Rise of the Planet of Sequels Reboot: Film Industry
I recently wrote about the rise of sequels in the video game industry. Since I made the comparison there, I feel I must devote a post about the film industry too. After all, this is an industry that has so far managed to spin off the poor orphaned lion cub to almost every thinkable medium on earth.
I used the same method and analysed the titles from three major film publishers; 21st Century Fox, Universal Pictures and Warner Bros. The result shows similar trends to my previous analysis.
Unsurprisingly, the sequels are rising in the film industry too.
15% of all titles published in 2010 were sequels*. It continued to go up to 20% and 29% in 2014 and 2016 respectively.
A quick glance at overall cost per film of popular franchises confirms our common perception — production cost is going off the roof due to ever-rising cost of computer graphics and top Hollywood actors. It is reasonable to assume the production cost is at least partially responsible for the rise of sequel projects with more predictable P&L.
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest cost $225 million in 2006. The following sequel to the series, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (2007) cost $300 million, followed by $410 million for Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011).
The first of the Batman Trilogy series, Batman Begins cost $150 million in 2005. Production cost for the second instalment to the series, The Dark Knight (2008) was $185 million at the time, followed by $230 million for The Dark Knight Rises (2012).
I argued in my previous post that one symptom of risk-averse behaviour of publishers manifests itself in the form of high rate of external IPs, in other words, ideas borrowed from external industries. (For instance, a video game title based on films, a film based on a classic TV programme and so on)
Comparison with video game publishers shows in all three years studied, film industry had higher rate of external IPs compared to the video game industry. 28% of games published in 2010 by the publishers sampled in the study were based on external IP whereas 41% of films were. The gap continues to close in as more and more games are produced using existing IPs.
This can be partly explained by the established formula in which a publisher obtains license to create film adaptation of a novel. In all three years that are studied, books made up over 70% of all external IPs.
It will be interesting to monitor external IP/ original IP ratio of both industries as we approach the end of year 2016. If the strong propensity towards more external IPs in gaming industry is an indication of where the creative industry as a whole is going, I expect to see more external IPs and serials in the film industry too.
[Footnote]
*Sequel/ New — Sequel refers to titles that are related to a previously published title. Taken 2 (Fox, 2012) and The Bourne Legacy (Universal, 2012) are considered sequel whereas Argo (Warner Bros, 2012) and Lucy (Universal, 2014) are new.
**Original/ External IP — External IP refers to franchise or series that originated from outside of video gaming such as books, TV, musical or cartoon. For instance, The Jersey Boys (Warner Bros, 2014) is a new title, but classified as ‘External IP’, as it’s based on a musical play of the same name. The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Fox, 2010) is both sequel and ‘External IP’.
[References]
Chart 1 — Rise of sequels in the film industry
20th Century Fox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_20th_Century_Fox_films_(2000%E2%80%93present)
Universal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_20th_Century_Fox_films_(2000%E2%80%93present)
Warner Bros https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Warner_Bros._films
Chart 2 — Production cost of Pirates of Caribbean series in million USD
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=piratesofthecaribbean2.htm
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End http://www.webcitation.org/5m6OlarMy
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides http://www.forbes.com/sites/csylt/2014/07/22/fourth-pirates-of-the-caribbean-is-most-expensive-movie-ever-with-costs-of-410-million/
Chart 3 — Production cost of Batman Trilogy series in million USD
Batman Begins http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=batmanbegins.htm
The Dark Knight http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=darkknight.htm
The Dark Knight Rises http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=batman3.htm
Chart 4 — Industry comparison — % of external IP
EA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Electronic_Arts_games
Activision https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Activision_video_games
Nintendo https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_Nintendo_games
20th Century Fox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_20th_Century_Fox_films_(2000%E2%80%93present)
Universal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_20th_Century_Fox_films_(2000%E2%80%93present)
Warner Bros https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Warner_Bros._films
