013. Now the company's also preparing a major redesign of Disney.com to make it easier to navigate. At Disney's theme parks, Iger says he sees promising signs after a quarter in which the company had to temporarily close Tokyo Disney following Japan's earthquake and tsunami. Consumers seem to be accepting the double-digit price increases at Disney hotels which shows that "the discounting we had to implement (in the depths of the recession) is something of the past."[/quote] [url]http://www.deadline.com/2011/05/mars-needs-moms-and-fuel-costs-lead-to-sub-par-earnings-for-disney/[/url]

The second I saw the trailer for that movie, I knew it was going to bomb. That was such a ridiculous premise in the first place. [editline]10th May 2011[/editline] Even for a kids' movie.

The kind of film that should have been dropped in the ideas room.

Who on Earth would let such a laughable joke of a plotline to turn into a $70 million dollar crapshoot? Oh, wait, Martian CEOs!

Don't they have test groups for this kind of thing to NOT happen? "Hey Timmy heres this trailer let us know what you think" plays 30 second trailer "What'd you think?" Timmy looks up in disbelief "That was fucking stupid!" And thats how you keep from wasting $70 million dollars.

why do companies think that just because they are kids movies they can make complete shit? rango was a kids movie i think and it was good.

spy kids was a fucking awesome movie

Please tell me Disney isn't really this fucking stupid.

[QUOTE=Lachz0r;29750077]why do companies think that just because they are kids movies they can make complete shit? rango was a kids movie i think and it was good.[/QUOTE] I think a good kids movie is fun for adults too. Innuendos are great.

I knew this would happen the second I saw the trailer.

[QUOTE=FunkyHippo;29750210]Please tell me Disney isn't really this fucking stupid.[/QUOTE] Sorry, bro. It's been like this since 2002.

How could this have failed? It was in THREEE DEEEE!

When I first saw the trailer, I thought it was stupid. It was kind of uncanny valley-ish, mostly from the poorly designed aliens than from the humans. Still. Plus, that... rainbow sparkly thing. Was that supposed to be magic? And also, again, the aliens were stupid. (I just rewatched the trailer, actually) But just now I read the plot. ... [i]What the fuck!?[/i] I mean, I know they're going for a message about parents, but... Really, Disney? That convoluted, stupid piece of shit? "To get rid of the burden of childbirth and early child rearing, they completely separate the two genders, treating the males like trash, and have robots raise the girls. Each robot downloads mother programming from Earth mothers." Who the fuck thought of that shit!? Jimmy Neutron (the movie, not the show) did the same thing, but was actually fun to watch. And the story was silly, but at least made minimal sense, not [i]negative[/i] sense, like the premise for this shit. You know what? No. I watched an old movie last year with a somewhat similar premise. It was much better than this crap could ever be. [url]http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058548/[/url] I'm serious. I have a feeling that that's much more entertaining to watch (even if for "so bad it's good" reasons) than this crap.

this only goes to show how under appreciated moms are in today's society

After seeing the aliens in the trailer, i had made up my mind that this would be the worst thing from Disney in decades.

Even the movie title itself sounds so fucking stupid.

Uncanny valley to the max. A decaying corpse is more huggable than one of the characters

[Quote=Disney's Fucked Up] [B]At Disney's theme parks, Iger says he sees promising signs after a quarter in which the company had to temporarily close Tokyo Disney following Japan's earthquake and tsunami. Consumers seem to be accepting the double-digit price increases at Disney hotels which shows that "the discounting we had to implement (in the depths of the recession) is something of the past."[/B][/Quote] "We lost 70 million on our shitty movie... on the brightside we get to charge full price to recession-ridden Japan!" :downs:

My aunt and uncle own a theater, and my cousin that was working at the ticket booth told me that in an entire weekend, only 2 people went to watch Mars needs Moms.

I didn't know this was a Disney release, didn't think they would go that low.

the shit star on the 3D christmas tree

[QUOTE=SpartanV2;29752035]My aunt and uncle own a theater, and my cousin that was working at the ticket booth told me that in an entire weekend, only 2 people went to watch Mars needs Moms.[/QUOTE] wow that's bad

Maybe they make a movie called Disney Needs Writers.

[quote]In video games, he says Disney took a five-month hiatus to refocus itself on higher quality games including some that will carry the Disney, ESPN and Marvel brands. He's hoping the unit will break even in 2013.[/quote] I want my damn kingdom hearts soon.

Wait, what movie?

[IMG]http://i56.tinypic.com/t7n14y.jpg[/IMG]

[QUOTE=Arachnidus;29749854]The second I saw the trailer for that movie, I knew it was going to bomb. That was such a ridiculous premise in the first place. [editline]10th May 2011[/editline] Even for a kids' movie.[/QUOTE] The second I saw the film trailer I knew it would bomb, not because of a bad premise or plot but because the film's style threw itself end over end into the bottom of the Uncanny Valley. [editline]11th May 2011[/editline] [QUOTE=Sift;29753175][img_thumb]http://i56.tinypic.com/t7n14y.jpg[/img_thumb][/QUOTE] Mother. Fucking. Badass.

[QUOTE=Madman_Andre;29753267] Mother. Fucking. Badass.[/QUOTE] The author was so god-damned pissed and tired of the trailer that came before the start of the actual film everytime he went to watch a movie. I can totally relate to that

I haven't ever heard of this film. It sounds...um...interesting

Sounds more like an adult film. It would probably be more popular if it was.