On April 25th, it was announced that the Super Mario Bros. movie, starring the like of Chris Pratt (for some goddawful reason) was going to be delayed until next year. But that's not what I'm here to talk about today. Instead, what this annoucement has done has re-reminded me of another franchise I got into which also seems to be having a delay, but unlike the Mario film, which at least somewhat has a release date next year, this one just seems to have vanished without a trace.
Overall, I've had a love-hate relationship with this book series at times. There was a period in which I was obsessed with it, then a period in which I disliked it, then a period in which I was obsessed with it again. At the moment, it's mostly reasonable pleasure with the series...though seriously, that crappy MacKenzie. She needs to get fucked.
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| If they offered dartboards like this, it would make my dream come true. |
I could rant all day about how much MacKenzie sucks and all the horrible things I wish could happen to her (she's a manipulative cyberbully trying to ruin other people's lives, for crying out loud!), but it's not why I'm writing this post. I'm writing it because of something called "development hell".
On the 5th September 2014, a now-deleted post was uploaded on the Dork Diaries blog. Here's an excerpt from it that I managed to save before it vanished, complete with the original font size, just to emphasise its main point:
Yeah, sure, because vampire romance stories written by Mormons and gritty dystopians for young adults sure do mix well with high school comedies. Also, wasn't The Hunger Games the only one of these franchises to get decent reviews from critics? And didn't the Divergent franchise die a swift and anti-climatic death two years later?
On the 5th September 2014, a now-deleted post was uploaded on the Dork Diaries blog. Here's an excerpt from it that I managed to save before it vanished, complete with the original font size, just to emphasise its main point:
Lionsgate Summit Entertainment, the same people who made amazing movies like Divergent, Hunger Games and Twilight, will be filming a DORK DIARIES movie!!!
Yeah, sure, because vampire romance stories written by Mormons and gritty dystopians for young adults sure do mix well with high school comedies. Also, wasn't The Hunger Games the only one of these franchises to get decent reviews from critics? And didn't the Divergent franchise die a swift and anti-climatic death two years later?
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| Hey, if District 1 tribute MacKenzie does get a hit in, dreamy vampire Brandon can simply save chosen Divergent Nikki's life by turning her into a vampire too. Isn't that the outcome the audience wants to see? |
Anyway, enough of that snarking. The film was supposedly going to be released in 2016. That didn't happen. They said it would then get released in 2017. It's now 2022. A source in early 2021 claimed that the "reason" why was because of COVID-19 restrictions, but given the unrealistic time frames and the fact that the film was already getting delayed, they were probably just trying to save face.
Next of all was a (also now deleted) blog post on the 15th May 2015 (a year before the supposed release date), which was asking fans to give suggestions for who they wanted to play the characters in this movie. The idea being that the film-makers would then look at the suggestions and take them into account. Most of the comments consist of:
I will also post my suggestions that I made at the time right here:
Obviously I was a young and naive teenager at the time, though I still think some of these actors could work (mainly for the adults). You can tell that everyone really had their hopes up too high, myself included, if this was how they were going to consider roles for it.
Let's start with the producers first. These people have worked for Lionsgate for some time, mostly on the less impressive films. It's likely that Rosenfelt in particular was in negotiations to produce due to producing the Twilight films, since the original books are gushed over in the original Dork Diaries books (in a non-ironic way, unfortunately).
Can I just say that Rosenfelt's name is essentially a dark mark on most of the films that she produces? Sure, Marley and Me was fairly successful, but everything else she produces is just pure trash, The Twilight films do much better at the box office than with critics (just like the original books), Me Before You was pretty mediocre, the Percy Jackson films and The Book Thief are insulting adaptations of the original books, Yogi Bear is an equally insulting adaptation of the original cartoon and then there was the issue with The New Mutants film, which kept on changing its release date every single time and was eventually got released with little fanfare. Considering that I saw Rosenfelt's name attached to it, it's safe to say that nobody should have been getting their hopes up about that film.
Now onto Sacchi. Probably most known for producing Punisher: War Zone and being the executive producer of My Bloody Valentine 3D. Most of his films tend to be action flicks or horror thrillers that are mostly mediocre or average. The IMDb ratings for them at least are either 4, 5 or 6 out 10. So why he's now producing a light-hearted school comedy, I have no idea. Not much to say on him otherwise.
On 18th September 2015, the blog announced that Mark Waters would be directing the film. The post is no longer available on the website, just like the other ones, making it sound even more like a pipe dream than before.
Dear lord, this guy's directing career is all over the place! He was clearly cast as director due to his work on Mean Girls and the Freaky Friday remake (both Lindsay Lohan vehicles) and yes, they are fantastic films you should check out. However, I feel that most of Mean Girls' high quality can be attributed to writer Tina Fey and whilst Waters did not directed the hated sequel, Fey had nothing to do with it either.
Otherwise, Waters' directing career is just mediocre. Either the films get mixed reviews or they get slated. The Spiderwick Chronicles was okay for instance, but pretty forgettable after its release. Particular duds aimed for a young audience include Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), a Jim Carrey vehicle that has barely anything to do with the original book, and the failed adaptation of Vampire Academy in 2014.
Plus there was the issue of this Mark Waters film being released in 2016 rather than Dork Diaries:
Next of all was a (also now deleted) blog post on the 15th May 2015 (a year before the supposed release date), which was asking fans to give suggestions for who they wanted to play the characters in this movie. The idea being that the film-makers would then look at the suggestions and take them into account. Most of the comments consist of:
- People trying to think up big names that would be way too old for the role by now.
- People trying to get themselves, or a a friend or family member hired for a role.
- People saying that Meryl Streep should be the grandmother, which would certainly help to improve the film's quality given her track record. A lot of people also mentioned Betty White for the role, which considering recent events, is now sadly impossible.
- People saying that Peyton List (the one who plays Holly Hills in Diary Of A Wimpy Kid and Emma Ross in Jessie) should be MacKenzie. And then some people complained that it shouldn't happen because she's too "nice".
- Paying saying that Mia Talerico (plays Charlie Duncan in Good Luck Charlie) should be Brianna. They would have to age Brianna up from 6 to 13 if they want to consider this now though, and thus that would make her only one year younger than Nikki.
- People complaining that other people's suggestions won't work because their suggested actors don't look like the characters that they are suggested for. There was also a priceless moment in which someone had to remind someone else that Ellen Albertini Dow (the rapping granny from The Wedding Singer) could not be Grandma Maxwell because she had died about a week before the blog post went up.
I will also post my suggestions that I made at the time right here:
- Nikki J. Maxwell: Chloe Grace Moretz, Maddie Ziegler, Abigail Breslin, Kaitlyn Dias, AnnaSophia Robb or a friend of mine from primary school who may or may not have starred in Casualty at some point.
- Chloe Garcia: Allegra Leguizamo (John Leguizamo's daughter).
- Zoey Franklin: Ciara Bravo (though she would have be a white Zoey if that was the case). Also liked the suggestion of China Ann McClain.
- MacKenzie Hollister: AnnaSophia Robb or Claudia Lee (the latter played Brooke in Kick-Ass 2).
- Brandon Roberts: Ryan Potter.
- Mr. Maxwell: Ray Romano (I unfortunately spelt it as Rino Romano in the actual post - completely different actor), Ty Burrell, Alan Tudyk or Brad Garrett.
- Mrs. Maxwell: Amy Poehler, Tina Fey, Isla Fisher or Kristen Wiig.
- Grandma Maxwell: Helen Mirren, Judi Dench or Julie Waters.
- Principal Winston: Denis Leary, Alan Tudyk, Jim Broadbent, Brad Garrett or Scott Adsit.
Obviously I was a young and naive teenager at the time, though I still think some of these actors could work (mainly for the adults). You can tell that everyone really had their hopes up too high, myself included, if this was how they were going to consider roles for it.
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| Look, Boomstick could make the role work if he wants to. It certainly can't be worst than choosing Chris Pratt as Mario. |
Now let's focus on the people who were hired to make this film and analyse them (as well as roast some of them in the process). When Summit Entertainment buying the film rights was announced, the book's original author Rachel Renee Russell said this:
"Summit Entertainment bringing Dork Diaries to life is a dream come true! My book series could not be in more capable hands. My fans and I are super excited to see Nikki Maxwell and her dorky world come to life."
"More capable hands", huh? Well, let's see what the analysis has to say about that.
Karen Rosenfelt and John Sacchi - The Producers.
Let's start with the producers first. These people have worked for Lionsgate for some time, mostly on the less impressive films. It's likely that Rosenfelt in particular was in negotiations to produce due to producing the Twilight films, since the original books are gushed over in the original Dork Diaries books (in a non-ironic way, unfortunately).
Can I just say that Rosenfelt's name is essentially a dark mark on most of the films that she produces? Sure, Marley and Me was fairly successful, but everything else she produces is just pure trash, The Twilight films do much better at the box office than with critics (just like the original books), Me Before You was pretty mediocre, the Percy Jackson films and The Book Thief are insulting adaptations of the original books, Yogi Bear is an equally insulting adaptation of the original cartoon and then there was the issue with The New Mutants film, which kept on changing its release date every single time and was eventually got released with little fanfare. Considering that I saw Rosenfelt's name attached to it, it's safe to say that nobody should have been getting their hopes up about that film.
Now onto Sacchi. Probably most known for producing Punisher: War Zone and being the executive producer of My Bloody Valentine 3D. Most of his films tend to be action flicks or horror thrillers that are mostly mediocre or average. The IMDb ratings for them at least are either 4, 5 or 6 out 10. So why he's now producing a light-hearted school comedy, I have no idea. Not much to say on him otherwise.
Mark Waters - The Director.
On 18th September 2015, the blog announced that Mark Waters would be directing the film. The post is no longer available on the website, just like the other ones, making it sound even more like a pipe dream than before.
Dear lord, this guy's directing career is all over the place! He was clearly cast as director due to his work on Mean Girls and the Freaky Friday remake (both Lindsay Lohan vehicles) and yes, they are fantastic films you should check out. However, I feel that most of Mean Girls' high quality can be attributed to writer Tina Fey and whilst Waters did not directed the hated sequel, Fey had nothing to do with it either.
Otherwise, Waters' directing career is just mediocre. Either the films get mixed reviews or they get slated. The Spiderwick Chronicles was okay for instance, but pretty forgettable after its release. Particular duds aimed for a young audience include Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), a Jim Carrey vehicle that has barely anything to do with the original book, and the failed adaptation of Vampire Academy in 2014.
Plus there was the issue of this Mark Waters film being released in 2016 rather than Dork Diaries:
The original Bad Santa (which was directed by Terry Swigoff and somehow had the Coen brothers providing rewrites) received pretty good reviews and was the only film of Swigoff's career that was financially successful. This sequel on the other hand scored crap reviews from most sources - it has a 23% critics rating on Rotten Tomatoes, 34% audience rating on that same website, 1.5 on Bomb Report and 34/100 critics score on Metacritic (though IMDb and Metacritic audiences were "kinder" to it with a 5.6/10 rating and 5.3/10 rating respectively). Additionally, against its $26,000,000 budget, it only grossed $23,229,371-$24,079,268 overall (sources differ on what the actual final gross was). Swigoff had nothing to do with this film, so most of the blame has been placed on Waters and the co-producer Andrew Gunn.
Of course, Mark Waters then directed Magic Camp, which got released in 2020 on the Disney+ streaming service...after originally being planned for a 2018 cinematic release and then being replaced by Christopher Robin. And given that the film has 38% on Rotten Tomatoes, and his next film He's All That (a "gender-flipped remake" of She's All That) has 30%, I doubt those movies did any favours for his career either (though at least they're somewhat better than Bad Santa 2).
Not really much to say here compared with Rosenfelt and Waters, but still more than Sacchi. Hendy is an actress and writer known for the the comedy play The Catholic Girl's Guide to Losing Your Virginity (which I vaguely remember from somewhere) and the short black comedy film #twitterkills. The former won the "Pick of the Fringe" award from both critics and audiences at the 2006 Cincinnati Fringe Festival and was nominated for two Cincinnati Entertainment Awards, before going on to have sold-out performances. The latter has a 7.0/10 IMDb score and a 3.1/5 Letterbox score, and it won some awards at the 2014 HollyShorts Film Festival including Best Comedy. So this does seem promising in how this may affect the Dork Diaries movie's quality. That said, they aren't necessarily mainstream and they're not family-friendly either. Maybe this was intended to be her first foray into family-friendly and mainstream fare? There's some more information on her here in case you're curious.
So "capable hands"? Not really. If anything, they're the type of hands that could cause a potentially trainwreck (except for Hendy's, it seems). It's likely that these roles have changed since being announced and that we'll get a different producer, director and writer though. But who knows? Maybe the film won't happen anyway?
I won't be surprised if the film actually does get made, it ultimately ends up on some streaming service like Netflix or the like. It happened with the film adaptation of James Patterson's Middle School, despite earlier implications that it would be a cinematic release. Plus, the recent Diary of a Wimpy Kid movie was released on Disney+ (likely due to a combination of COVID-19 restrictions and because The Long Haul was a dreadful box office bomb). What's to prevent this film from going the same route?
What I'm trying to say is that given the fact that the movie seems to have some unrealistic expectations on release dates and casting, as well as some really iffy choices for people working on the movie, I expect it to be a "meh" experience at best and a trainwreck at worst. If it does turn out to be good, I'll be pleasantly surprised. But we'll just have to wait. Depending on whether it actually does get released or not.
Oh, and also, MacKenzie's a lying, cheating, manipulative, abusive, vain, diary-stealing, cyber-bullying queen bee who should have been expelled for some of the stuff she's done in the Dork Diaries books. Just saying.
Of course, Mark Waters then directed Magic Camp, which got released in 2020 on the Disney+ streaming service...after originally being planned for a 2018 cinematic release and then being replaced by Christopher Robin. And given that the film has 38% on Rotten Tomatoes, and his next film He's All That (a "gender-flipped remake" of She's All That) has 30%, I doubt those movies did any favours for his career either (though at least they're somewhat better than Bad Santa 2).
Annie Hendy - The Scriptwriter.
Not really much to say here compared with Rosenfelt and Waters, but still more than Sacchi. Hendy is an actress and writer known for the the comedy play The Catholic Girl's Guide to Losing Your Virginity (which I vaguely remember from somewhere) and the short black comedy film #twitterkills. The former won the "Pick of the Fringe" award from both critics and audiences at the 2006 Cincinnati Fringe Festival and was nominated for two Cincinnati Entertainment Awards, before going on to have sold-out performances. The latter has a 7.0/10 IMDb score and a 3.1/5 Letterbox score, and it won some awards at the 2014 HollyShorts Film Festival including Best Comedy. So this does seem promising in how this may affect the Dork Diaries movie's quality. That said, they aren't necessarily mainstream and they're not family-friendly either. Maybe this was intended to be her first foray into family-friendly and mainstream fare? There's some more information on her here in case you're curious.
So "capable hands"? Not really. If anything, they're the type of hands that could cause a potentially trainwreck (except for Hendy's, it seems). It's likely that these roles have changed since being announced and that we'll get a different producer, director and writer though. But who knows? Maybe the film won't happen anyway?
I won't be surprised if the film actually does get made, it ultimately ends up on some streaming service like Netflix or the like. It happened with the film adaptation of James Patterson's Middle School, despite earlier implications that it would be a cinematic release. Plus, the recent Diary of a Wimpy Kid movie was released on Disney+ (likely due to a combination of COVID-19 restrictions and because The Long Haul was a dreadful box office bomb). What's to prevent this film from going the same route?
What I'm trying to say is that given the fact that the movie seems to have some unrealistic expectations on release dates and casting, as well as some really iffy choices for people working on the movie, I expect it to be a "meh" experience at best and a trainwreck at worst. If it does turn out to be good, I'll be pleasantly surprised. But we'll just have to wait. Depending on whether it actually does get released or not.
Oh, and also, MacKenzie's a lying, cheating, manipulative, abusive, vain, diary-stealing, cyber-bullying queen bee who should have been expelled for some of the stuff she's done in the Dork Diaries books. Just saying.
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| Again, it would be awesome if they offered punching bags like these in real life. |
Anyway, that will be it for this blog post. The film might happen, or it might not. If it does, good. If it doesn't...well, considering the people supposedly involved, probably for the best.
