Sunday, April 5, 2009

I've had it with FOX

Normally, I try not to be a Negative Nancy with my blog. I'm not about burning bridges or anything and am very interested in giving everyone a fair shake. But after much internal dialogue I feel it is my duty to rant a little bit. So get ready with your grains of salt as this is just one guy's opinion of sticking it to The Man.

Fox Studios as a film company has been more than dubious of late and their "Let's take 'em to court" business model has me suspicious of their creative abilities. After sitting on The Watchmen for so long and being on record as saying the movie was "impossible" to make they went forth with a contract to WB to allow them the rights to make one of the best adaptations I have ever seen. But of course WB in their rush of giddiness failed to read the fine print and got slapped with a lawsuit regardless. Lately we have watched Fox destroy the story lines to many of fandom's favorite characters to dumb them up for a public who loves American Gladiators and Professional Wrestling. It would almost seem as though Rupert Murdoch doesn't have a lot of faith in the average American intellect. This is obviously the reason that Fox News can exist at all by creating false news stories.

I would love for everyone to remember the fact that every time you watch Fox television or a Fox movie, one way or another you are putting money into the pocket of Bill O'Reilley. By spending your hard earned dollars for a Fox film, Fox News can exist whether it turns a profit or not. I think Fox is a perfect example of what happens to an entertainment company when they have no one creative in charge of anything and the company is run entirely by business executives.

Unfortunately, Marvel is in a lock with Fox at this point and WB and DC Comics are the same entity. All that leaves are the independents. Although it is difficult to refer to Dark Horse and Image as independent anymore. But as far as I am concerned there is absolutely no reason an independent comic book company should be dealing with Fox at all. For your consideration I would like to recommend a company by the name of Screen Gems Studios located in beautiful Wilmington, North Carolina. They are one of the studios behind the Underworld films among others successful franchises. I would love to see Screen Gems corner the market on films produced by independent comics. They seem to be more of a company willing to take creative risks and for that I applaud them.

Just click the video below to see where your money really goes.