AAAAAhahahahaha!

God gave you a present this weekend, Dear Reader. And not some bogus everyday present like a sunrise, I mean He really rubbed some spit in His hands this time. We’re talking real powerful stuff. What happened, you inquire? Well I’ll tell you: “Saw VI” took in less money than “Paranormal Activity.” Not much less, I admit, but “Activity” still took the weekend crown. Boom, baby! Oh, what’s that “Saw,” you want some more? Okay, how about this: this was “Saw VI’s” opening weekend, and it still lost! Bam! Still standing, torture porn? Get ready for the right hook: “Saw” as a franchise has opened on or around this weekend for years, it has been marked territory, and now it’s gone! Kabang! No? You’re still not through? How about “Paranormal” is a brand new franchise and “Saw” has been an established IP for almost a decade?! Hiii-YAH! …I’m impressed, you’re still not down for the count. Okay, I was saving this one for a special occasion anyway. Get ready, here it comes:

“Paranormal Activity” was playing in fewer theaters than “Saw VI.”

HAHAHAHAHA!

Yes, Beloved Reader, American audiences have finally reacted violently against this entire sub-genre of horror. “Grindhouse” tanked (and it didn’t even qualify, but people thought it did), “Captivity” was a punchline, “Hostel” is done for, and now “Saw” finally takes one on the chin. Our ignominious little friend survived this long on brilliant marketing and a savvy, unconventional business model that favored low negative cost and high awareness. Really quite clever, and were it almost any other series I would be its champion, but these movies need to die a horrible death. And so, the Lord in His mercy sends in a horror film after His own heart: bloodless, gore-less, old-fashioned suspense. At first it may not look like that big of a deal, Dear Reader, but you have to assemble all the pieces of what happened this weekend (here comes a run on sentence): an established intellectual property with a high functioning business model was significantly trounced by a complete newcomer whose budget and marketing costs were less than a hundredth of their competitor’s while it played in significantly fewer theaters and was nowhere near its opening weekend while the established IP was.

That, Dear Reader, is history making. That is conclusive. “Saw” may come back, it may not, but the franchise will never be the same. You don’t bounce back from a hit like that. Frankly, I have to admit that the downfall of this franchise has less to do with righteous indignation than confusion. They hit a sort of unofficial “sequel ceiling,” Americans just don’t like seeing numbers that high next to a title. Sure, Bond gets away with it, but he wouldn’t if we called it “James Bond 22,” and the changing guard of lead actors and talent behind the camera effectively births a long family of related but distinct entities. Whatever 007 is, “franchise” is too limited a term for it. The “Star Wars” prequels deftly termed themselves “Episode I—III,” and after all they were completely distinct and inferior from their older siblings. That’s not exactly a franchise either. “Saw” is a franchise, and it drew from the well once too many times. I think the secret rule is simple: you get three movies, maybe a fourth if we really like you and you give it some time. But past that, we don’t know how to have expectations about what we’re going to see. Everyone knows the second chapter is darker, the third lightens up and finishes the major character arcs, the fourth is just terrible. What exactly is a fifth movie supposed to be? We just don’t have that crap absorbed into our culture.

Anyway,

Some early reviews have surfaced for “Dragon Age: Origins.” As usual, they’re utter milquetoast, completely lacking in hard observation or real, tactile insight. I cried foul on “Batman: Arkham Asylum’s” pre-release press, but damned if I didn’t discover a lot of truth in what was being said. I suppose the same will be true again, but I foresee an ugly precedent here. We all know developers care enormously about their critical reception, and it’s only a matter of time before some high-gloss, low-execution series like “Kane and Lynch” decides it would like to blow out of the gate on a wave of generous printed affirmation as well. “Why should the good games hog all the good reviews,” they will wonder, “Especially when we have so much money?” Why, indeed. I’m not implying anything about the integrity of the gaming journalism community, but I am quietly reminding myself of the fact that opinions are murky, subjective things, and money is a cold hard motivator.

So yeah, this has happened twice in 2009, and it just so happens that both games turned out to be sound investments. I’m not convinced that wasn’t 50 percent coincidence and 50 percent publishers playing it safe while they test the waters. We’ll see.