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Sam Raimi To Direct World of Warcraft Movie 298

Posted by Soulskill from the this-is-my-boomstick dept.
Decado writes "Blizzard has just announced that Sam Raimi is to direct the new World of Warcraft movie. 'Raimi, acclaimed director of the blockbuster Spider-Man series, will bring the forces of the Horde and the Alliance to life in epic live-action film. Charles Roven's Atlas Entertainment will produce alongside Raimi's Stars Road Entertaiment.' While it's still early in the process, does this offer hope that someone might finally make a good movie based on a game IP?"
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Sam Raimi To Direct World of Warcraft Movie More

Sam Raimi To Direct World of Warcraft Movie

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  • Wouldn't this movie... (Score:5, Funny)

    by sys.stdout.write ( 1551563 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @09:36AM (#28781589)
    require WoW players to stop playing WoW?

    Can they even do that?

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Yvanhoe ( 564877 )
      As a non-WoW player, I have a more important question : will it be subtitled ?
    • They'll just release it straight to DVD / Bluray, charge WOW players an extra $30 that month and then send it to them without even asking.

    • Re:Wouldn't this movie... (Score:4, Funny)

      by Austerity Empowers ( 669817 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @10:28AM (#28782423)

      It's interactive. You watch as Frodo the Gnome enters the world at level 1, and kills kobolds to level 80. The sequel features instance PUGging (it's a spring break drinking movie), and the trilogy rounds out with guild drama in raid content (this is more like one of those plotless teeny bopper movies where everyone is depressed and mad at their parents).

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ukyoCE ( 106879 )

      They plan to provide WIFI at the theaters so players can bring their laptops.

      Players without laptops will require a family member or friend to take their spot in the raid, or risk getting kicked from their guild

      >.

    • Speaking from personal experience, yes. Been clean for just a hair over a year now, I believe, after going cold turkey.

  • ... this film gonna be bad... like so many other film based on a game... I can't even name one good film based from a game.
    Maybe it's just a feeling...

    • Re:... Film from a game... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by funwithBSD ( 245349 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @09:42AM (#28781675)

      Clue!

      Well, at least it had Tim Curry, Madeline Khan and Christopher Llyod in it... how bad could it be?

      So bad it's good!

      • Re:... Film from a game... (Score:4, Interesting)

        by eldavojohn ( 898314 ) * <eldavojohn@@@gmail...com> on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @09:59AM (#28781951) Journal

        Clue!

        How interesting you should pick this movie. In this movie, if I recall correctly, they had three endings. Because the Clue game has many combinations of endings so they tried to include that spirit in the movie. I personally enjoyed it.

        Now let's look at other movies based on RPG games like Final Fantasy or Hitman. I must confess I've not seen or played the latter but let's face it, you have a definite ending in the game and you get a definite ending in the movie. Much more tangible to translate to the movie what makes the game so good -- plot (or what you have of it).

        Now let's look at games that have no definite ending or story like Dungeons and Dragons. Ever see that movie? How painful. Why? Because it could not embody what makes the game so great: the unexpected. And once it's laid on celluloid, what's done is done. We're not going to watch Dungeons and Dragons and have the dungeon master lay different traps or experiences for the player every time we watch it. And, effectively, the movie cannot embody what I see as the greatest part of D&D. It can't even leave much to the imagination. It was doomed.

        I see World of Warcraft following the same path as D&D. You're not going to get the great game mechanics, instances, battlegrounds, unique experience, etc. that you find in the game and package it into a movie. It's bound to disappoint because by definition, it must embody something that cannot contain what makes the game great. You might as well lift the plot from Dune, The Count of Monte Cristo or Lord of the Rings and dump it into the Warcraft universe. This movie has the odds stacked against it. Especially if I am expecting the World of Warcraft experience from it. How do you build an ending to a movie for a game that has no ending?

        • Re:... Film from a game... (Score:5, Informative)

          by samriel ( 1456543 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @10:17AM (#28782267)

          I see World of Warcraft following the same path as D&D. You're not going to get the great game mechanics, instances, battlegrounds, unique experience, etc. that you find in the game and package it into a movie. It's bound to disappoint because by definition, it must embody something that cannot contain what makes the game great. You might as well lift the plot from Dune, The Count of Monte Cristo or Lord of the Rings and dump it into the Warcraft universe. This movie has the odds stacked against it. Especially if I am expecting the World of Warcraft experience from it. How do you build an ending to a movie for a game that has no ending?

          I may be wrong on this, but the press release only says "the Warcraft© universe", not "World of Warcraft". This means that the movie could, indeed, have a definite ending, as the first three games did. Previous rumors seem to support the idea that the movie will be based somewhere between Warcraft III and World of Warcraft, as does the whole "Warcraft© universe" thing that was stated.

          /IANADOWUH - I Am Not A Director Or Warcraft Universe Historian

          • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

            by Reivec ( 607341 )

            Not sure why there is so much speculation on the basics of the story line when blizzard has already been talking about this for some time.

            http://www.gamespot.com/news/6176224.html?tag=top_stories;title;0 [gamespot.com]

            It will cover part of the lore before the timeline for WoW began. All the comments about the movie trying to replicate a repeatative gameplay mechanic have obviously never paid one bit of attention to the game or read any of the quest logs etc. There is plenty of story there. The game must remain static so p

        • Re:... Film from a game... (Score:5, Insightful)

          by bitslinger_42 ( 598584 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @10:29AM (#28782425)

          I've been playing WoW for 3-4 years now, and I'm curious as to what unique experiences you're looking for. Getting ganked during the Stranglethorn fishing contest? Spending 40 hours fishing pools in Northrend trying to get the sea turtle mount? Watching some bot-based toon running in circles for some Chinese gold farmer? Spending 30 minutes challenging the door boss to get in to an instance?

          While there aren't ends for the players, there are story lines that run through the game. Theoretically, they could easily pick something from the Lich King, the whole Scourge vs. everybody fight thing, but I suspect that pessimism here is warranted. I don't enjoy the game itself, per se. I like having something to do while chatting with guildies. That, and the achievement system integrates nicely with my OCD.

        • DND movies should have and very well could have been choose your own adventure. They could have worked exactly like choose your own adventure books. Albeit less complicated for some vague sense of fluidity. Released straight to dvd would not have been in issue for dnd movies. The idea of using your dvd player to actually do stuff which would horrify most people would likely not daunt dnd fans. And it could have some moderate replay value. You would of course need to be inventive in making the plot mesh toge

        • Re:... Film from a game... (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Phyvo ( 876321 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @11:14AM (#28783073)

          I think they can pull it off with WoW, because while the *game* moves on, various subplots don't. They could totally make a movie about Onyxia or C'thun getting pwnzored, because they can choose from any subplot they darn well please. They could even do the origin of Deathwing and the creation of the demon soul, events which have never taken place in WoW the game but are an important part of the lore.

          The thing with DnD is not just that it, as a game, has no definite ending. It just doesn't have the same lore structure to back it up. DnD (from an outsider's perspective, at least) lacks NPCs with names who run around doing important stuff. WoW doesn't lack any of that because of its RTS storylines, which since day 1 have guided the path of stories that WoW has told.

          Onyxia was killed, C'thun lies dead, Kiljaden was defeated, and now the Lich King has the Alliance and Horde knocking on his front door crying for blood. Stories in WoW end, even if the game itself doesn't.

    • Re:... Film from a game... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Ukab the Great ( 87152 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @09:45AM (#28781737)

      But this is Sam Raimi. It could be so bad that it might actually be good. Especially if Bruce Campbell plays both protagonist and Lich King.

      • Re:... Film from a game... (Score:5, Funny)

        by Chris Burke ( 6130 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @11:02AM (#28782925) Homepage

        But this is Sam Raimi. It could be so bad that it might actually be good. Especially if Bruce Campbell plays both protagonist and Lich King.

        Oh man, they could easily do that if they do the story of how the Lich King came to be and it would be awesome.

        [In the snow of Northrend, Arthas, his mind already becoming corrupted, is confronted by a sinister doppelganger of himself]

        Arthas: What demonic trickery is this?! What are you?

        Bad Arthas: [mocking child-like voice] I'm baad Arthas. And you're good Arthas! You're a goodie little two shoes! [Bad Arthas dances back and forth, teasing Arthas and singing] Little-goodie-two-shoes. Little-goodie-two-shoes.

        Arthas: Good. Bad. I'm the guy with the sword. [decapitates Bad Arthas with a single swipe of Frostmourne].

    • Uwe Boll does not count. He makes no movies. He exposes film material so he gets federal movie aid money. Whether or not they do any good in the movies or whether or not anyone comes to see it, he doesn't care, he already got his money.

      Basically, my assumption is that he saves a lot of money that way because the plot is, essentially, already there.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by morari ( 1080535 )

      I thought that the first Mortal Kombat was pretty good. Aside from that however, I would tend to agree. I also wonder why Raimi insists on making crap film after crap film. Why does he waste his time on licenses like Spider-Man and now Warcraft, when he should be working on the Evil Dead 4!

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mcvos ( 645701 )

        I also wonder why Raimi insists on making crap film after crap film. Why does he waste his time on licenses like Spider-Man and now Warcraft, when he should be working on the Evil Dead 4!

        Is Drag Me To Hell that bad? I haven't seen it yet, but I heard it was reaching back to the days if Evil Dead. WoW in Army Of Darkness style is something I might watch.

    • Hmm... I liked the Silent Hill movie, as well as the Resident Evil movies. Of course I didn't play the games until after, but I felt that they did a nice job getting the feeling of the game into the movie. And then in Silent Hills case, the latest game took some element of the movie which I found interesting as well.

    • Re:... Film from a game... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by vertinox ( 846076 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @10:02AM (#28781991)

      I can't even name one good film based from a game.

      Resident Evil was pretty good and it actually one of the few video game movies that actually didn't just make random shit up for its own plot.

      Beyond that I'm hard pressed to think of any movies based on games that were any good... There was the first Mortal Kombat movie, but it was about as good as a Van Dam movie.

    • You know what, I'm boycotting any movie from now on that's "based" on anything. Be it a book or a comic or a TV Show or video game or a "reboot" of an old movie series or remake of an old movie or whatever. Give me something original.

      Come on...I'd take a "Pan's Labyrinth" or "In Bruges" or "WALL-E" over a "Transformers 1 or 2" or "Batman _____(insert verb here)" or "Warcraft: The Movie".

      • Come on...I'd take a "Pan's Labyrinth" or "In Bruges" or "WALL-E" over a "Transformers 1 or 2" or "Batman _____(insert verb here)" or "Warcraft: The Movie".

        Did you actually _see_ Batman: The Dark Knight? That's easily the best movie on your list, and one of the best movies in recent years.

      • Re:Dear Hollywood: DO SOMETHING ORIGINAL! (Score:4, Insightful)

        by navygeek ( 1044768 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @10:23AM (#28782353)
        Good luck seeing any movies in the next...ever. I'm not even trying to be cynical. It's a simple fact that everything is a rehash of something else. A good portion of the original Star Trek episodes were takes of various Shakespeare plays. The original Battlestar Galactica was mostly re-tellings of various movie plot lines. I took a lit class in college years ago and the prof said something that's stuck with me since - there are only 7 original plot lines to a narrative/story, everything else just changes setting and mixes up the characters a bit. Now, take that with a grain of salt, as I have no links to support that claim.

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by geminidomino ( 614729 ) *

          I took a lit class in college years ago and the prof said something that's stuck with me since - there are only 7 original plot lines to a narrative/story, everything else just changes setting and mixes up the characters a bit.

          Are you sure you're not mixing that up with conflicts?

          Man vs. Man
          Man vs. Society
          Man vs. Himself
          Man vs. Nature
          Man vs. The Supernatural
          Man vs. Technology
          Man vs... err... bugger all. Can't remember.

          Seems to me you can get more than 7 plots just using combinations of these.

          • I did not, I am just relaying what I was told. The prof might have, however. As I said, I have no evidence to support the claim, so I'm more than willing to concede something got garbled in transmission.

          • Re:Dear Hollywood: DO SOMETHING ORIGINAL! (Score:4, Funny)

            by OglinTatas ( 710589 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @01:42PM (#28785431)

            Man vs. Man - PvP
            Man vs. Society - RP
            Man vs. Himself - I have a paper due tomorrow, but my guild is raiding Ulduar
            Man vs. Nature - PvE
            Man vs. The Supernatural - God says that j.o. to my dancing naked night elf bank alt is a PERVERSION!!
            Man vs. Technology - Patch Tuesday
            Man vs... err... bugger all. Can't remember. - Alzheimers

            Yeah, that about covers it.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Krneki ( 1192201 )
      I liked the first Resident Evil.

    • The Resident Evil series and Silent Hill movie were pretty good IMO. I didn't like the camera angles/controls in RE though (and never tried the rest of the series, though I did see someone playing 3 or 4 and it still looked pretty crap), and never tried Silent Hill. If I was a fan of the games, perhaps I wouldn't have enjoyed the movies..

  • Thank God they didn't tap Uwe Bol for this one.

    • Edit: Hopefully they won't cast Ben Affleck as Varian Wrynn either... or in any role, for that matter.

      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        by cabjf ( 710106 )
        They better at least include Chuck Norris, after having to hear so much about him in-game.

    • Yellow Oldsmobile (Score:3, Informative)

      by OglinTatas ( 710589 )

      Why can't I ever compose all my thoughts before clicking submit?

      Look for a gnome-engineer-built yellow steampunk Oldsmobile on the streets of Stormwind.

  • Did anyone forget the shitstain that was Spiderman 3?

    We had emo Peter Parker, and a song and dance number in the middle of it!

    Here's hoping Raimi goes back to his evil dead roots and makes a proper movie . . .

    oh yeah and Bruce Campbell [bruce-campbell.com] had better be in it!

    • Sorry, but Parker *is* emo. He stole all of Batman's emo in the first Marvel/DC crossover. My problem with Spiderman3 was the "Blob" origin for Venom.

  • No (Score:2)

    by edremy ( 36408 )
    And No again since blank messages get rejected

  • Repeat (Score:5, Funny)

    by CopaceticOpus ( 965603 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @09:40AM (#28781657)

    For the real WoW experience, buy it on DVD and watch it a few hundred times.

    • Re:Repeat (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @10:16AM (#28782253)

      As my good friend pointed out, if you want the old school experience, get 40 people who don't necessarily like each other and organise a time each week for all of them to cram into one room and watch a particular scene. Be sure to rewind the scene when one of them acts like an asshat.

      • As my good friend pointed out, if you want the old school experience, get 40 people who don't necessarily like each other and organise a time each week for all of them to cram into one room and watch a particular scene. Be sure to rewind the scene when one of them acts like an asshat.

        Damn you for posting AC. You actually made me laugh aloud.

    • It will be a DVD on blue ray. After the first run it starts over with a few things changed. Then the next one has a few more things changed. This repeats until the blue ray disk is full.

      Then you insert disk number 2, and it that pattern continues.

      The challenge is to see what the differences are.

  • Games, in principle, could make perfectly decent movies(half life could really do with a decent treatment); but I have a very bad feeling about this one.

    Because of their business model, MMORPGs have to feature large worlds where large numbers of characters can be the center of attention, to the degree that there even is one. In most cases, WoW being one, there isn't even much in the way of "history" going on. The world stays pretty much the same, no matter what you do, the same NPCs show up, with only th

    • Games, in principle, could make perfectly decent movies(half life could really do with a decent treatment)

      The problem with game>movie transitions is the same problem with movie>game transitions. In both scenarios you have a set amount of people who are going to buy the game or see the movie for no other reason than the name. Since the developer or producer can already count on X amount of sales regardless of how much time or money they put into the project, their incentive to put more than the bare minimum into it is therefore reduced. Until the average consumer can start looking past brand recognition

    • half life could really do with a decent treatment

      Some are speculating that the upcoming District 9 is the half life movie, but they didn't get the rights to actually do halflife.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Stele ( 9443 )

        Some are speculating that the upcoming District 9 is the half life movie

        And they would be wrong. The premise of District 9 isn't even close to that of Half Life.

    • In most cases, WoW being one, there isn't even much in the way of "history" going on. The world stays pretty much the same, no matter what you do, the same NPCs show up, with only the occasional prescripted changed. That isn't inspiring material for a movie. At best, they'll pretty much have to make a Warcraft movie and just use WoW as a marketing tie-in.

      It really depends on the angle they take. 99% of game movies I've seen in the past have been gimmicky films designed as a sequential series of scenes where they show off some specific memorable moment from a game, as if all the games players are going to rise up each time and "OMG!!!! THEY HAZ MADE IT IN LIVE ACTION!!! I LOVE MR BOWE!!!!". It never works out that way, but they keep trying nonetheless. Street Fighter the movie was one of the worst I saw in this. They came up with this contrived storyline

      • Despite what you think, the Warcraft series has a HUGE backstory and set of lore to work from.

        I'm not sure J.R.R. Tolkien and Michael Moorcock were actually writing with Blizzard in mind.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by nahdude812 ( 88157 ) *

      There is major error in the article title, summary, and even very nearly every article out there on the net. To demonstrate, let's go to the actual source of the information, the Blizzard press release [blizzard.com].

      The error is this: the movie is not a World of Warcraft movie. The movie is a Warcraft movie. It's a movie set in the Warcraft universe, not one based on the World of Warcraft game. You're right, out of necessity WoW is fairly static - that's how it is that you have content that's consumed again and again

  • "World of" added to summary. (Score:5, Informative)

    by dreemernj ( 859414 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @09:48AM (#28781773) Homepage Journal
    The press release doesn't mention a "World of Warcraft" movie, just a "Warcraft" movie. Perhaps this will be geared towards the more linear storyline of the RTS games?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by k_187 ( 61692 )
      Even if they call it world of warcraft and just use the settings/characters, it might not suck...
    • No, the movie will be 80 hours long, where the first 79 hours will be the main characters completing meaningless, pointless tasks like collecting rocks or bird feathers and making absolutely no difference in the lives of anyone they encounter, no matter how many of them complete the tasks they are given.

      The last hour will consist of them all entering a dungeon while they stand around whaling on a "boss" 300 times bigger than any of them, until he finally dies. The last five minutes is them bickering abou
    • The cutscenes in WarCraft III were awesome. Cut and paste, Raimi, cut and paste.

  • Not as good as you'll expect. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Sj0 ( 472011 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @09:52AM (#28781845) Journal

    The movie will be 16 hours long and will chronicle the journey of Frank the warrior on his epic quest to gather seventeen moose heads from the moose spawning area. He makes it to level 12, setting the viewer up for the sequel, where he can finally buy new armour and eat the soft banana bread he was previously not battle hardened enough to eat.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Chris Burke ( 6130 )

      You laugh, but it takes a lot of confidence -- the kind that only comes with lots and lots of experience -- to stick something called a "mana strudel" in your mouth.

  • A friend pointed out that this basically guarantees that Bruce Campbell will be involved.

  • Chris Metzen as co-producer (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Quince alPillan ( 677281 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @09:56AM (#28781909)
    What I find interesting is that Chris Metzen, Blizzard's senior VP of creative development and writer for much of the Warcraft universe is listed as a co-producer of the movie.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Not just WoW.. (Score:5, Informative)

    by murphyd311 ( 1364187 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @09:59AM (#28781953)
    It's just titled Warcraft. Remember those RTS games and books [wikipedia.org]? I'll pretend it's based on those instead of WoW.

    Though a character named 'Leroy Jenkins' would be hilarious.

  • Else we'll get to see something like this:

    Young Grurk is a hunter of his tribe, and he's set out to conquer the world. He meets some old leader of his tribe who proceeds to tell Grurk his life story, giving the watcher of the show a chance to head back to the lobby to get himself some treats. Then Grurk heads out to collect a few apples, fishes or Murlocheads for his Elder. On his way, he meets the token cleric who has essentially been given the same task, but they both choose to ignore each other. Grurk fi

  • Suggested Tagline (Score:5, Funny)

    by __aamkky7574 ( 654183 ) on Wednesday July 22, 2009 @10:04AM (#28782021)

    "How does one kill that which has no life?"

    P.

  • when you can live it...

    • Because we might end up with a bit less of "carry X to Y and bring back some Murlokfins", and a bit more of a heroic story?

      • Or you might end up with Bruce Campbell (uncredited) wielding a chain saw/shotgun/battle axe in an orc/elf/dwarf costume. (With and without a shirt)

  • Raimi also produces the Legend of the Seeker [wikipedia.org] tv series. Make of THAT what you will!

    • Raimi also produces the Legend of the Seeker tv series. Make of THAT what you will!

      Two things:

      1. 'Produces' (actually, co-produces) != has a strong hand in the art direction, storyline, acting, etc. thereof
      2. I actually like this show. It's reminiscent of the old Hercules and Xena shows, though not quite as quirky. For a TV fantasy show it has a few things going for it: very accessible plot, attractive females, and respectable fight choreography to name a few.

  • Sooooo, they can take all three games and make three movies...then reboot the series with new characters from the World of Warcraft campaigns...sooooo...Blizzards trying to launch a big ol' movie cash cow that will last for a decade. I think the Lord of the Rings set a pretty high bar for fantasy films with the sticking point being characters.

  • Sam (Score:2)

    by NekoXP ( 67564 )

    Who's Sam Raimito?:D

  • [D]oes this offer hope that someone might finally make a good movie based on a game IP?

    A good movie based on MMORPG game IP has already been made: Ben X [imdb.com] revolves around the game Archlord [archlordgame.com] and the real life of some players. Think Rainman meets WoW.

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