re: Hollywood had worst summer in 17 years

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And some of the original ideas like Edge of Tomorrow were profoundly ignored by moviegoers.

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It had a shitty preview man.

I'm telling you, give that thing a trailer that is interesting and fully explains the concept and its a big hit.

Yeah I usually do the afternoon matinee with the kids while the wife shops or something, if there's a movie they're dying to see. Matinee is still around $8-$10 a ticket at our theater though. So if I take both kids, we're still talking $30 before we even hit the concession stand. Our theater does have a decent deal though where you can buy a big refillable tub for popcorn, and it's only $5 to fill each time you come, or something like that.

As for the experience, I still prefer the theater to watching at home. Blame it on my ADD, but I have a hard time watching at home because there are too many distractions.

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but the prices are becoming a huge turn off. It's over $50 for my family of 4 to go to the movies after you throw in concessions. Last movie we saw as a family was last summer, and it was $60 for tickets and concessions.

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I went to see Ninja Turtles two weeks ago on a Sunday and I was standing in the concessions line for a drink. The family in front of me had 4 kids. They all ordered those nacho boxes, popcorn, and drinks. I overheard the clerk say, "Your total is $116.43, sir."

My face was like

The price of movies is what does it for me. Unless I hear through the grapevine that it's an awesome movie (like GotG), I'm not dropping the money to go see it.

I honestly think I only saw a grand total of one movie this summer and that was Guardians of the Galaxy.

And the reality is in the summer there's so much more to do with kids for cheaper. Here if you get them early you can get season passes to the local theme park for about $50 a piece. 4 trips to the movies with the family < A summer full of trips to the water park.

Hollywood is making less middle ground budget movies. It is either $200mm superhero movie or $10mm indy movie and only teen movies, animation and R/PG-13 comedies in between

this creates:
less jobs for movie actors/writers/directors
more competition for studio dollars
more drive for TV work
more talented people doing TV work

so couple that with:
inconsiderate people in the theaters
sky high ticket and concession prices
better and better TV options at home

and we see the cycle Hollywood is currently in. I can tell you the last three movies I saw in theaters were 22 Jump Street (with my son), Neighbors (with my wife) and This is the End (with my son)

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Hollywood is making less middle ground budget movies. It is either $200mm superhero movie or $10mm indy movie and only teen movies, animation and R/PG-13 comedies in between

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This is what I was about to say. It seems like Hollywood doesn't take many chances anymore...everything has to be guaranteed to make money and do solid business. And part of that is because people are becoming more and more tight on what they spend (and movies are most definitely a luxury that people can afford to let go).

So Hollywood focuses on making movies that can guarantee asses in the seats. So you get things like several sequels of successful movies, comic book movies (which are hot right now and have been for a while), animated movies (family demo), and guaranteed success based on already-existing mega franchises (like Hunger Games, Twilight, etc.).

Rarely do you see Hollywood throwing any kind of budget to new, original ideas. Because the gamble is too big and they won't risk it not paying off.

I go to weekday movies, 98% of the distractions are gone. I love when I have the theater to myself!

That being said, I only sat GotG this summer, I might go check out TMNT after class one day in Lafayette but only if I have nothing better to do.

Unfortunately, quality is not the biggest factor in this major letdown of a summer.