- May 15th, 2022, 12:37 am#4969891
*Just an FYI. This post might bother some GB16 fans. If that’s a trigger for you, you may want to avoid the following. Apologies in advance.*
Top Gun Maverick is getting the hype & potential of what a GB3 with the OG cast could’ve been. Of course we will never know that for sure, but we can make a few suppositions.
Top Gun is a beloved property but I would say there’s no argument that Ghostbusters dwarfs it in it’s popularity, right? It’s a little hard to judge those things but if you look at box office comparison between the OG films & cultural staying power, they are similar but I’d give GB the edge. Both had huge soundtracks and number 1 songs. But GB had the animated series and merchandise that Top Gun never did. Infact I’d prob say Top Gun is more dated than GB, but still pretty well regarded.
Yet I can feel the hype for this movie in the theatre everytime the trailer plays in a way I never did for GB16/GBA. Somehow I doubt if Top Gun Maverick only featured a 4 minute Tom Cruise cameo at the end there’d be the same hype. It’s looking to open at about 130 million. I can see it doing more. I’d say 160 isn’t out of reach. But the box office prognosticators are guessing a 100+ opening to easily within reach.
What we are seeing is what could’ve been for this franchise. I know, I know. But it’s really hard not to understate what a colossal mistake GB16 was. We’ve been over that. But that’s where it all went wrong, from a box office POV.
Top Gun Maverick is Tom Cruise, in the lead, supported by new characters. Boom. That’s it. That’s all they had to do. And they got it wrong twice. Twice. I’m sorry, I know a lot of you LOVE GBA. I wish I could…
This is the last time I’ll say this(that’s probably a lie). But GB3 needed to be Dan, Bill & Ernie(or Harold before he passed) with a bunch of younger talent in the wings and not doing that is one of the biggest F ups in franchise filmmaking history. Sony thought the audience loyalty was to the concept. The same way they thought MiB was the concept. But because Sony is stupid, and boy are they stupid, they tried to be hip. Oof. I still remember that trailer, one of the worst main stream trailers ever forged by humankind, I remember it playing in front of Batman V Superman and Captain America Civil War. I remember the buzz in the air as those Ray Parker Jr piano notes hit and the text started with “in 1984 four scientists saved New York”…and I remember the silence, the deafening silence after the “the power of patty compels you” ending. No Dan Aykroyd as Ray, No Ernie Hudson as Winston and no Bill Murray as Venkman & no laughs. That’s what’s audiences were thinking. “Where are the ghostbusters?”
I’ll say this until I’m blue in the face but Ghostbusters IS those characters/actors. The same way Top Gun IS Tom Cruise. Or Indiana Jones IS Harrison Ford. It doesn’t mean those franchises are exactly the same, just that the audience identifies the franchise with those names.
Some fans are cool so long as the studio keep chugging out the films and merch. But me? I like to know the franchise I love is loved, that it kills at the box office. I guess it’s the same way that we like it when our sports teams not only win, but dominate. I wasn’t around in 1984 to see Ghostbusters at its zenith. And I was too young for the RGB/GB2 media blitz. Seeing GB16 bomb sucked and seeing GBA do “meh” wasn’t much better.
But there’s certain movies that you can just tell are going to be hits. You can feel it in the air. It’s in the way people talk about it or get excited about it. It’s very unscientific but if anyone was alive in 2002 you felt that with Spider-Man. You could feel it when people talked about another Indiana Jones movie. The Star Wars prequels. The Matrix sequels. Fellowship of the Ring. Some of them you could feel months before the movie came out, others before cameras even rolled. Ghostbusters 3 circa 1999-2013 was in that realm.
So if anyone wants to see what a possible GB3 opening might look like, Top Gun Maverick could be your answer. Maverick is back, flying planes, with new characters, new villains and with made 21st century tech on a huge budget. That’s what the audience wants, Paramount + Tom Cruise knew that, because they aren’t stupid, and they’ll reap the rewards.
Top Gun Maverick is getting the hype & potential of what a GB3 with the OG cast could’ve been. Of course we will never know that for sure, but we can make a few suppositions.
Top Gun is a beloved property but I would say there’s no argument that Ghostbusters dwarfs it in it’s popularity, right? It’s a little hard to judge those things but if you look at box office comparison between the OG films & cultural staying power, they are similar but I’d give GB the edge. Both had huge soundtracks and number 1 songs. But GB had the animated series and merchandise that Top Gun never did. Infact I’d prob say Top Gun is more dated than GB, but still pretty well regarded.
Yet I can feel the hype for this movie in the theatre everytime the trailer plays in a way I never did for GB16/GBA. Somehow I doubt if Top Gun Maverick only featured a 4 minute Tom Cruise cameo at the end there’d be the same hype. It’s looking to open at about 130 million. I can see it doing more. I’d say 160 isn’t out of reach. But the box office prognosticators are guessing a 100+ opening to easily within reach.
What we are seeing is what could’ve been for this franchise. I know, I know. But it’s really hard not to understate what a colossal mistake GB16 was. We’ve been over that. But that’s where it all went wrong, from a box office POV.
Top Gun Maverick is Tom Cruise, in the lead, supported by new characters. Boom. That’s it. That’s all they had to do. And they got it wrong twice. Twice. I’m sorry, I know a lot of you LOVE GBA. I wish I could…
This is the last time I’ll say this(that’s probably a lie). But GB3 needed to be Dan, Bill & Ernie(or Harold before he passed) with a bunch of younger talent in the wings and not doing that is one of the biggest F ups in franchise filmmaking history. Sony thought the audience loyalty was to the concept. The same way they thought MiB was the concept. But because Sony is stupid, and boy are they stupid, they tried to be hip. Oof. I still remember that trailer, one of the worst main stream trailers ever forged by humankind, I remember it playing in front of Batman V Superman and Captain America Civil War. I remember the buzz in the air as those Ray Parker Jr piano notes hit and the text started with “in 1984 four scientists saved New York”…and I remember the silence, the deafening silence after the “the power of patty compels you” ending. No Dan Aykroyd as Ray, No Ernie Hudson as Winston and no Bill Murray as Venkman & no laughs. That’s what’s audiences were thinking. “Where are the ghostbusters?”
I’ll say this until I’m blue in the face but Ghostbusters IS those characters/actors. The same way Top Gun IS Tom Cruise. Or Indiana Jones IS Harrison Ford. It doesn’t mean those franchises are exactly the same, just that the audience identifies the franchise with those names.
Some fans are cool so long as the studio keep chugging out the films and merch. But me? I like to know the franchise I love is loved, that it kills at the box office. I guess it’s the same way that we like it when our sports teams not only win, but dominate. I wasn’t around in 1984 to see Ghostbusters at its zenith. And I was too young for the RGB/GB2 media blitz. Seeing GB16 bomb sucked and seeing GBA do “meh” wasn’t much better.
But there’s certain movies that you can just tell are going to be hits. You can feel it in the air. It’s in the way people talk about it or get excited about it. It’s very unscientific but if anyone was alive in 2002 you felt that with Spider-Man. You could feel it when people talked about another Indiana Jones movie. The Star Wars prequels. The Matrix sequels. Fellowship of the Ring. Some of them you could feel months before the movie came out, others before cameras even rolled. Ghostbusters 3 circa 1999-2013 was in that realm.
So if anyone wants to see what a possible GB3 opening might look like, Top Gun Maverick could be your answer. Maverick is back, flying planes, with new characters, new villains and with made 21st century tech on a huge budget. That’s what the audience wants, Paramount + Tom Cruise knew that, because they aren’t stupid, and they’ll reap the rewards.