By Joe Walker
If there was a summer movie about a radioactive spider that could transform into an angry, green, silver-surf-board-riding pirate, would you go see it?
Don’t lie; you’d wait in line for the 12:01AM show just to say you were one of the first to see it.
There doesn’t seem to be much originality in the creation of summer blockbuster movies anymore. Yet movie theaters come up with increasingly original, blockbuster prices! You pay gallons for gas to get there, tickets cost gallons of man-hours to afford them, and while you’re there you consume gallons of junk food, which adds to the gallon tank in your jeans. Fun!
The summer movie season of recent years has been all about sequels. When movie companies make a hit movie, you’re almost guaranteed to see at least two sequels; and here comes the fifth Harry Potter flick, Ocean’s Thirteen, Shrek The Third, At World’s End – the third and final (?) installment of Pirates of The Caribbean, and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. And yes, that is only the second Fantastic Four movie. But fanatic comic geeks, and those of us who simply grew up on superhero stories, know Silver Surfer is just a prelude to an even bigger story for Marvel’s iconic quartet. So a second sequel is inevitable.
And then there is Spiderman 3. The worldwide box office total of the first two movies is over a billion dollars. An inevitable second sequel for our friendly neighborhood wall crawler was a matter of fact! Do you have kids? Has Spiderman merchandise found it’s way into every room of your house over these last four years? Do have boys? Did Spiderman find a way into every room of your home since they were old enough to say “Spiderman”? Like James Bond and Star Wars, Spidey will never go away. And if the folks in your house like him as much as the folks in my house, then you’re already getting up your gallons to go see his latest blockbuster movie. Summertime … summertime … sum-sum-summertime!
"New Resolution #8": Make sure your paycheck has sequels so you can afford to see all these movies!
