John Carter and the Lone Ranger

Recently I watched the more recent “Lone Ranger” film with Johnny Depp as Tonto and Armie Hammer as the title character.   It’s another CGI orgy with Depp essentially turning Jack Sparrow into an American Indian.  Enjoyable…to an extent.

Ages back I caught “John Carter” in the movie theater and then watched it on Blu-Ray.  Like “Lone Ranger” it was heavy on CGI, but had a fairly decent story and no awkward Depps lightening the mood.  Taylor Kitsch played the title character, Lynn Collins played his love interest Dejah Thoris [they played together in an earlier X-Men film], and Mark Strong – who always seems like Steve Carell’s bad-ass evil older brother – as the quasi villain. 

Both were financial failures as movies.  “John Carter” (2012) totaled out at $350 million production and marketing, yet only grossed $284 million worldwide.  “Lone Ranger” (2013) combined production and marketing was $375 million yet only grossed $260 million worldwide. 

Another big similarity is both had archaic source material.  “John Carter” was based on Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter trilogy from 1913.  ERB, not to be confused with Naked Lunch writer William S. Burroughs, is much more famous for Tarzan, which remains a popular franchise.  His John Carter character is mainly known among sci-fi fans, as Carter is arguably the template for Conan and all other swords & sorcery heroes we’ve had since.  Robert Heinlein was a huge fan of ERB and even wrote a book, Number of the Beast, in tribute to ERB.  James Cameron also cites John Carter as an influence for his big film Avatar.  But since 1913, there had been only one film adaptation, in 2009, which was not great:  it was direct-to-DVD and pretty much tanked.  In any case, I reviewed both the source material and the 2009 film in my prior blog, dated 4/30/10.

The Lone Ranger was significantly more successful prior to the 2013 film.  The 1933-54 radio show was very popular, followed by the similarly popular 1949-57 TV show.  Although many actors have portrayed the Lone Ranger, Clayton Moore is most popularly associated with the role.  The theme song, better known as the William Tell Overture, is well known, as is the Ranger’s famous catchphrase, “Hi Ho Silver” (which even figures in some Frank Zappa shows). 

Ok.  But look at the films:  110 octane CGI orgies of 1080p eye candy.   In Dejah Thoris’ case, serious eye candy.  Most of the people know who of John Carter or the Lone Ranger are old folks who don’t care much for that type of film.  You won’t get that demographic into the theaters to see these films, or even to watch them on DVD at home.  “Matlock is on!’ 

Clearly Granpa wasn’t the desired demographic.  What about his XBOX/PS4 playing grandkid?  Yeah, that’s the ticket.  He’s the one you thought would shell out $15 at the megaplex to see them in 3D IMAX.  But with no familiarity with the source material – and no reason to care – he stayed at home playing XBOX or PS4.  So the movies tanked.

The studios must have thought:  hey, this is easy.  We have ready-made stories here!  John Carter and Lone Ranger were written ages ago.  We just need to tweak a screenplay a little and we’re home free!  No original thinking necessary!  It’s like printing money!  WRONG. 

The sad part is, neither film actually sucks.  Of the two, “Lone Ranger” is less reverential.   We get Reid’s backstory – a naïve prosecutor who doesn’t believe in guns – but the film is told from Tonto’s point of view, and Depp can’t resist giving him, as noted above, the full Jack Sparrow treatment.  “Carter” was more straightforward.  It’s vast, epic, and again, did I mention Dejah Thoris?  Yeah.  For my sci-fi readers out there, by all means check out the original source material.