Does anyone know of a "famous screw-ups" site?

[axeman61]

A site that deals mostly or solely with historically bad decisions and predictions.
Sorry for so many adverbs.
I mean stuff like when Eddie Bond told Elvis Presley to stick to truck driving, because he would never make it as a singer.
http://www.snopes.com/music/artists/presley2.asp

Another example is when Will Smith passed up on being Neo in The Matrix to do Wild Wild West.

I tried looking for a site with only this stuff, but I don't know what exact search terms to enter into google. So if any SRKers know of a site like this, let me know.

[maxx]

umm i dont think theirs a site soley on this stuff..just random entertainment sites will tell you it as tidbits..but not a whole site.

honestly in hindsite having will smith skip the matrix did not hurt him in the long run. he has had like 1 bad movie in his career....matrix 2 and 3 are two bad movies.

[ChibiT89]

this should be similar to what you're looking for:

http://darwinawards.com/darwin/

edit: nevermind, the stuff you're looking for is not that comical, but my site might help ya out.

[axeman61]

umm i dont think theirs a site soley on this stuff..just random entertainment sites will tell you it as tidbits..but not a whole site.

honestly in hindsite having will smith skip the matrix did not hurt him in the long run. he has had like 1 bad movie in his career....matrix 2 and 3 are two bad movies.


Yeah, that's the thing. You can find it if you search trivia sites, but I'm tired of searching the shitty engines.
And while Mr. Smith dodging the Matrix Trilogy didn't hurt him in the long run, the first one still got much more praise than Wild Wild West. A giant mechanical spider for fucks sake... the director needed his ass beat harder than the boys on a catholic priest's home video collection.

[maxx]

Yeah, that's the thing. You can find it if you search trivia sites, but I'm tired of searching the shitty engines.
And while Mr. Smith dodging the Matrix Trilogy didn't hurt him in the long run, the first one still got much more praise than Wild Wild West. A giant mechanical spider for fucks sake... the director needed his ass beat harder than the boys on a catholic priest's home video collection.

its not the directors fault...watch an evening with kevin smith..it explains the giant spider...the director hadddd nothing to do with that.

[goodm0urning]

I don't know of any such site, but I'm sure we can rustle up a few ourselves.

Comics master artist Will Eisner ran a publishing/packaging business back in the late 30s/40s. Two guys, a young writer and artist, brought him a new property that they were interested in selling--an action hero who starred in stories for boys' comic books. Eisner turned it down, reasoning that he couldn't afford to take a risk on an unproven new property at that point time.

The writer and artist were Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster, and the property they were trying to sell was Superman.

[axeman61]

That's not as bad as Shuster and Siegel eventually selling the rights to Superman for, what was it, about 120 bucks? Even if they had NO clue as to how Superman would blow up, that was hardcore chainsaw ass rape right there.

its not the directors fault...watch an evening with kevin smith..it explains the giant spider...the director hadddd nothing to do with that.

Oh yeah, my bad. I slipped up. I meant to say writer.

[semijuggalo]

Regarding Will Smith...

According to his wife, Jada, he at least wanted to be in the sequels as an Agent.

As for a famous screw-up, Joel Schumacher immediately comes to mind. During the director's commentary on the Batman and Robin DVD (featured in the Batman Legacy boxset), Joel admits that the movie was disappointing to Batman fans and he points out the things that he realized were mistakes in retrospect, such as using all the ridiculous gadgets and vehicles in the movie, because Warner Bros wanted a lot of crap for the toy line. Basically, he pretty much apologizes for the whole movie, period.

[Biolink]

Regarding Will Smith...

According to his wife, Jada, he at least wanted to be in the sequels as an Agent.

As for a famous screw-up, Joel Schumacher immediately comes to mind. During the director's commentary on the Batman and Robin DVD (featured in the Batman Legacy boxset), Joel admits that the movie was disappointing to Batman fans and he points out the things that he realized were mistakes in retrospect, such as using all the ridiculous gadgets and vehicles in the movie, because Warner Bros wanted a lot of crap for the toy line. Basically, he pretty much apologizes for the whole movie, period.

XD

At least he apoligized.I'm still waiting on Uwe Boll to apoligize

[maxx]

XD

At least he apoligized.I'm still waiting on Uwe Boll to apoligize

that muthafucker doesnt apologize..i respect he will actually fight nerds for his beliefs..but uwe boll is the devil of movies.

[Autocrat1]

The writers screwed up Season 6 of 24, dammit!

They even admitted to it (barely) stating it was "troubling" to write this season. Feng Wei Soap Cocksuckers.

I can't find the exact article...read this instead:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18786082/

[goodm0urning]

That's not as bad as Shuster and Siegel eventually selling the rights to Superman for, what was it, about 120 bucks? Even if they had NO clue as to how Superman would blow up, that was hardcore chainsaw ass rape right there.Looking back, yeah, it's pretty awful. But if you look at it in the context of the times, it's a lot more understandable. There were no superheroes, and Superman was just another character that they cranked out in hopes of making ends meet.

Back then, when companies paid artists and writers for their stories, they would put "for all rights and title" on the back of the check. That way, when you endorsed the check, you would also be signing your property away. It was later deemed to be so friggin' illegal, but at the time, that was how they did things. In the Depression, the market was such that people were both happy and fortunate to get anything for their work.

Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster did get something in the way of compensation, decades down the line. When the Superman movie was in production, Neal Adams and a few other DC artists let the newspapers know that the original creators of Superman were working joe jobs and living in relative obscurity. This publicly embarrassed DC enough that they set up a stipend, so the Siegel and Schuster families do get money from Superman now, and their names appear in a credit in all Superman-related productions.

[maxx]

Looking back, yeah, it's pretty awful. But if you look at it in the context of the times, it's a lot more understandable. There were no superheroes, and Superman was just another character that they cranked out in hopes of making ends meet.

Back then, when companies paid artists and writers for their stories, they would put "for all rights and title" on the back of the check. That way, when you endorsed the check, you would also be signing your property away. It was later deemed to be so friggin' illegal, but at the time, that was how they did things. In the Depression, the market was such that people were both happy and fortunate to get anything for their work.

Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster did get something in the way of compensation, decades down the line. When the Superman movie was in production, Neal Adams and a few other DC artists let the newspapers know that the original creators of Superman were working joe jobs and living in relative obscurity. This publicly embarrassed DC enough that they set up a stipend, so the Siegel and Schuster families do get money from Superman now, and their names appear in a credit in all Superman-related productions.

yup..respect for neal adams a legend and all the others who helped show how slimey big companies can be.

[DingDang McGee]

Will Smith passed up the role for Neo? Damn. That movie would have been 100x better with the fresh prince. His wife was in those movies.

[goodm0urning]

yup..respect for neal adams a legend and all the others who helped show how slimey big companies can be.I wouldn't say slimy. Cold, maybe, but to me, slimy implies that they did something to fool the writers and artists into giving up their stuff, which they didn't do. Everything was right up front.

Say it's the Depression. If Joe Artist brings in a new property for Harry Publisher, Harry Publisher might say, "I am interested in buying this. I will give you $100 for this. I think you've got a good, marketable idea, but we can't afford to spend anymore than $100 on an unproven property." Joe Artist, who is utterly strapped for cash himself, has three options: A. negotiate the price, which it appears that Harry Publisher is unable to do, thus costing him the deal, B. reject the deal outright, which isn't much of an option in such a small industry, or C. accept the terms of the deal.

It might seem slimy on the surface, but it's really just business. Maybe it was a bad deal for Siegel and Schuster. But there are two types of people who sign bad deals: stupid people and desperate people, and Siegel and Schuster--who had been roundly rejected all over town prior to selling Superman to National--were clearly desperate. As for National, they merely bought for what they were willing to pay. And they've retained the rights ever since.

Now, Bob Kane, on the other hand, was one slimy douchebag.

[semijuggalo]

Oh, yeah! How about Universal Studios suing Nintendo for copyright infringement, because they said Donkey Kong was a King Kong ripoff?

Well, because the videogame industry wasn't serious business back then, Universal pretty much thought they could muscle in and run a small, budding videogame company out of town over DK. However, the legal suits at Universal didn't do their research, because they didn't realize that King Kong was a PUBLIC DOMAIN property, meaning that anybody was free to use it as they saw fit!

The case eventually fell through and Nintendo lived on. Ever since then, we now have an iconic videogame company responsible for some of our greatest games! Also, I think it's safe to say that Universal is much more careful about how they handle their licenses.