Prequels! Hunh! Yeah! What are they good for? Absolutely...something
March 8, 2013 2:31 PM   Subscribe

Having mixed feelings about the new movie prequel to The Wizard of Oz? [previously] Well how about new prequels to other film classics such as Gone with the Wind and Dr. Strangelove? Or, try to imagine Casablanca: The College Years.

For your consideration: movie posters for pretend prequels to five film classics, featuring several of Hollywood's current darlings.
posted by fuse theorem (51 comments total) 3 users marked this as a favorite
 
These would have been better if they contained jokes.
posted by mr_roboto at 2:33 PM on March 8, 2013 [3 favorites]


I'd totally pay to see The Wind Done Gone as a movie.
posted by cjorgensen at 2:40 PM on March 8, 2013 [8 favorites]


Although it would be tempting to dismiss the first comment as mere snark, I am afraid I have to agree with the general notion: far too much of what is now marketed as humour is merely a reference to something else. Comedy is hard. Recreating something the audience is vaguely familiar with and may chuckle with recognition at is not.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 2:41 PM on March 8, 2013 [7 favorites]


The Wizard of Oz is also a bad example. There should be dozens of these films. This is like decrying the later Harry Potter movies and being sellouts.
posted by cjorgensen at 2:43 PM on March 8, 2013 [3 favorites]


A Citizen Kane prequel would obviously be about Rosebud, starring [your favorite bad actor] as the sled.
posted by perhapses at 2:44 PM on March 8, 2013


Agreed with above. X + Y doesn't always equal HA.

As for my thoughts on the made-up movies in the "jokes":

If not directed by QT (who I love but not for this project as I imagine it) and named something else (We'll Always Have Paris perhaps), I would totally see the Casablanca one with that cast.

Fortunately, Gangster Squad exists so I don't have the same "I'd see anything with Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone" feeling that would get me to drag my ass into the Gone With the Wind one.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 2:45 PM on March 8, 2013


Most of these are not very good, the only one I would watch is Resident Strangelove.

Unless of course you count Tarantino's latest as a Gone with the Wind prequel, then I suppose that makes it two.
posted by ckape at 2:48 PM on March 8, 2013


It wasn't mere snark. I don't see any jokes here. These are just the original movie posters with other people's faces (badly) photoshopped in. Is there a reason why DeCaprio in particular as Kane is funny? I think he'd do it pretty well, actually. The "prequel" concept as presented here doesn't even make sense... Kane starts when the guy's a kid; why is the prequel called "The Rise to Power"? And Dr. Strangelove was a physicist, so at least "Postdoc Strangelove" or "Grad Student Strangelove" would have made sense as a joke. These just seem lazily and ignorantly tossed off.
posted by mr_roboto at 2:48 PM on March 8, 2013 [15 favorites]


Maybe I'm missing something here, but where does it say these are supposed to be humorous? I thought it was more a commentary on how Hollywood is trying to wring every last drop out of stuff that's already been done.
posted by xbonesgt at 2:56 PM on March 8, 2013


I just want to point out that the Citizen Kane spoof poster depicts an actor in his late thirties portraying a character in his late fifties, who was originally played by an actor in his mid-twenties.
posted by Atom Eyes at 2:57 PM on March 8, 2013 [6 favorites]


I'm going to go ahead and list some good prequels, just to clarify that it isn't an inherently degraded form:

Wide Sargasso Sea is a prequel to Jayne Eyre.
Almost all of the Horatio Hornblower novels are a prequel to The Happy Return
Heinlein's The Man Who Sold the Moon is a prequel to his Requiem
Patriot Games is a prequel to The Hunt for Red October
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is a prequel to Raiders of the Lost Ark
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me is a prequel to Twin Peaks
Half of Godfather II is a prequel to The Godfather, making it, I think, the only film ever where both its sequel and its prequel are considered to be as good or superior to the original

And, for what it's worth, most Godzilla films are technically prequels to Destroy All Monsters and Fast Five is a prequel to Tokyo Drift
posted by Bunny Ultramod at 3:02 PM on March 8, 2013 [4 favorites]


The Casablanca treatment is not particularly funny, especially given the sheer absurdity of other contemplated possibilities.

A sequel, however, may still be waiting to be made...

More screen time for ol' Renault, is all I'm sayin'.
posted by Capt. Renault at 3:05 PM on March 8, 2013 [3 favorites]


You know, now that I think of it, there actually was Casablanca prequel. It was also called Casablanca and debuted on television in 1983, and starred David Soul of Starsky and Hutch. It wasn't bad, but, when you're adapting a classic film, you have to shoot for higher than not bad. Here's a whole video essay on the show, including scenes from the show.

Edited to add: Apparently there was also a prequel to Casablanca as an episode of Warner Brothers Presents in 1955. Sheesh!
posted by Bunny Ultramod at 3:17 PM on March 8, 2013


I'm going to go ahead and list some good prequels, just to clarify that it isn't an inherently degraded form:

The Star Wars prequels were pretty decent too, IIRC.
posted by George Lucas at 3:17 PM on March 8, 2013 [8 favorites]


Almost all of the Horatio Hornblower novels are a prequel to The Happy Return

The Happy Return is almost perfectly at the midpoint, actually, since Forester wrote out Hornblower's career from frigate captain to admiral, and then went back and filled in the blanks from midshipman onwards. As a result the chronologically earlier novels are a lot stronger all around, which I'm grateful for as I'd never have gotten to Lieutenant Hornblower or Hornblower and the Hotspur if I had to read The Happy Return first.

Other good prequels:
- Rurouni Kenshin: Trust and Betrayal is another case of a prequel that's stronger than the, er, quel (the Ruroken anime), but it's a bit of an edge case as both are adaptations of different parts of the same work (the Ruroken manga); Trust and Betrayal had (from the looks of it) a much higher budget for its running time and was more faithful to the original manga.
- The Magician's Nephew gets ragged on a lot, but it's one of my favorite of the Narnia books
- The Silmarillion (YMMV)
- Lynn Flewelling's Tamir Triad is imo far superior to the Nightrunner series it serves as a prequel to (at least, the first three books -- I didn't even realize there were six, now!)

I'm having a lot of trouble thinking of film examples, though -- at least not ones that aren't both sequels as well as prequels.
posted by bettafish at 3:28 PM on March 8, 2013 [2 favorites]


They should just give all prequels the Muppet Babies treatment: all toddler versions of the characters playing in a nursery with occasional appearances by a nanny.
posted by sourwookie at 3:29 PM on March 8, 2013 [4 favorites]


Ron Perlman returns - this time as director - in the startling new prequel, Quest for Dry Cave (With No Bears)
posted by oulipian at 3:49 PM on March 8, 2013


The thing that makes these kind of dumb is that a real prequel wouldn't have the exact same poster. "Before the Wind Came" is a decent premise but then you have to, you know, follow through and produce a poster for that movie. C-.
posted by bleep at 4:06 PM on March 8, 2013


I think a Casablanca sequel following Rick and Renault in the Legion would be brilliant!

I imagine it being like a cross between Beau Geste and Papillion, with a bit of The Dirty Dozen or The Guns of Navarone thrown in for good measure.

Maybe Jude Law as Rick (I don't want to say Ben Affleck), and Jeremy Renner as Renault? Michael Shannon as the sadistic adjutant? Slap a kepi on Eric Cantona's head and get him in there somewhere?
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 4:09 PM on March 8, 2013 [2 favorites]


I was just thinking that all of these notional prequel movies could be improved by casting Jason Statham. Statham as Rick! Statham as Aslan! Statham as Oscar Wilde!

And then I realised that Statham had starred in the Death Race 2000 prequel, Death Race.
posted by The River Ivel at 4:31 PM on March 8, 2013 [2 favorites]


Filter: Community 'Zine
posted by notyou at 4:45 PM on March 8, 2013 [2 favorites]


This is the only prequel I'm interested in.
posted by brundlefly at 4:55 PM on March 8, 2013


Prequel, or Making a Cat Cry: The Adventure.
May make less than perfect sense if you're not into Elder Scrolls games.
posted by sourcequench at 5:08 PM on March 8, 2013 [2 favorites]


Having mixed feelings about the new movie prequel to The Wizard of Oz?

Only because it is Sam Raimi, otherwise I would be all BURN IT WITH FIRE.
posted by Artw at 5:10 PM on March 8, 2013


And hey, money for EVIL DEAD 4.
posted by Artw at 5:10 PM on March 8, 2013


And then I realised that Statham had starred in the Death Race 2000 prequel, Death Race.

It's no Crank or Crank 2, but it's up there in my list of favourite Statham movies.
posted by Artw at 5:11 PM on March 8, 2013


There's a [book] sequel to Gone with the Wind. It is called Scarlett and it is horrible.
posted by shakespeherian at 5:17 PM on March 8, 2013


Anything. Prequel. Postquel. Sequel. Series. Short. Commercial. Whatever, anything. I will watch anything that promises kissing happening between JGL and J-Lau.
posted by carsonb at 5:33 PM on March 8, 2013 [1 favorite]


Patriot Games is a prequel to The Hunt for Red October

I was really disappointed that the movie Patriot Games was not done as a prequel to the movie The Hunt for Red October. Ahh, youth.
posted by mountmccabe at 5:34 PM on March 8, 2013


- The Magician's Nephew gets ragged on a lot, but it's one of my favorite of the Narnia books

Read this to the kiddo recently, first time I've read it as an adult. At the time it never occurred to me that it might have been written AFTER the other Narnia books (it was sixth) and things like setting up a magical lamppost and a wardrobe made from wood from an otherworldly tree just seemed remarkably prescient.

Coming back to it it's pretty blatantly a prequel but has some wonderful stuff - the wood between the worlds, the dead world of Charn, Jadis - who would become the witch, and whose origin is like something out of a Clark Ashton Smith story. Most of everything after they get to Narnia is dull and burdensome though.
posted by Artw at 5:52 PM on March 8, 2013 [2 favorites]


They should really make a Star Wars prequel. It's been about 30 years since we got anything new from that franchise.
posted by blue_beetle at 6:03 PM on March 8, 2013 [1 favorite]




shakespeherian: "There's a [book] sequel to Gone with the Wind. It is called Scarlett and it is horrible."

It was made into a horrible TV mini-series too.
posted by octothorpe at 6:49 PM on March 8, 2013 [1 favorite]


The Cracked.com ones are actually funny. I would love to see Christopher Walken in Watch Up My Ass.
posted by How the runs scored at 6:58 PM on March 8, 2013


20 Prequels Too Awesome to Exist

I wouldn't mind seeing that Liam Neeson prequel to Taken. It couldn't be any worse than Taken 2.

Also, Cracked must be confused about their Nemo prequel since they deemed it both a "worst possible" and a "too awesome to exist".

This is the only prequel I'm interested in.

Hah. What about Die Hard: First Christmas?
posted by fuse theorem at 7:00 PM on March 8, 2013


Might as well pitch my sequel idea here:

After defeating Steve Via to keep his soul from Satan in an epic guitar battle in the first Crossroads (1986) Ralph Macchio learns too late how the system works: He who defeats The Devil's Headchopper now becomes The Devil's new Headchopper. Spending the rest of the 80's, the 90's, and the aughts dispatching again and again the many guitar slingers who hope to best him he becomes weary, eventually succumbing to a cocky young kid named Caden, who in the same way Ralph defeated Steve Vai not just with Blues but also confusing him with Baroque, defeats Ralph by combining his Blues with his other musical love: Dubstep.
posted by sourwookie at 9:06 PM on March 8, 2013 [2 favorites]


And Dr. Strangelove was a physicist, so at least "Postdoc Strangelove"

Surely, that's the sequel, not the prequel...
posted by axiom at 9:10 PM on March 8, 2013


The Star Wars prequels were pretty decent too, IIRC.

You're a very, very sick man, Mr. Lucas. Please quietly come back inside and finish your nice jello cup and take your pills.
posted by loquacious at 9:19 PM on March 8, 2013 [2 favorites]


I was disappointed for awhile that one of the two Matrix films after the first wasn't a prequel as originally rumoured (announced?). That would have been way better than what we got instead.
posted by ODiV at 9:28 PM on March 8, 2013 [1 favorite]


Die Hard actually is a weird sort of sequel. It's the second book in a series of books by Roderick Thorp. The first book in the series is called The Detective, which was adapted into a 1968 film starring Frank Sinatra. The book version of Die Hard is called Nothing Lasts Forever, which is actually pretty close to the film adaptation, except, of course, the hero isn't named John McLean but Joe Leland. The story is that, because of Sinatra's contract for The Detective, they had to offer him the lead in Die Hard first, but he was a senior citizen then and passed.
posted by Bunny Ultramod at 9:33 PM on March 8, 2013 [3 favorites]


Now I have a machine gun ring.. a... ding... ding?
posted by Slap*Happy at 3:44 AM on March 9, 2013 [2 favorites]


They should have brought in the while surviving rat pack*.

* unsure how many this is circa 1988.
posted by Artw at 5:52 AM on March 9, 2013


The reviews for Oz are all over the place - 30s movie purists in particular seem to hate it, but the chief complaint seems to be its a bit generic, which is a shame from Raimi. Still - Evil Dead 4!

(Oh, and if you've not seen Drag Me To Hell do it now - he's still got it in him when not encumbered by a Hollywood budget.)
posted by Artw at 6:21 AM on March 9, 2013


There's an obvious prequel to be made for Casablanca. Not that I'm suggesting that it should be made, but for god's sake, the whole movie is based on the premise that Rick and Ilsa have a romantic past that is interrupted when Ilsa's husband turns out not to be dead. If you're going to make a joke about a prequel to Casablanca, it somehow has to account for the fact that the plot of a potential prequel is baked right into the damned movie.
posted by jacquilynne at 7:32 AM on March 9, 2013


The US version of the (very good) Korean Mirrors movie did something very odd. The second movie is the one that could actually pass for a remake, while the first one (with K. Sutherland) is actually a precuel to that and the original. Not that this temporary bafflement will stop you from quickly noticing that both US movies suck pretty bad.
posted by Iosephus at 8:42 AM on March 9, 2013


I'm still waiting for a Smokey And The Bandit prequel.
posted by spilon at 9:15 AM on March 9, 2013


I saw Oz The Great And Powerful. Bottom line: Rami good, all three witches good, script flabby and lame, James Franco sucks. Shoulda cast Bruce Campbell as the wizard. Grade C+.
posted by vibrotronica at 9:52 AM on March 9, 2013 [2 favorites]


The latest LoEG ("Nemo: Heart of Ice") manages to be a prequel and sequel to some things I'm quite fond of set in the Antarctic, and do a great job of it. Of course, we are in Mash-up territory there.
posted by Artw at 10:02 AM on March 9, 2013


Artw, someone came with the word midquel for that kind of thing. Is it just me, or is that a horrible neo-word? (I keep thinking about a kind of cheese I never heard of, for some reason.)
posted by Iosephus at 4:58 PM on March 9, 2013


"Bridge" maybe sounds better...
posted by Artw at 5:32 PM on March 9, 2013




« Older Atheists going to church   |   Our Man in Samarra Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments