Paramount’s decision to move “G.I. Joe: Retaliation”‘s release date from June 29th (just a month away) to March 29th, 2013 is shocking. And their main reason – wanting to convert the film to 3D – is puzzling.
Clearly there’s more to this move than that. Here’s why it doesn’t add-up:
– This was Paramount’s big summer release (since “Marvel’s The Avengers” was mostly Disney and “Madagascar 3” is a DreamWorks Animation release). What are the left with now? Katy Perry’s 3D concert movie.
– The studio’s six remaining movies for the remainder of the year are all jammed between October and Christmas Day (but I’m sure that’s going to change now. Expect them to spread-out their schedule.)
– And think about all the money spent on the marketing and promotion of “G.I. Joe 2 “: posters, media events, trailers, the preview at Cinema Con and the Super Bowl ad – all now wasted. It’ll be interesting to see if they’ll do another Super Bowl ad next year.
Paramount has been delaying a lot of releases lately. The “Star Trek” sequel, “World War Z” and “Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters” were all originally planned to be 2012 films and they all got pushed to next year. 2013 now set-up as a huge year for the studio, with all these films and a new “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” film and “Anchorman 2”. Maybe this will make-up for their split with DreamWorks Animation, who will officially begin distributing their films alone starting next year.
As for the 3D explanation, well, you know what I think about 3D. Apprently the gimmick does increase international sales, which is important. But why make that decision now? If they were confident in the film, which came-in $50 million under the budget of the original, and includes new heavyweight action stars Dwayne Johnson and Bruce Willis) – there’s no need to pull it only 5-weeks before it was schedule to hit theaters.
I believe the real reason has to do with disappointing performance of “Battleship” at the box office. Paramount execs. were afraid “Joe” wasn’t strong enough to face this summer’s action movie competition, including “Brave” the week before and “The Amazing Spider-Man” and “The Dark Knight Rises” shortly after the original release June 29 release date.
Bottom line: This “G.I. Joe” apparently wasn’t strong enough to battle with the big boys of summer. We’ll find-out next March if he can handle the Easter Bunny.