Gareth Edwards: How soon Production for Godzilla Sequel begins Depends on China

As far as this movie having "poor word of mouth", it has a 73% fresh critic score and audience ratings of over 70% on all of IMDb, RT and MetaCritic. It also has a 4 star average rating on Fandango, for what it's worth (much smaller sample size than IMDb and RT), since when is that considered "bad WOM"? That's considered net positive by those site's standards (as the norm for movies is in the 6's/60% range). Granted, it's not buzzing or anything, but good nonetheless, just not good enough to hold over X-Men. People just chose X-Men over it because it's fresh and it's a sure thing as comic book movies are huge these days, plus the early critic reviews for it were amazing (and it was an excellent movie, I must admit). Every single BO projection site was projecting a huge dropoff in its 2nd weekend before this movie came out simply because of X-Men coming out just a week later, and yes, it matters. What do you think would happen if X-Men came out just a week before T4? Because remember: it had a 64% dropoff in its 2nd weekend to Maleficent.

ok looks like i missed out on alot since last night....lets see where i begin.

@something real,

I was not directing what i said towards you in particular, i appreciate your honesty and your apoligies. All i was saying was for everyone here to be careful with what some say to others, we don't need name calling at all here on this site there are many rules that must be kept up for this site to continue to run for as long as it can.

@destroyah-x,

I can't even begin to compare those two films, honestly godzilla 2014 was far better than pacific rim as far as the actual fights scene goes, but the directing does need work and i feel like gareth can do better than this. So the directing between the two goes to del toro. Another thing i would like to point out is gareth did try to go for a realistic approach to the new godzilla film where as pacific rim did not. Don't get me wrong but the main thing i am realizing about these two kaiju films are that they both fall on the gamera heisei trilogy i am seeing some major similtarties between these films, but at the end of the day these are all only films about people, people who want to make art, and people who need to turn a profit. :)

@destroyah-x,

One thing that i forgot to mention in comparing these films, the simple fact is godzilla 2014 only made more because people know the name "godzilla." That also explains why tristars godzilla did good in the box office, but critics and us die hard fans alike didn't like it because it wasn't our godzilla that we grew up watching. Legendary is a great studio at the end of the day and all of their films are marvelous, I also feel the same way that del toro should direct the godzilla sequal and of course i want jim rygiel to helm the cgi again, i loved his work. If jim doesn't return then lets give micheal bay a try.

BIGBADBEN - You're most welcome. I'll do my best to remain as cordial as possible. I've never been nasty to anyone on this site, and I intend to keep it that way. :)

Getting a little more on topic, Godzilla's made over $20 million more in China since the weekend, putting it around $60 million overall. It's projected to be around $480 million world wide by the time the weekend's over.

With next week still in play before Transformers debuts in China, Godzilla could very well hit or be just under $500 million world wide before next weekend.

Source comes from a contact in China.

GMAN2887 - That's fantastic news! I'm very pleased that Godzilla is bringing in sush a great amount of revinue! We'll no doubt be given an exceptionally fun sequal! :)

If that source is true and Godzilla 2014 did indeed rake in another $20 mil since last weekend that is extremely fantastic! Hopefully it will rake in at least $20 more mil by the end of this week and hit the $480 mil mark.

If this film reaches $500 mil without Japan's help that would be awesome. I hope the sequel is awesome, it must not have the same flaws as this one or else the sky over this franchise will start becoming dark I'm afraid :( I will keep my expectations low in case.

@BigBadBen - I kind of agree with you on this. But what if initially Legendary hadn't set their sights on Gareth E. to direct Godzilla 2014 and taken Guillermo instead? Would we have ended up with a bolder vision of Godzilla today? That said, I thought budgeting was also one of the strongest factors that led Legendary to pick Gareth, and I dun believe in all that PR sugarcoating that tells us Gareth was so passionate about Godzilla whatsoever, because at the end of the day, its still a PR move to assure the public that Godzilla is in the safe hands of a competent director. To me, the reason for Legendary's choice was purely because Gareth demonstrated that ability to make something on a tight budget and yet deliver, and considering that the last 3 Godzilla movies that screened in America were all underperformers, plus no one is sure if the bitter aftertaste of 98's abomination still lingers, it just wasn't a safe bet to put anything more than $160 million to make this new movie. The rest is history, the marketing-wave kicked in, and people were treated to a Godzilla-fest that seemed to promise a 'dark' or somewhat apocalyptic vision and the hype meter went wild. There's no denying that and I'm sure Manga fans know much better for this one, because even Godzilla's name font and dark red theme on his posters and marketing material, including the Halo jump were inspired heavily by the Manga series Akira, which depicts a dark urban post-apocalyptic future. Turns out Godzilla became a Gamera, and that dark vision never existed. - No surprise here why many mainstream audiences felt cheated by the marketing.

@Gman2887 - Thanks for the update. I have confidence that Godzilla would still be able to hit at least $110 million in China eventually and to reach the $570 million projected combined sales that I estimated. On the US side though, its kinda struggling at a daily pace of $300 - $400K sales, and to date has added an extra $2M to reach $193 million up from the $191 million last week. 

I predicted mid-$500 million in January, so that sounds close. (Though I think $575 million may be a bit high.)

That said, Tull said he'd like a "4" to be at the beginning of a final box office number before he plunged headfirst into production with the sequel. I think we're safe. At the end of the day Godzilla is a success. We should rejoice and look forward to the future.

lol, love how when this OP loses an argument- his resort is to report me to a moderator for "trolling". i seriously can't tell how is my post even remotely close to trolling. then again, this idiot here might be the real troll, trolling all of this forum to a page 9. and when someone digs up shit for you, you will probably just label it as "I dun believe in all that PR sugarcoating that tells us Gareth was so passionate about Godzilla whatsoever"

i should have just cared less about douches like this and their opinion on godzilla 2014. please, maybe you should just take a bullet in your face or join a fan forum for transformers because clearly you don't have the mentality to understand why godzilla2014 is great and the humility to accept that you have failed in your "assessment"

@SelimBradley - Oh Yes you are. You are trying to spoil the thread and you are a troll and I would still report you again if I have to. :) For someone who just made 4 postings so far, and 3 out of the 4 were used to attack my statements, its not hard to see a clone account is being used here or you were banned previously. I don't recall anyone joining this forum as a newcomer and the first thing they do is start shooting unpleasantries at other members. :)

To clear up that delusion of yours, first off, you have never even provided any valid point of discussion to begin with, so I do not get it when you say I lost an argument. I have responded and asked you to provide the source of your claims, which you have yet to do so, and instead you come back in to call me names again. I identified you as a troll because you concocted ficticious statements and then claimed that Gareth Edwards said those things just to rebut my arguments for fun. Your only purpose was to stir up trouble. 

@SelimBradley

- And one last thing to add. In all your postings here, you have called me an 'Ass', labelled me an 'Idiot' and a 'Douche' and even saying that I should " Take a bullet in the face ", which is uncalled for.

 It would be very much appreciated if you could practise a bit of respect not only for others but also for your own sake. Thank you. :)

Gman- Your totally right!

Godzilla 2014 is only successful because of the initial box office.

If you look at Box Office Mojo and see comparable titles at the 90 Million domestic opening,

and they are already passed or nearly 200 Million, Spiderman 2 which wasn't a good movie by any means is comparable.

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/alltime/weekends/

The point people are forgetting is that there is no "momentum" to carry into the sequel. No matter how one tries to spin this, if Edwards does this same thing again, we are looking at a failure in the future.

That is the reason some fans such as myself want to bring awareness to that.

I honestly believe with all my heart that he is the wrong director. 

@Talisman - 

And you are right. Thanks for providing the all-time weekends chart for us to get a better idea. If you look at all the movies that opened with at least $90 million domestically, both Spider-man 2 and Godzilla are actually underperforming and still quite a lot away from the typical movie box-office projections. Basically, when a movie opens with $90 million, eventual box-office projections will be pegged to at least $230 - $240 million. You will see that all movies in the list have achieved that consistent box-office sales to reach or even exceed the targeted projection, including X-Men DOFP which is already progressing at $212 million to reach the outcome in less than a month. Even if I were to add another 30 days to Godzilla's calendar based on its sales progression, I doubt it would be able to hit the target of $230 million. 

Some people cite reasons like timing of debut or competition from other movies that affect the sales momentum of Godzilla. We do not deny that competition exists, but I do not think it would make a difference whether I swop places between Godzilla or X-Men or Maleficent or Edge of Tomorrow, because even if I put X-Men one week ahead of Godzilla, the latter would still open bigger than X-Men as it had that much of hype with it. And I don't think even putting Godzilla 2014 alone for 2 weeks without the interference of Spider-Man 2 or X-Men is going to make a huge difference either. The only thing that matters is whether after all that hype, do audiences go on to recommend it enough to others. If a movie opens big and trumpets that it has crushed box-offices everywhere in 2014, the natural expectation that what comes next would surely be equally Big too isn't it? Would anyone expect a box-office crusher to make $400 - $500 million eventually and then call it a crushing success?  

There are others who also cite reasons that movies like the Transformers franchise that have been ringing sales over a Billion per instalment have sucky storylines but people still went on to watch them. I think in all fairness, where Michael Bay sucks in storytelling and direction, it is heavily and far far compensated for by the explosive firepower and the tonnes of special effects thanks to the collaboration with Steven Spielberg. The result is a movie with epic proportions. In Godzilla's case, it had a so-so storyline but where it fails, its creature elusitivity and special effects are not overwhelmingly compensating these shortfalls. Do note that Transformers Dark of the Moon only opened to $97 million in the US which led projections to $250 - $260 million, but it still outperformed the box-office and went on to earn $352 million, and nearly $1.5 Billion combined.

And if people say superhero movies enjoy a wider advantage and recognition, perhaps they clean forgot about the mighty Avatar which was a complete unknown from the start. Need I say more about this phenomenal movie? It opened to a measely $77 million and what happened next? It just kept going stronger and stronger week after week, churning huge sales and earning a whopping $749 million in the US alone, and a combined sales of $2.5 Billion dollars. Haha well, I don't think a lack of competition or timing in debut is helping Avatar make $749 million in the US box-office. If the formula to box office success is down to as simple as competition and debut-timing then next time I'll make a movie and slot it with an opening that has the least competitors and I get instant success? :)

Therein lies the hypocrisy that I see certain people have here. (Sorry I have to say this) But I think we are dealing with different groups of fans here. There are those who have moderate or balanced views and able to accept reasoning and facts, while there are those who are blind-loyalists and would accept anything as long as you do not tread the red-line with criticism or negative views. They will attack you relentlessly and try to shut you out if say something they do not want to hear. You noticed that the first group of fans I just mentioned here have lately been contributing lesser in these forums or stopped commenting altogether? :)

Why the hypocrisy? I recall a couple of months before Godzilla 2014 was screened, everyone was hyped up and started saying how easy it would be for G14 to match or even outdo the sales of the abysmal Godzilla 98 which made $231 million in the US and $643 million combined total (adjusted). When G14 exploded with a huge-opening, that confidence went sky-high, people mocked Zilla 98 even more in their topics and said making $600 million and above was a piece of cake with that kind of results. Even Legendary's execs when interviewed said they were aiming to dominate the worldwide box-office in sales after such a strong opening. We were also clearly aware that G14 needed to make at least $380 million to break even after all the costs and marketing factored in.

Fast-forward 36 days into opening, Godzilla stands at $193 million and doesn't look like it would surpass the 98 version eventually. It has a combined total of less than $500 million to date, which sounds like they profited close to $110 million so far from its break-even mark.  China seems to be the only major key market left to ring in the sales for Godzilla but do not forget that how much Godzilla earns in China, the studios only gets a 25% cut of the actual amount earned, which means its not even surpassed $100 million profit beyond the break-even mark. - And suddenly all these is acceptable to the loyalists now, and they will gladly take 1001 reasons for G14 failing to meet expectations, as long as it steers clear of reflecting actual criticism upon the movie's area of failings. 

A Monumental opening with no monumental success. There's certainly valid ground why some of us here are reflecting upon it, and questioning the use of the same director to continue the sequel which could have consequences to its future success. It's the same like asking Roland Emmerich to direct a 98 sequel, but people already know what they will get from this director. And chief among all, in all irony despite all the excuses we can think of, isn't Godzilla 2014 currently entangled in the same fate as G98, which opened Big and fizzled? Unless Godzilla 2014 can make past $230 million domestically, and past $640 million in combined sales, it will just be viewed by outsiders as another iteration of G98. 

You get my point here. 

Talisman- As usual, I agree with you. Just say the word gets out that the Godzilla sequel has the same director as G14. That has the potential to turn off a lot of people right from the get go. How do we know this? Because clearly, he has already turned off a lot of people. There are a many moviegoers that I have no doubt would not show up for G2, unless Edwards goes right on the offensive and convinces us that he is taking a different approach with the sequel. Going with Edwards is risking a flop. Let's face it folks, the majority of the public are NOT Godzilla fans like us. In a case such as this, they just want a good popcorn movie. A 15 year old kid, the most likely wide audience for this type of movie, doesn't generally care about a great plot. They just need a story good enough to get you where you need to be. Which is my opinion, is just fine for a Godzilla movie. It's GOD-ZILLA, not GOD-FATHER. G14 goes out of it's way to NOT be a spectacle. In the 'Transformers,' movies, even when you you want to scream at the screen because it's so stupid, you can't stop enjoying the over the top action and effects. I'm telling you, at G14, If I hadn't had to pee so bad, I might have fallen asleep. I'm going to say this again...The story in G14 wasn't that great. Emotional at times, sure. But great, original, thought provoking, interesting, scary? No. I'm just not sure what some people are seeing.

Destroyah-x- Which leeds me to this point which you and I share. I said this already in this thread or the one about "Ranters." There are two camps of fans, the ones who love this movie, and those of us who are more critical. While we are all entitled to our opinions, I do believe there are people who have rather large blinders on. Heck, I think there are people who are knowingly being disengenuous out of fear of not getting a sequel. Let me be perhaps the only person to say, that I would rather get no sequel, then to get the same sort of infuriating teasing as we got in G14. I'm getting too old to have my emotions played with in such ways:-)

DestroyahX- You are absolutely wrong. This movie is no where near the monumental flop 98 was. 98 Sure it made about 600 million with inflation, But it was horrible people hated this movie, With this one people dont actually hate it they just think there wasnt enough monster battles. Most people think the movie was pretty good. It has a 9/10 on ign, And over the weekend its made 194,914 domestically, Meaning soon its gonna get to 195 millions. Then 200 million, The movie is gonna be a whopper in japan to. Can you guys listen to me for once and give Gareth a chance with the sequel! #GiveGarethachance

@ThePike - Actually there's no problem at all if people have differing views. What I do not agree is when blind-loyalists start seeing something they don't favour, they get nasty and go into attack-mode in an attempt to put others off from airing their views. And to some extent, most of them get their way, but we end up with less people commenting in the forum.

Talking about hypocrisy earlier, like I've said, many of these people were so critical about Godzilla 98 and derided the film, and expressed so much confidence that Godzilla 2014 could easily beat out G98 in the US box-office and worldwide too. But when it starts becoming clearer now that Godzilla 2014 won't achieve what G98 did in terms of sales (after adjustment), suddenly we get 1001 reasons and justifications from these folks why G14 isn't performing. To put it across this way, even if Godzilla 2014 were to literally make just $400 million, they would still call it a huge success against G98. Which is why I said different standards are being applied selectively. If a non-Godzilla movie opens big and fails to reach the projected target, its called a failure. If it happens to G14? - oh there's no problem with that, its understandable.

@GorillaGodzilla77897 is an example of such a loyalist. He calls Godzilla 98 a monumental flop from a fanboy point of view, and he will never settle for anything that's critical about Godzilla 2014. At the same time, he conveniently forgets that the 98 version has made more than Godzilla 2014 adjusted. So going by numbers alone, won't that make Godzilla 2014 an even bigger flop? Even when its becoming clear Godzilla 2014 may not beat G98 both the in US and overseas eventually, he insists that this new movie is still a whopper at the box-office. 

In all fairness to Godzilla 98 - It was an artistic failure only from a fanboy's standpoint, but it would be considered a hit by today's standards if we talk about box-office takings. To add on, it was the 9th highest grossing film for 1998 in the US, and 3rd highest-grossing film worldwide. 

And when people cite competition, I think X-Men and Spider-Man 2 are in a complete different league with Godzilla to really affect the audiences' choice. And its not like there aren't enough audience numbers to go around that all these movies are competing for the same pie. Avatar's earnings of $749 million and being #1 at the US box-office consecutively for months despite all that competition and new movies debuting is the perfect example of telling us there's no limit when it comes to audience numbers, and if a movie is good, whatever the genre, people would still catch it. 

So to say that it is acceptable for Godzilla 2014 not to beat G98's $231 million takings in the US box-office or $643 million in G98's combined sales (while earlier expressing so much confidence that it would be a piece of cake only to backtrack later) is applying a different standard here. 

To add on, here are some of the best reasons to indicate all the more why it shouldn't be difficult for Godzilla 2014 to beat Godzilla 98 in box-office sales. 

1) Population numbers have certainly grown larger, as with the consumer base.

2) Unlike in 1998 where they rely on mostly TV ads and prints for marketing, today we have the full-blown internet to our advantage, and the era of social media power, capable of reaching out to so much more people.  

What else is there to stop Godzilla 2014 from beating 98 flat-out? Nothing literally, except only if the director or his marketing team screws up. 

I think the comparison in the box office is largely due to the marketing campaign each film got. Whatever anyone's feelings are about the 98 movie I think most of us can agree the marketing for the movie itself was amazing. This also points to a few things with the G14 story aand marketing that need to be pointed out.

When the trailers for the 98 movie came out as a Godzilla fan I was hyped. A 6 year old getting his favorite movie monster done in hollywood was amazing and the trailers just made it better. The trailer would come on the music would start and you'd just see shots of Godzilla running through the city, things being destroyed ect. When the movie came out it was another story. EVERYONE blasted it. Not a good story, crappy characters, and basically a worse version of jurassic park, however none of the reviews said anything about lack of action or Godzilla, in fact a few said there was too much. So to the average person when you saw the trailers(similar to transformers) you went there for destruction and action. The average person didn't expect Oscar winning performances or a deep story, they just wanted to see stuff destroyed and Godzilla.

Then G14. The adverising came is somewhat late and was a joke compared to the 98 one, but once the trailers started you saw a dark tone, and destruction accompanied by Godzilla. What was even better was when the reviews got released it didn't seem like the story or characters were bad in fact a few said they were quite good. There was one big flaw though, perhaps the the average audience the biggest flaw the movie could have. Not enough Godzilla and somewhat boring came up. These are the two worst possible things a movie like Godzilla could get. So by no means it G14 bad, actually it's pretty good and parts are very enjoyable, but to a non Gfan was this the movie we wanted to represent the franchise and wake it back up? A movie that showed trailers purposely misleading about Godzilla's role, and then barely any time with him? The fact Godzilla isn't in the movie isn't the thing that makes people mad about it. If everytime Godzilla showed up or was on screen he got stuff done I don't think there would be a problem, but the fact it it teases over and over action that happens. Godzilla fighting the flying muto, cut, the female going through vegas, cut, Godzilla making his way through San Francisco and running into the muto again, cut then finally the final fight. Godzilla and monster action in general is teased too much, and this is 100% a turn off to the average viewer. "Oh look something's going to happen! Oh wait nevermind it just cut away..." That is from Gareth. He seems like he doesn't know when it's time to stop teasing and show the real action. Some may argue the payoff in the end was worth it but what? So because the fight at the end was good that means that you don't need any scenes with Godzilla prior? No there's no reason to tease fights to that point and if Gareth doesn't learn that then what does that say for him directing a sequel?

@Durp004 - This statement from you: " Godzilla fighting the flying muto, cut, the female going through vegas, cut, Godzilla making his way through San Francisco and running into the muto again, cut then finally the final fight. Godzilla and monster action in general is teased too much, and this is 100% a turn off to the average viewer. "Oh look something's going to happen! Oh wait nevermind it just cut away..." That is from Gareth. He seems like he doesn't know when it's time to stop teasing and show the real action." - I completely agree with you on this. Even all 5 of my friends whom I went with to catch Godzilla 2014 (and they are no fans of Godzilla btw), were wondering what in the world was this director thinking when he kept cutting the scenes off and teasing the audience, when there was absolutely no harm at all showing more Godzilla-action. As if the human characters weren't bland enough, you cut off the main creature's limelight and put all your bet in one final scene. One of my friend even joked and remarked if its because Legendary studios ran out of cash to make the movie, and used the cuts as a disguise for artistry. 

And like @ThePike has pointed out, it would be hard going forward to convince people the sequel would be of any substance as long as the same director is at the helm because we are not gonna watch a tease-fest going on again laden with false visions and promises brought on by misleading marketing. 

And then another thing to point out. Considering Godzilla was made for $160 million. - Compare this with Transformers Dark of the Moon's production cost of $195 million, and Michael Bay & Steven Spielberg's collaboration suddenly looks so much more worth it now. For the cost, it overwhelmingly delivers much more bang for the buck and action and CGI, including the box-office returns of over $1 Billion. That's truly genius.