His face was made for punching...and that's just what I'll do.
Before video games took over as the number one source of entertainment for young people (number two: masturbation), Where’s Waldo was primo stuff. The premise was simple: look at the picture filled to the brim with crazy characters and situations and try to find the guy with the beanie and candy striped shirt. Most of the time they would throw you off by including other characters in Waldo colors, and other times you’d have to find other characters in the Waldo universe (his dog, some wizard guy, etc.). All of the time it ended with me getting bored and/or frustrated because my tiny brain cannot handle such simple tasks.
And now it’s gonna be a MOVIE! Coming Soon reports that MGM has bought the rights for a Where’s Waldo movie, which will obviously be a family friendly comedy (and probably in 3D). This isn’t the first time Where’s Waldo? has been adapted; there have been video games and even a cartoon TV show before. I don’t remember either because I like enjoying myself. From a business standpoint, MGM’s acquisition is pretty brilliant; they are still struggling from their bankruptcy and a good way to make some quick cash is to license something everyone knows so people will flock to it. If I was the head of MGM, I would’ve done the exact same thing. But I’m not, dammit, I’m a moviegoer and a Where’s Waldo? movie just feels like a hollow cash grab and nothing more. Can we end this recession already so somebody will try something new again? Sigh.
Do you want to see a Where’s Waldo? movie? If so, let me know why. There’s a good chance I’ve just become too bitter to get excited about something this stupid.
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I just read this story to my wife. She sat there shaking her head saying, “No no no no no no” through the entire second paragraph.
Twitter: JonSullivan_
November 7, 2011 1:48 pm
At the fact there’s a Where’s Waldo movie in the planning stages or the fact I’m not a fan of it in the first place? Both are acceptable for head shaking.
The fact that this project exists.
It should be shot in 70MM.
Twitter: JonSullivan_
November 7, 2011 1:49 pm
And then out of a cannon into space. Let the aliens deal with it.
Twitter: manilovefilms
November 7, 2011 2:31 pm
What’s worse – Where’s Waldo or Battleshit [sic]? I say the latter, by about a mile.
Don’t get too offended as Waldo is not nearly as beloved or containing of artistic merit as what I’m about to compare it to, but If Spike Jonze can transform Where the Wild Things Are from 80 words to 100 minutes (of high quality entertainment), then clearly anything is possible. Even if it has no narrative.
I’m not FOR this, but I’m not 100% against it, either. It sounds so nucking futs that it just might work.
Twitter: JonSullivan_
November 8, 2011 6:11 pm
Fair enough. I always forget about WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE when thinking about adaptations for some reason; maybe it’s because I never actually read the book growing up.
I read somewhere else about a cool idea where the Where’s Waldo movie could be just about something completely different, and just have Waldo show up in the background in nearly every scene. That’d be ballsy.
Twitter: manilovefilms
November 8, 2011 6:41 pm
Yup. A lot of films sound like dogshit (and admittedly, I’m being much more forgiving with this one – for some unknown reason – thank I should be), but you get the right people involved and they can turn just about anything into something worthwhile. I guess I just would think that anyone nutty enough to try something like this (with such a thin and/or nonexistent narrative) must have something good up their sleeve. I mean, it ain’t like the WALDO ‘franchise’ carries with it a ton of cache and support. Hell, that fad broke like more than a decade ago, along with Magic Eye posters.
Uh-oh, I just gave someone another idea…
Probably the best example of this is the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. All but the most die-hard Disney fans rolled their eyes at that one. When I heard that a movie was being made based on a theme park ride I assumed that Hollywood had gone past the bottom of the barrel, dug down ten feet and hit bedrock.
And yet, that first film (at least) was loads of fun.
I could have sworn I heard about this roughly a year or two ago.
Twitter: JonSullivan_
November 8, 2011 6:09 pm
Universal had the rights, but realized it was a terrible idea and dropped. That’s probably the cause of your deja vu.