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Monday
09Jun2008

Talk of a 'Jumper' Sequel Make Me Want to Jump

DateMonday, June 9, 2008 at 1:14PM
I'm just going to throw this out there, a word to the wise if you will: Stay thee away from Hayden Christensen franchises.

We're advanced enough to know now that George Lucas suckerpunched us with the second Star Wars trilogy; the bottom line is, the overall endeavor wasn't worth the wait. A big component of that disappointment was Christensen, who most people hated as Anakin Skywalker, although he was a marginal step up from Jake Lloyd. Still, a lot of that was Lucas' fault because he can't direct actors. Hell, Natalie Portman was bad in those movies.

But I have a hard time believing that over half the people who saw Christensen's latest effort, the Doug Liman sci-fi flick, Jumper, came away from it demanding more. And yet...

"It was set up to become that - a trilogy - if it did well," Christensen is quoted as saying by WENN, in an announcement that shocks logical moviegoers. "And I think they're happy with how it did so they want to make another one."

The basis for the film - the jumping through portals in space or whatever - works well enough for the setup of a movie. Jumper just had nothing else to add to it. It was 90 minutes of zapping from place to place starring a leaden actor who rarely earns the trust of an audience.

But because the film did very well overseas (it failed to make back its production budget based on U.S. ticket sales), now there's talk of a sequel. Why can't one success be its own reward? Why do we need another movie - or even worse, two more movies - with Hayden Christensen zapping himself from New York to Madrid?

Hayden says they're not "rushing to get into production," but does confirm that talk about a sequel or sequels is definitely ongoing.

I wish I understood the way studios and movie producers think. Here you have a movie that even IMDB voters never liked (and that's saying something), a movie critics chewed up, and a movie that peaked early and never held a consistent crowd after word got out about it, but because it snookered enough people into giving it money, they're going to make two sequels?

Stop and consider that the gimmick is probably accountable for 40% of that movie's gross, if not more than half. They weren't all showing up for Hayden, Rachel Bilson, and Sam Jackson, in any case. The gimmick has lost its novelty, so now a real story has to pop up in place of that novelty. Look at how that didn't work for the Wachowski Brothers as they tried to continue The Matrix. And people actually wanted sequels for that.

Quit while you're (marginally/financially) ahead: No sequels to Jumper.

AuthorColin Boyd | | in , , , , | Print ArticlePrint Article | | Comment1 Comment |

Reader Comments (1)

Can we preface this with "Direct to DVD"? It might make more sense...

Also, a little odd that this news comes out on the Eve of the DVD release of the film. Maybe they are just trying to squeeze a few more bucks out of the first one, and have no real intention of making it a series.

Then again, isn't this alot like "The Highlander"? And they milked that for a whole slew of films.

Still, if I was writing the sequel I'd probably have H. Christenson "jump" to the storeroom of a knife factory or something in the first act, and pass the baton to someone who can act.

By the way, have you seen the "Attack of the Clones: in 5 Seconds" vid on Youtube? Priceless.

Monday, June 9, 2008 | Unregistered CommenterWill

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