# Movies/TV Series that Had Interesting Concepts But Were Poorly Executed



## DemonDragonJ (Aug 24, 2014)

In the world of entertainment, many ideas exist, but not all of them are ever fully realized, and even those that do become a reality may not always be well-made.

This thread is to discuss movies and television series that seemed to be great ideas when they were first conceived, but were not executed in the best of manners.

At a first glance, _The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen_ may have seemed awesome: numerous famous characters from 19th-century literature gathering together and forming a Victorian version of the Avengers and/or Justice League is certain to be a great idea! However, the movie had too many characters and not a sufficient focus on any of them, apart from Allan Quartermain and Tom Sawyer; the storywriters were likely presuming that most viewers would already be familiar with the characters, having read their original stories, but that is not an excuse; in my opinion, a well-written, self-contained story properly introduces and develops all of its characters without requiring the audience to consult any external sources for information. One of the worst elements of the story was that the portrayal of Dr. Jeckel and Mr. Hyde was horrendous; he was too similar to the Incredible Hulk (which is ironic, considering that the Incredible Hulk is clearly a modern equivalent of Dr. Jeckel/Mr. Hyde), rather than a metaphor for the struggle between good and evil in each person. Also, the main villain was Professor Moriarty, but there was no foreshadowing of that, making the revelation of his identity rather contrived and confusing.

The live-action film adaptations of _Street Fighter_ and _Mortal Kombat_ in the 1990's also may have been awesome to the fans of those franchises, but they pandered far too heavily to said fans, rather than to mainstream audiences. Far too many characters from each game series appeared in the films, with little depth or development, making their appearances basically glorified cameos. Plus, the main character of the _Street Fighter_ film was Guile, rather than Ryu or Ken, who were demoted to secondary characters; clearly, the film makers wished to have an American character as the main hero, despite Guile being only secondary in the games. On a positive note, he was played by Jean-Claude Van Damme, who, to his credit, is skilled at playing action heroes, making him a perfect candidate for that role, and at least Chun-Li was a major character in that film, while Raul Julia gave an excellent performance as M. Bison (his final film performance, in fact, and he certainly made it memorable).

What other films or television series were great as concepts but were poorly executed? I eagerly await your responses.


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## wibisana (Aug 24, 2014)

everything that Uwe Boll made,
based on quite good video game concept
but very poorly directed


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## ~Gesy~ (Aug 24, 2014)

Pretty much every M.Night film


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## Mider T (Aug 24, 2014)

Twin Peaks.


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## Stunna (Aug 24, 2014)

Uh... Hancock?


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## Jena (Aug 24, 2014)

Prometheus
Disney's Atlantis
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
The Star Wars prequels (there are kernels of interesting plot amidst all the shit)
9
Hancock
Jumper
Suckerpunch


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## Huey Freeman (Aug 24, 2014)

Terminator Salvation


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## Rukia (Aug 24, 2014)

Good one Jena.  Jumper immediately came to mind as a movie that should have been much better.


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## DemonDragonJ (Aug 25, 2014)

Jena said:


> Prometheus
> Disney's Atlantis
> Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
> The Star Wars prequels (there are kernels of interesting plot amidst all the shit)
> ...



Could you please elaborate on _Atlantis_ and the _Star Wars_ prequel trilogy? I would very much like to hear details of your opinions of those films.


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## Rain (Aug 25, 2014)

V for Vendetta.

Such a deep cool concept, extremly shallow execution.


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## Arya Stark (Aug 25, 2014)

Jena said:


> Disney's Atlantis



I disagree with this one. In fact it's one of the more underappreciated movies with Treasure Planet.


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## Aduro (Aug 25, 2014)

V became the most boring alien show ever despite an great idea for a conspiracy that humans had been manipulated by aliens and they used the media to manipulate people was good great. But frankly they were really bad at it and it was a very weak plot. Also it became incredibly boring and it was ridiculous that it basically balmed the aliens for everything wrong in the last few hundred years of history then they showed up to save us nowwhen we're starting to get the hang of things.

The 2009 version of The Prisoner had good acting but it was too rushed for a good mystery series and 6 just didn't have anything that made him a sympathetic character. Ian Mckellen was epic though.


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## Jena (Aug 25, 2014)

DemonDragonJ said:


> Could you please elaborate on _Atlantis_ and the _Star Wars_ prequel trilogy? I would very much like to hear details of your opinions of those films.





Arya Stark said:


> I disagree with this one. In fact it's one of the more underappreciated movies with Treasure Planet.



Atlantis has a lot of great world-building, but the movie could definitely use some polishing up. I enjoy it, but I have a hard time saying it's great because it has a lot of issues:

1. Way too much time is devoted to exposition and traveling _to_ Atlantis. As a result, we get to spend much less time in Atlantis and the ending feels rushed.

2. The simplistic animation more often than not works against the movie rather than in favor of it. It looks great when they're actually _at_ Atlantis, but a lot of the beginning scenes and traveling scenes look dull and lifeless because of the lack of shading. Most of the character designs also look weird when animated.

3. Most of the attempts at humor are really cringe-worthy. There's also a lot of terrible dialogue.

4. The characters are really flat and one-dimensional and mostly stereotypes. And I don't buy the "it's a kid's movie!" excuse because there are _plenty_ of Disney movies that manage to flesh out the characters a bit more than this one does. 

5. The movie has an identity crisis, and it shows. It wants to appeal to older kids/adults with the Indiana Jones-esque plot, but it's still Disney and it wants to appeal to kids as well. _That's_ my biggest issue with it. Because I feel like every time it goes in one direction, it immediately whiplashes in the other. The result is that the movie overall feels really simplistic (not in a good way) but with a few interesting themes.

It could've been a really cool action-adventure movie with a sci-fi twist, but it falls flat for me. By far my favorite scenes are the ones in Atlantis because it sets up some interesting questions (how did they find the crystal? why did they forget how to read? is the crystal evil or good? should the atlantians stay where they are if their culture is stagnating? etc.)


As far as SW prequels goes, I could write a _dissertation_ on how the movies could be improved even with the existing plot. But I'll be lazy and defer you to this video which, while I don't necessarily agree with all the changes, shows that there are interesting plot points that could have made a decent movie:

[youtube]VgICnbC2-_Y[/youtube]

(although I definitely disagree that Obi-Wan should be the main character -- anakin still could've been the main character)


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## Stunna (Aug 25, 2014)

Jena more or less hit Atlantis on the head. I'm fond of the movie myself, but I agree that it's a flawed picture.

Treasure Planet's the better of the two.


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## Swarmy (Aug 25, 2014)

Everything after the original Starship Troopers except for the animated series which didn't even receive a proper ending....
If there's any movie that got screwed worse than SST with the sequels do tell


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## Rindaman (Aug 25, 2014)

Godfather III
X-men Origins: Wolverine
X-men: Last Stand
Green Lantern 
Hulk
Firefly (first mistake Joss,  was pitching to Fox when two of your shows already had so much success at Warner Bros.)
Alphas
Daredevil
Trueblood
Star Trek Voyager
Star Trek: ENT
Star Trek : Into Darkness 
Blade: Trinity 
Quantum of Solace
Camelot (Starz series, had great potential)
Vampire Diaries 
Tron 2
Last Air bender'
Dragonball
Indiana Jones: Crystal Skull
Dark Knight Rises


There's more, but  they escape me at the moment.  These are the ones tho,  I was personally  banking on to be good.


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## Aruarian (Aug 25, 2014)

Heroes              .


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## ~Gesy~ (Aug 25, 2014)

Smallville


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## The World (Aug 25, 2014)

Fuck you Jena 

9 was great


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## Samavarti (Aug 27, 2014)

Hancock
Splice
Kikujirō's Summer
Lulu on the Bridge
X-men: Last Stand
Tales from Earthsea


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## Huey Freeman (Aug 27, 2014)

Eh Tron 2 wasn't bad !


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## Stringer (Aug 28, 2014)

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
Birds of Prey
The Hobbit
John Carter
Hancock
SW Prequels
Shutter Island


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## Batman4Life (Aug 28, 2014)

John Carter
Star Wars prequels
Green Lantern
Catwoman
Spider Man 3
Fantastic Four 2
The Wolverine


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## Unicornsilovethem (Aug 29, 2014)




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## Pain In The Ass (Sep 14, 2014)

In Time

that movie with Timberlake. Imo it had solid ground for a good story but was poorly executed. Could be a good plot for a tv series if done right


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## blacklusterseph004 (Sep 14, 2014)

Stargate (movie and series)
Godzilla
Wing Commander
Alien Resurrection
Predators
Event Horizon
Human Target
Supernatural


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## Magnum Miracles (Sep 14, 2014)

Awake

The most hyped show of that season too, and it had one of the best trailers I've ever seen. Was very disappointed with it after 3 episodes.


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## Blitzomaru (Sep 15, 2014)

Alphas was such a great concept and they ruined it.


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## Stunna (Sep 15, 2014)

Doctor Who Season 23 - "Trial of a Time Lord"


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## Caitlyn Jenner (Sep 28, 2014)

Cloud Atlas had the potential to be something a lot better.


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## Pseudo (Sep 29, 2014)

Artificial Intelligence.


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## Morglay (Oct 9, 2014)

~Gesy~ said:


> Pretty much every M.Night film





Adding Lucy. Scarlett is the female version of Keanu Reeves


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## Sparrow (Oct 28, 2014)

_The League of Extraordinary Gentleman_ is really a perfect example. The premise is awesome and it deserves a reboot that more closely follows the comics. Perhaps doing so in the form of a television series would make more sense, but I still think it deserves another big budget release. 

_Repo Men_ has a cool concept ripe for a great sci-fi thriller, but wasn't executed so well despite having a good cast. Both leads did well but something just didn't click. Would do better in the hands of a better director and certainly need some major rewriting. 

_Young Ones_ which I just saw recently could have been better. While I actually still enjoyed the film and loved the setting and look of it, it could have been more. It seems to be pretty clearly split between critics, though most that like it only gave it primarily middling reviews. The performances were great though. 

_Flyboys_ could have... actually I don't know if this particular movie really could have been good, but dammit I just really want a quality WWI air combat film that isn't old and that I haven't already seen several times.


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## St. YatōKiri_Kilgharrah (Oct 28, 2014)

Everithang


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## St. YatōKiri_Kilgharrah (Oct 28, 2014)

Also I dont think Supernatural is a good fit for this thread's premise at all LOL.


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## DemonDragonJ (Oct 29, 2014)

St NightRazr said:


> Also I dont think Supernatural is a good fit for this thread's premise at all LOL.



Why is that?


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## Palpatine (Oct 29, 2014)

Star Wars prequels
Hancock
The Purge
Devil
The Box
Alice in Wonderland (Tim Burton film)
The Butterfly Effect


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## Psychic (Oct 29, 2014)

75% of the movies/tv shows listed here are good/fine.


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## Didi (Oct 29, 2014)

In Time is probably the epitome of this


Pretty cool concept

such a fucking terrible execution

STOP MAKING TIME PUNS YOU ASSHOLES
HAHA TIME IS LITERALLY MONEY AND EVERYTHING REVOLVES AROUND TIME
WE GET IT

fucking hell
and that's just only part of why it's so bad


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## DemonDragonJ (Sep 26, 2015)

I am reviving this thread to say that _Pixels_ was another movie that had an excellent concept that was poorly executed. The idea of extraterrestrial invaders creating an invasion force modeled after old-school games was very awesome, but the choice of actors was very poor, and the movie overall displayed too many negative stereotypes regarding nerds. Although Adam Sandler was not nearly as obnoxious in that film as he has been in the past, he still was too annoying for my liking, and Kevin James definitely was not a good choice to play the president of the United States, in my mind. Also, while I did like how Josh Gad's character was a conspiracy theorist, I did not at all like his obsession with video game character Lady Lisa, which bordered on unhealthy and also was a huge insult to nerds and video games players everywhere.

That film had such great potential, but it was dragged down by terribly awkward interactions between its characters, and humor that was more cringe-inducing than it was genuinely humorous.


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