Back in the early years of the century, upon hearing that Sony Columbia Pictures was interested in acquiring the movie adaptation rights for the G.I. Joe toy series, Duke purchased the movie rights to the Transformers series from Hasbro at a considerable price, intending to turn it into a series of films once the time was ripe. The Transformers series heavily relies on CG production, which is one of the reasons Duke waited until now. Today’s CG technology is much more advanced, and the production costs have been greatly reduced. What required $50 million at the start of the century can now be achieved with just over $20 million. Even so, Duke still planned a minimum production budget of $200 million to allow Optimus Prime and Megatron more screen time, instead of the Transformers appearing with a few flashes before the camera cuts back to the humans. Compared to The Dark Knight, Transformers is undoubtedly of a much lower tone, but in Duke’s eyes, Transformers is far more important than The Dark Knight. On one hand, it’s because of the commercial gains; on the other hand, it’s due to a deeply buried nostalgia he never forgot. During his childhood on the other side of the Pacific, Transformers was at its peak of popularity. How many people still have unforgettable images of Optimus Prime and Megatron? Even if this is destined to be a purely popcorn flick, Duke still intends to direct it personally. It’s still a story about a boy and his car. The primary audience of the film determines its basic setup. However, the approved script has undergone huge changes—first of all, the film’s tone is no longer comedic, and while the human roles are important, they won’t steal the spotlight. Duke never had a sense of humor, nor was he good at comedy, and he certainly wouldn’t include anything overly vulgar in the film. Although the script contains a few light jokes, they’re all kept to a minimum. As for the male and female leads, his film has nothing to do with DreamWorks, and his relationship with Spielberg is not particularly close, so he certainly wouldn’t choose the old Jewish man’s protégé. As for the female lead, he has no interest in actresses like Megan Fox and definitely won’t be using her... Just as Duke instructed Nancy Josephson to prepare, once the production team is formally established, large-scale auditions will be held for the two roles. Next comes the designs of Optimus Prime and Megatron. From the moment he had the screenwriting team begin working on the script earlier this year, Duke had Tina Fey notify Hasbro’s headquarters in Rhode Island. According to the copyright agreement they had signed at the start, Transformers directly concerns Hasbro’s core interests, and they understand well that if they want to elevate the Transformers brand, leveraging Duke as the director is undoubtedly a wise choice. The most update n0vels are published on 𝗻𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗹✶𝗳𝗶𝗿𝗲✶𝗻𝗲𝘁 Hasbro responded with great enthusiasm and quickly produced conceptual design drawings of the Transformers for the film. But when Hasbro’s CEO personally flew to Los Angeles to deliver them to Duke’s studio, he was directly rejected. "Brian, I don’t think this is appropriate." In the lounge, Duke flipped through the concept art, his brow tightly furrowed. "They look too much like the cartoon characters." "I think resembling them is a good thing." Sitting beside Duke, Hasbro’s CEO Brian Goldner had a completely different opinion. "We based the designs on the animated characters, incorporating a lot of Japanese mecha styles..." Looking at the bulky, box-like robots in the concept art—stacked like blocks—Duke shook his head. "The designs are too ugly. I can already imagine that they’ll have no sense of streamlined beauty when shown on the big screen." "Streamlined beauty?" Hearing this term, Brian Goldner shook his head even faster. "They’re robots. They must conform to the laws of physics. If they’re not bulky enough, it would be impossible for them to run, jump, or perform complex movements." "Brian, I think you’re missing something." Duke knew this CEO hadn’t been in the position long, so he said, "They’re not robots. They are intelligent mechanical lifeforms. Any living being’s body would have a unique streamlined aesthetic, not the rough, rigid lines of a pure machine!" In Duke’s opinion, the notion of designing Optimus Prime as bulky and clunky was completely wrong. That was based on using Earth robots as the prototype while ignoring a critical fact in this sci-fi world, Transformers are not robots! Moreover, movies on the big screen are vastly different from cartoons on the small screen. To a certain extent, what appears in the film will be a group of highly intelligent beings from an alien star system beings whose bodies are made of metal, not clunky Earth robots. "But..." Brian Goldner thought for a moment and changed his tone, "If the designs differ too much from the cartoon, wouldn’t it alienate some fans?" Duke didn’t respond directly but asked instead, "Hasbro has released some new 3D Transformers cartoons in recent years. How were they received?" Brian Goldner sighed and said nothing more. The recent Transformers cartoons had all been universally panned by fans. "Brian, I’ve adapted many works and have a good sense of what kinds of visuals suit the big screen and mainstream audiences." After a brief pause, Duke stated a fact, "The Dark Knight was a box-office and merchandise hit, and the market response was strong, but there are still a lot of Batman fans who didn’t like it—some even said online that I ruined Batman’s image..." Turning to look at Brian Goldner, Duke continued, "No matter how we adapt Transformers, some fans will feel like we’ve ruined their childhood memories. No matter how popular or successful a movie is, it can’t please everyone." The truth is quite clear whatever the adaptation, some people will always say it ruined their childhood. "And there’s another thing." Although the film adaptation rights were in hand and he could do whatever he wanted, Duke would not ignore Hasbro. If the film was to be a huge success, the manufacturer’s promotion was equally important. There was absolutely no need to create a massive conflict with Hasbro over such issues. "Don’t you agree? Only if the designs of the Transformers are sufficiently different from those in the cartoon will fans be more willing to buy new toys and peripheral products after the film is released." After sitting and thinking for a few minutes, Brian Goldner slowly nodded and said, "I’ll head back to Rhode Island as soon as possible and have the design department—" "No, I’ll have a design team sent to Los Angeles." This man, who could sit in the CEO position of Hasbro, was also someone capable of making decisive choices. "They’ll fully cooperate with you and the production team." In the past, the success of the Transformers franchise owed much to Hasbro’s tireless promotion efforts, which had played a very significant role. After sending Brian Goldner off, Duke returned to his office and made a call to Warner Bros. The film required an enormous budget, and Warner Bros. had already initiated pre-sales and financing mechanisms. Movies, especially large-scale commercial productions, are high-investment, high-risk industries, and financing is one of their fundamental components. How much investment is secured, and how it is allocated, can decisively impact a movie. The reason Hollywood is able to continuously churn out blockbusters and succeed in the global market is closely tied to its strong financial backing. In the past, because of the confidence in Duke and the relatively low risks, Warner Bros., though it did seek external financing for his films, kept the amount relatively small. But things were different now. The massive investment in The Dark Knight had not yet been recouped, and other major projects like Duke’s Transformers, Zack Snyder’s Watchmen, and the new Harry Potter films all required massive capital. Warner Bros. could not afford to allocate too much of its liquid assets, so raising shooting funds through various mechanisms became the top priority. In addition to pre-selling film distribution rights to overseas distributors around the world, Warner Bros. was also preparing to accept investment from several foundations. Since 2004, investment institutions initiating film funds to invest in a studio’s slate of films over a certain period had become a trend—this was also known as "slate financing." In today’s era, all major Hollywood studios have long since been absorbed into larger media and entertainment conglomerates. The globalization trend of the Hollywood film industry has become increasingly obvious, and "high-concept" films characterized by large investments, large-scale productions, aggressive marketing, and massive markets have become the mainstream in Hollywood. MPAA statistics show that in 1975, the average production cost of an American film was $5 million. By 1987, that number had reached $20 million. By 2007, the average production cost of a major studio film had climbed to $70.8 million, with average marketing costs reaching $45.9 million, bringing the total cost to over $100 million. With such a large investment scale, even the annual self-owned funds of major Hollywood studios were insufficient for large-scale production. Although their parent companies were financially strong, they were reluctant to invest too much in high-risk film productions. And as publicly listed companies, none wanted too many debt records on their financial reports. Thus, bringing in external investors became a necessary option for major Hollywood studios. However, in the 1980s and 1990s, for quite a long time, Hollywood did not feel much financing pressure. With the rise of new distribution channels such as video tapes, cable television, satellite television, and local European TV stations, Hollywood films could raise most of their funds simply through pre-selling rights. Some governments overseas, to promote the development of the film industry, also provided tax incentive policies that greatly facilitated Hollywood’s financing efforts. Among them, one particular policy in Germany stood out and became a loophole widely exploited by Hollywood companies. Hi For access to additional Chapters of Director in Hollywood (40 chpaters) Made In Hollywood (60 Chapters) Pokemon:Bounty Hunter(30 Chapters) Douluo Dalu: Reincarnated as Yan(40 Chapters) Hollywood:From Razzie to Legend(40 Chapters) The Great Ruler (30 Chapters) Join pateron.com/Translaterappu