‘Logan’ Director James Mangold Raises Concerns About Disney Buying Fox

Written By: Nick Poulimenakos

The deal between Disney and Fox should be announced in the coming days and now, one famous Marvel director is raising concerns over the house of mouse buying the historic movie studio.

James Mangold, who directed the critically acclaimed Logan, spoke at a post-screening panel discussion of his R-rated Marvel Comics adaptation and was asked about the potential monumental acquisition:

“If they’re actually changing their mandate, if what they’re supposed to do alters, that would be sad to me because it just means less movies. I just hope what we end up with is going to be a positive in terms of movies.”

The X-Men franchise has been known for its loose continuity and Logan continues this trend. Unlike the main series films, Logan is a dark, emotional and violent entry into the superhero franchise. It followed another outlier comic book movie, Deadpool, which was Fox’s R-Rated action/comedy. Both films proved to be major hits for the studio, garnering critical and commercial success.

As Mangold puts it, he’s worried that if Disney buys Fox, then the films the studio is known to make would slowly die out and cinemagoers would simply get more and more of the same product from Disney. Fox has had an incredible 2017 thanks in part to Logan as well as War for the Planet of the Apes and loads more.

Mangold went on to state his worry for Marvel Studios, which, despite its undeniable success with their Marvel Cinematic Universe, doesn’t seem to want to make its way into the R-rated scene:

“The real thing that happens when you make a movie rated R, behind the scenes, is that the studio has to adjust to the reality that there will be no Happy Meals. There will be no action figures. The entire merchandising, cross-pollinating side of selling the movie to children is dead before you even start. And when that’s dead, it means you’re making a grown-up movie.”

Mangold finished his post-film talk by talking about how important it was for Logan to have the freedom to carry emotional weight and (spoiler) kill its main characters:

“We’ve now so co-opted this idea that these movies are not really stories, but are merchandise entities. You can’t kill the characters because they’re worth so much effing money.”

Despite my inner comic fan wanting to see Wolverine and the Avengers fight together, it’s hard not to see where Mangold is coming from. Logan is my favourite superhero film and it’s clear that (as of now), is not the type of film that Disney would have produced. MCU films are made in the vein of pushing the characters but also pushing the 10+ billion machine. Mangold was able to make the superhero film he wanted because Fox gave him almost full creative control. If Disney buys Fox, are we saying goodbye to more mature films like Logan? We’ll just have to wait and see…

Source: Deadline

Do you want Disney to buy Fox? Let us know in the comments down below!

%d bloggers like this: