If you’re one of the millions that waa looking forward to The Rock laying the smack down on some candy-assed Cobras in director Justin Lin’s G.I. Joe sequel, then I’ve got some bad news for you.
Despite being just a month away from its June 29th release date, Paramount has decided to delay the film until March 29th 2013. The reason? They need more D’s. 3 of them to be exact.
According to Variety, Paramount decided on this surprising course of action after showing the film to focus groups who questioned why the film was not in 3D, a format which would apparently lead to a bigger international box office take.
(Can we all just pause for a moment to agree that those focus groups, with their ridiculous need for more dimensions, suck? OK, cool. Moving on…)
The calendar shift, while not something that fans wish to hear, may end up strengthening G.I. Joe: Retaliation‘s box office potential next year, as it would really just be facing opposition from Disney’s Oz: The Great and Powerful and Warner Bros.’ Jack the Giant Killer then. This is as opposed to this year where it would probably have been stuck fighting for table scraps, since it would have been opening just a week before The Amazing Spider-Man and 3 weeks before The Dark Knight Rises. Yeah, I’ve heard that spiders and bats are notorious cash hoarders.
Besides just fanboy rage, the decision does have some major negative ramifications though: Paramount is currently dead last in the revenue race between all the major studios, due to having released the least films thus far. And with G.I. Joe gone this year, they now only have Madagascar 3 and Katy Perry: Part of Me to bank on for the summer tentpole season, both of which are not exactly going to be making Avengers money any time soon.
On top of that, they already had several multi-million dollar marketing tie-in deals in place, which will all now have to be shelved until next year. All of this means that they are really going to need this film to have a huge box office presence when it does release next year, or face having some massive money-less egg on their face.
In the mean time, us fans have 9 months of thinking up highly creative but morally (and anatomically) questionable names for Paramount ahead of us.
Last Updated: May 24, 2012
James Francis
May 24, 2012 at 09:02
The last Wrestlemania was lathered in promos for this film, so they have already spent a fortune in marketing. My guess is that the movie did not do that will with preview audiences and Paramount is hoping that 3D might improve the odds of it making money. If rumours of reshoots and new scenes start to surface, then we’ll know that this might go the way of Jonah Hex…
Wtf101
May 24, 2012 at 12:59
If what you saying is true, then I am living in fear for the future of my beloved GI Joe.
One would think that by now, the novelty of 3d would have worn off. How much so when this movie is released in 2013. By then people may just end up going to see the movie for the movies sake, and not for the flashy 3d. Is this not a huge gamble that Paramount is taking?
Kervyn Cloete
May 24, 2012 at 13:33
It’s a massive gamble. If it bombs, they would then have 2 years running with no major hit on their hands.
Wtf101
May 24, 2012 at 14:22
Or at least until Bay does the next Transformers…