8 Mistakes That Will Ruin Upcoming Movies
Suicide Squad 2 is making the same mistake all over again...
Whether it's acting, directing, visual effects or sound mixing, there's a lot that can go wrong during the moviemaking process.
Though projects of all sizes are planned for months in advance and there are thousands of different people contributing towards the final product, it's impossible to tell if everything's going to work in tandem until it all comes together on the screen. Nobody sets out to make a bad movie, but sometimes, an unforeseen detail or script-level problem can derail the entire thing.
And while some movies can rise above their flaws and be great in spite of them, often, it can take just one mistake to kill a film's momentum, giving it a problem that proves impossible to recover from.
There are several upcoming movies that - at face value - might fall victim to this particular issue, from franchises that are repeating the mistakes of their predecessors, lazy stories that seem quite uninspired, and odd character additions that don't seem to mesh well with what the movie is trying to do.
There's still plenty to look forward to with these eight films, but there's also one big reason to be worried.
8. Having The Same Villain - The Avatar Sequels
The Mistake: Having Miles Quaritch as the villain (again).
Avatar is widely regarded as a phenomenal visual treat, a stunning blockbuster experience that demands the biggest HDTV and the most expensive sound system you can afford (and cram in your living room).
But its characters and its story are not praised as highly. It's basically Dances With Wolves in space - director James Cameron even admitted as much - and feels a little too predictable as a result, with Jake Sully's turn from military pawn to Na'vi saviour one of the most obvious plot developments in recent memory.
The story wasn't helped by the addition of a generic, military grunt villain either, with Colonel Miles Quaritch consistently spouting dialogue that felt ripped from a bad video-game cutscene and never rising above his position as a one-dimensional obstacle for the hero.
And unfortunately, he's going to be the bad guy in every single one of the Avatar sequels.
It would be far better for these movies to feature a different, more interesting antagonist - or multiple different, more interesting antagonists. Quaritch is such a cardboard-cutout that having to watch him flex his guns and carry the same angry look on his face for the next few movies won't help in the slightest.
Plus, he died in the original. Doesn't bringing characters back from the dead lower the stakes quite a bit?