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Veronica Mars news roundup
Mar. 14th, 2013 04:57 pmIf you haven't heard, the Veronica Mars movie met its Kickstarter target in LESS THAN A DAY. It's up to $2.7 million and there are still 29 more days to go. (And if you didn't pledge anything because you're outside the U.S., fear not. They're working on a way to make it happen.)
So, what does this mean? Well, first of all, a Veronica Mars movie IS HAPPENING. Which is crazy and awesome and unbelievable. But more importantly, this is the first-ever project like this, and the fact that it succeeded so quickly and so strongly means that more folks are going to be looking to do the same thing. And that's really the interesting story of the day, because the potential impact this could have on fans and their relationship to TV shows is enormous.
James Poniewozik at TIME talked about it as possibly setting a new standard for getting niche projects made by capitalizing on depth of interest, rather than the studio model of appealing to the broadest possible audience. Alan Sepinwall at HitFix thinks it might be more difficult than it seems to revive other brilliant but canceled TV series and discusses some of the hurdles. IndieWire thinks we're going to see more projects like this, and Mental Floss has suggestions for what else should be revived via Kickstarter.
The issue of Warner Bros' involvement has also prompted a lot of discussion. Because Warner Bros, as the rights-holder, will make money from the film's profits, it's been suggested that they should be the ones financing the film, not the fans. (Warner Bros is paying for the marketing and distribution now that the film is going forward, but the production budget will, as far as I know, be all crowd-sourced.) This seems to assume that Kickstarter donors are equivalent to regular movie investors, albeit on a smaller scale, so where's our return on investment? And while I agree that it makes Warner Bros look miserly and craven to say, "Fund it yourself and then we'll take the profits," that's... kind of how the business works, isn't it? It's just usually not this transparent. Studios already make these kinds of calculations in choosing whether to greenlight films, so how is this really any different? Simply because they're asking up front what it's worth to you? And, whether you like how it was done or not, the fact remains that, without the Kickstarter project, there would be no Veronica Mars movie. The "profit" for the Kickstarter donors is the movie itself. So what's it worth to you?
(Over at USA Today, Whitney Matheson thinks we should stop donating now that they've reached the $2 million goal, although I'm not sure why she expects that Warner Bros would kick in anything more than they've already agreed to.)
ETA: And Alyssa Rosenberg at Think Progress has some interesting thoughts on how the Kickstarter rewards should be used if we're going to start thinking of consumers as investors. In a similar vein, the problem with rewards that make more work - and costs - for the people behind the project.
So, what does this mean? Well, first of all, a Veronica Mars movie IS HAPPENING. Which is crazy and awesome and unbelievable. But more importantly, this is the first-ever project like this, and the fact that it succeeded so quickly and so strongly means that more folks are going to be looking to do the same thing. And that's really the interesting story of the day, because the potential impact this could have on fans and their relationship to TV shows is enormous.
James Poniewozik at TIME talked about it as possibly setting a new standard for getting niche projects made by capitalizing on depth of interest, rather than the studio model of appealing to the broadest possible audience. Alan Sepinwall at HitFix thinks it might be more difficult than it seems to revive other brilliant but canceled TV series and discusses some of the hurdles. IndieWire thinks we're going to see more projects like this, and Mental Floss has suggestions for what else should be revived via Kickstarter.
The issue of Warner Bros' involvement has also prompted a lot of discussion. Because Warner Bros, as the rights-holder, will make money from the film's profits, it's been suggested that they should be the ones financing the film, not the fans. (Warner Bros is paying for the marketing and distribution now that the film is going forward, but the production budget will, as far as I know, be all crowd-sourced.) This seems to assume that Kickstarter donors are equivalent to regular movie investors, albeit on a smaller scale, so where's our return on investment? And while I agree that it makes Warner Bros look miserly and craven to say, "Fund it yourself and then we'll take the profits," that's... kind of how the business works, isn't it? It's just usually not this transparent. Studios already make these kinds of calculations in choosing whether to greenlight films, so how is this really any different? Simply because they're asking up front what it's worth to you? And, whether you like how it was done or not, the fact remains that, without the Kickstarter project, there would be no Veronica Mars movie. The "profit" for the Kickstarter donors is the movie itself. So what's it worth to you?
(Over at USA Today, Whitney Matheson thinks we should stop donating now that they've reached the $2 million goal, although I'm not sure why she expects that Warner Bros would kick in anything more than they've already agreed to.)
ETA: And Alyssa Rosenberg at Think Progress has some interesting thoughts on how the Kickstarter rewards should be used if we're going to start thinking of consumers as investors. In a similar vein, the problem with rewards that make more work - and costs - for the people behind the project.
