10 Terrible Movies That Should Have Stayed In Development Hell

Some movies would have definitely been better off if they were never made at all.

Will Smith Gemini Man
Paramount Pictures

Development hell is a cold, barren wasteland littered with countless ideas that have failed in their attempts to escape and reach the promised land of the big screen. Making movies is an incredibly difficult process, and the vast majority of pitches never even make it past the first hurdle.

An idea has to become a script, which needs to be approved and green-lit by a studio, then the producers get involved, more writers are drafted in for polishes, budgets need to be worked out, and a cast and crew needs to be hired before the thought of even shooting a single frame can be considered.

The longer a project remains stuck in development hell, the less likely it becomes to ever see the light of day, and some of the biggest names in the business have found themselves unable to escape its clutches. However, some movies have battled for years and even decades and finally managed to get themselves into production, only for the end result to be so terrible that it would have worked out much better for everyone if they'd just remained in purgatory instead.

10. Watchmen

Will Smith Gemini Man
Warner Bros.

Watchmen had been in the works for over 20 years by the time Zack Snyder finally managed to bring it to the big screen, and after decades stuck in development hell the end result turned out to be one of the most polarizing comic book adaptations ever made.

The reaction was split right down the middle, with fans praising such a faithful live-action take on the source material, while much of the criticism was based on the exact same reasons. For the uninitiated, Watchmen was a frustratingly complex and almost impenetrable anti-superhero movie, while those in the know celebrated the fact that the supposedly unfilmable graphic novel had turned out so well.

After sinking $185m into the project, not to mention the countless millions that were spent developing it when Terry Gilliam, Darren Aronofsky and Paul Greengrass were all attached at various points over the years, Warner Bros. ended up taking a huge loss on Watchmen when it failed to even recoup the budget at the box office.

Having been in the works since 1986 and passed through the hands of Fox, Universal, Paramount and Revolution Studios before WB managed to get it made, all of that effort hardly seemed to be worth it once the reviews came in and Watchmen ended up firmly in the red.

Contributor

I don't do social media, so like or follow me in person but please maintain a safe distance or the authorities will be notified. Don't snap me though, I'll probably break. I was once labelled a misogynist on this very site in a twenty paragraph-long rant for daring to speak ill of the Twilight franchise. I stand by what I said, it's crap.