Trailers better than the Film

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Post your favorite film trailers

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Man of Steel, Comic-con 2012 had a timeless trailer. It was better than the official ones. 

 

The music, the timeless themes, the applause, the post-Dark Knight hype, and the sense of possibility.

 

  I still enjoy watching this now:

 

 

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Dark Knight Rises teaser #1 and trailer #3.  

 

 

 

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Some good parts, not all of it works. My favorite starts from 3:48- 4:22 as it includes two of the best lines of the 3rd movie.

 

 

[Michael*]

I know for me, Prometheus springs immediately to mind as an example of a film with great promotional material and a middle order end product. The initial teaser in particular was just through-the-roof amazing.

 

[Michael*]

For a secondary nomination, I'd go with Avengers: Age of Ultron. The trailer made it look like James Spader's Ultron would be a genuinely cold and predatory villain, instead the character came off as a rather ill-conceived plot device.

 

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On 4/14/2021 at 1:12 PM, Michael* said:

I know for me, Prometheus springs immediately to mind as an example of a film with great promotional material and a middle order end product. The initial teaser in particular was just through-the-roof amazing.

 

 

Remember the prometheus discussion on BZ? Donbot, Jennka, Candlevixen, etc.?  good times.

 

The prometheus trailers generated a great deal of hype on the internet and the hype train was really strong. A lot of fun, too.  

 

I still like Prometheus despite its flaws, which could have been corrected.  The trailer has that critical and fascinating open-endedness that causes one to really speculate on the myriad possibilities.

 

Did you see Covenant?  I thought it sucked, despite some cool bits.  It also sank the possibility of part 3, which it was building towards.

[Michael*]

7 hours ago, Cult Icon said:

Remember the prometheus discussion on BZ? Donbot, Jennka, Candlevixen, etc.?  good times.

 

Not that I'm especially big on nostalgia (of any kind, really), but that was the golden age of BZ for me. I missed the boat on that particular conversation though, true to form I didn't end up seeing the film until much, much later. 

[Michael*]

7 hours ago, Cult Icon said:

I still like Prometheus despite its flaws, which could have been corrected.  The trailer has that critical and fascinating open-endedness that causes one to really speculate on the myriad possibilities.

 

I never thought Prometheus was entirely deserving of the flack it got, however like a lot of prequels it probably tried too hard to answer questions that nobody asked and to establish a "mythology" by mashing together bits of Alien and Aliens, with a touch of Frankenstein mixed in. Taken out of the Alien universe, it could have quite easily stood on its own as a perfectly decent piece of sci-fi.

[Michael*]

7 hours ago, Cult Icon said:

Did you see Covenant?  I thought it sucked, despite some cool bits.  It also sank the possibility of part 3, which it was building towards.

 

Yeah. I must confess that not much of Covenant worked for me while it was rolling, although certain things grew on me the more I thought about them afterwards.

 

Overall though, what struck me most about it was how much Scott has seemingly lost interest in the xenomorphs and the horror they bring, in favour of artificial intelligence and the impact it has on humans. So much so that he seems to have started trying to weave the synthetic android themes of Blade Runner into the Alien mythology.

[Michael*]

The teaser for Spectre was another good one, but the movie turned out to be decidedly average. The plot device of the bad guy who, while still achieving something close to world domination, really just lives to torture the good guy, and the awkward attempts at knitting seemingly unconnected strands together, was mostly what tanked it.

 

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On 5/4/2021 at 6:55 PM, Michael* said:

 

I never thought Prometheus was entirely deserving of the flack it got, however like a lot of prequels it probably tried too hard to answer questions that nobody asked and to establish a "mythology" by mashing together bits of Alien and Aliens, with a touch of Frankenstein mixed in. Taken out of the Alien universe, it could have quite easily stood on its own as a perfectly decent piece of sci-fi.

 

It definitely compromised the original mystery of the Xenomorph.  It is supposed to be kept ambiguous as a cosmic space horror.  The Space Jockey was supposed to an elephant like Alien, not a helmet LOL for a species that look like ancient gods of world civilization.  A big flaw to me was how they cheapened the Engineer from being a potentially fascinating actor in the cosmic drama to being another violent alien villain.

 

It is also funny to me that the the Ridley Scott produced TV show resembles Prometheus in significant ways.

 

In the comics, many of which are very good and never made it to screen (Alien Resurrection resembles the comics most) they don't focus much on the origins of the Xenomorph either.  More like they expand it from ship to the level of a "intergalactic pandemic" as humans are being threatened by spreading Xenomorph infestation. 

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On 5/4/2021 at 6:58 PM, Michael* said:

 

Yeah. I must confess that not much of Covenant worked for me while it was rolling, although certain things grew on me the more I thought about them afterwards.

 

Overall though, what struck me most about it was how much Scott has seemingly lost interest in the xenomorphs and the horror they bring, in favour of artificial intelligence and the impact it has on humans. So much so that he seems to have started trying to weave the synthetic android themes of Blade Runner into the Alien mythology.

 

This is a clever insight, I had not thought of this.

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another new marvel film:

 

 

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On 5/4/2021 at 6:55 PM, Michael* said:

 

I never thought Prometheus was entirely deserving of the flack it got, however like a lot of prequels it probably tried too hard to answer questions that nobody asked and to establish a "mythology" by mashing together bits of Alien and Aliens, with a touch of Frankenstein mixed in. Taken out of the Alien universe, it could have quite easily stood on its own as a perfectly decent piece of sci-fi.

 

I've been rewatching Alien and re-watched the Alien: Isolation game.  What strikes me as a bad move was how he overexplained the mythos of Alien and Aliens. I see them as inherently disconnected and non-canon.  A bit part of the horror and interest in these films was the mystery in the world building.

 

The worst thing he did was make the Space Jockey into the big white humanoid.  The humanoid isn't the space jockey in Alien.  In Alien it is a bio-mechanical creature attached to a telescope like (or Ridley said, a weapon) device.  Its elephant like head is not a helmet..

 

The comics attempted to explain the space jockey as some sort of telepathically communicating, floating alien creature.  Almost deity like, but with malicious intent (world destroying).

 

Aliens was criticized for making the Queen into a videogame boss, while in Alien the source of the eggs are a mystery besides one (still mysterious) deleted scene.

 

Have you played Alien: Isolation?  I see it as the true sequel to Alien.  It's very well designed and very faithful to Alien.

[Michael*]

On 6/28/2021 at 9:29 PM, Cult Icon said:

Have you played Alien: Isolation?  I see it as the true sequel to Alien.  It's very well designed and very faithful to Alien.

Oh most definitely, Isolation was a wonderful game for the PS3, hard to believe that it came out all the way back in 2014. I remember initially finding it a bit off-putting that they made the Xenomorph unkillable throughout, however since the first film was also about the crew not being able to kill it while still being proactive in pursuing it, I thought when Ripley eventually found a way it became that much more satisfying. So the idea grew on me because it made sense thematically and was faithful to the original story. 

 

Earlier this year, rumours resurfaced that Neill Blomkamp's long-abandoned Alien project might be back in development. I believe it was dropped by the studio when they decided that Scott's prequel series would be the main focus of the franchise moving forward.

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On 7/2/2021 at 1:16 PM, Michael* said:

l game for the PS3, hard to believe that it came out all the way back in 2014. I remember initially finding it a bit off-putting that they made the Xenomorph unkillable throughout, however since the first film was also about the crew not being able to kill it while still being proactive in pursuing it, I thought when Ripley eventually found a way it became that much more satisfying. So the idea grew on me because it made sense thematically and was faithful to the original story. 

 

 

Did you play the DLCs?  There is one called "Crew Expendable" that has the original Aliens cast do voice acting.  It is an excellent DLC.   Have  you played Aliens colonial Marines?  It's a mediocre shooter that is, at the same time, the most true to the Aliens movie.

 

I think with the Xenomorph (in games and the movies) they made them too numerous and too easy to kill.  There is a new Alien game called "Aliens elite fireteam" and the Aliens get killed in mounds in this one.  This entirely removes the horror aspect, and they become as scary as a guy with a gun. 

 

I think the middle road is good- more horror, more danger, and less action.

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@Michael*  This is the most important scene in Prometheus but it was edited out.  It answers a lot of questions:

 

 

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Return of the King is a great film (4.5 out of 5 for me), but the trailer is timeless.  Watching it again I am still hyped now! :