Coyote Vs Acme

Could we not assume it's all down to one specific person at WBD? Blame the whole damn board.

To quote Hopper from A Bug's Life:

"First rule of leadersip. Everything is your fault."

Not saying he isn't at fault. Just that he's far from the only one we should be blaming.

And honestly, if a live action Scooby Doo series is being developed for Netflix, that's because of WBD and not despite it. That means they figured it was a way to make money.

It's clear that WBD doesn't have a problem releasing Scooby Doo stuff. They released two seasons of Velma, after all.

Edited by M84 on May 3rd 2024 at 10:28:53 PM

Except for that Scoob sequel that got scrapped for a tax write off.

Which can most likely be undone by paying back the IRS. See this right here?

However, if A Pup Named Scooby-Doo actually had a Christmas-themed episode, then we wouldn't need Scoob! Holiday Haunt.

Edited by aldrinejoseph25 on May 3rd 2024 at 8:01:05 AM

You know, since that image brings up Batgirl, was that movie far enough along to get focus testing?

Just because Batgirl has been cancelled doesn't mean that everyone will mourn it. As it turns out, there are some people who aren't too bothered about said cancellation, even criticizing some aspects of the film.

And remember, the film was poorly-received in test screenings and likened to a "bad TV episode".

Not to mention, given DC's track record of some of their recent movies that have been released, some people have said it's for the best.

Edited by aldrinejoseph25 on May 3rd 2024 at 8:35:36 AM

...a simple "yes it did and people didn't like it" would've done just fine. I genuinely didn't know if they got that far.

Batgirl did get along far enough for test screenings. From what I recall, it got mixed responses. I recall it being described as not great (which also could be down to the edit of the film they saw; test screenings are not about "Do you like the finished product?" but "How did the audience respond to this version?"), but better than some DC films.

I'd like to remind some that Star Wars also famously didn't test well in it's first edit which was genuinely terrible. Like, it was LONG with unneededly lengthy boring long-takes and scenes of Luke on Tatooine watching a Star Destroyer battle far above the planet and other things.

While I want to acknowledge Batgirl didn't test well, scrapping a nearly finished film at that point is still considered excessive unless we know more particulars about what the problems were.

Since Scooby-Doo apparently didn't even get that much and was scrapped for seemingly no real reason in regard to it's merit as a finished product... and then Cv A got scrapped even though it had extremely positive testing...

Yeah, I somewhat question if "It tested poorly" actually holds that much water here.

Edited by InkDagger on May 3rd 2024 at 10:20:56 AM

Also as someone who was once part of a test audience screening (for The Last Stand), the people running the screening really try to manipulate your opinions.

Edited by Brandon on May 3rd 2024 at 10:30:19 AM

People at test screenings try to manipulate you?

Bruce Timm apparently said once that Cartoon Network manipulated screenings of the Green Lantern animated series to get it out of the way asap. I remember reading that once.

These are people working for movie executives, who often appear to have axes to grind for their own projects and against the projects of others, who for all accounts appear to have egos, and who have the power to push.

Edited by TomWithoutJerry on May 3rd 2024 at 11:30:55 AM

That makes a really unfortunate amount of sense. I could totally see them "convincing" people to skew Batgirl impressions negatively in order to have the excuse for dropping it.

You can undo a write-off by amending that year's tax return. The downside is that you owe the IRS the tax plus interest.

Apparently the people at Archie Comics have thoughts about this too:

Archie comics are such an underrated treasure.

I just kind of wanna see this because the idea of this movie being released seems interesting. Troubled Production or no, probably an interesting experience.

As for any Scooby Doo show? Well, it can't be worse than Velma.

Notably, this is also what George Lucas does when he finds out people have physical copies of the Star Wars Holiday Special.

Any other Scooby-Doo! show is better than Velma. Especially Shaggy & Scooby-Doo Get A Clue! and the upcoming live-action series.

Btw, M84 I like your Pooh avatar, and the text underneath it, "Oh bother." It just neatly sums up most of the WBD news nowadays.

Edited by Brandon on May 3rd 2024 at 8:55:31 AM

Yeah, everything is just getting worse at WBD.

Yeah, there's not a lot of... interview integrity within test screenings. And, because they're not public (and often subject to ND As), there's not a ton of view as to how they go down.

Take a police investigation and court trial- There's a VERY important topic about leading the witness and asking questions that suggest their desired conclusions. There's a very real reason why we have that consideration; if you ask "Did you think that the accused murderer was a bad man?", there's a yes/no dichotomy there and leading the audience to consider the "accused murderer" aspect when answering. "What did you think of insertnamehere?" allows complete freedom of response and doesn't imply any one way or the other about the topic.

Bringing that to a test screening, if you ask an audience "Did you think x character was a bitch?" and no one in the room had otherwise come to that conclusion, they're now going to reframe all of their opinions about the character around "Was this character actually bitchy? Idk. I didn't think so... well, that one moment for .5 seconds of the film maybe..."

Or some of these test screenings will have, like, a dial that you change up or down depending on your interest during a screening. Gretta Gerwig has talked about her pilot for "How I Met Your Mother" where, everytime she was on-screen, the test audience lowered the dial. But that "Interest/Disinterst" dichotomy has very little data on what is actually causing it.

Like, was it Gerwig's acting? The character? The direction she was given? Granted, her explaination might not entirely be the entire story either but I think the premise alone is rather concerning.

It also explains A TON about Hollywood execs having wildly insane and 2-dimentional ideas about what does or does not sell a product; "THIS MOVIE FLOPPED BECAUSE OF THE GAYS!" "THIS MOVIE FLOPPED BECAUSE NO ONE LIKES FEMALE PROTAGONISTS!"

If you have an industry where it's regular practice is to take the most surface level data as the voice of the market, of course they're going to come to bizarre and insane conclusions.

Edited by InkDagger on May 3rd 2024 at 10:11:29 AM

It might be even worse in creative industries due to the egos involved. When it comes to stuff like art and entertainment, there's a level of emotional investment that isn't there in other industries. That's how you get Running the Asylum.

As I mentioned before, that's probably why Suicide Squad the game's development lingered for fourteen years. Someone at WBD clearly wanted that game to be real and refused to give up.

Steven Ray Bird has tweeted that it sounds like WB has made up their mind regarding the movie and are waiting on things to die down.

https://x.com/stevenraybyrd/status/1792357490715492738?s=46&t=7YT7yMPCw2VMMwQUxWj5_A

So what decision was made then?