no, the inventor of ALF
Tom Patchett - Wikipedia
Tom Patchett | Producer, Writer, Director
Known for: Buffalo Bill, ALF, The Bob Newhart Show
www.imdb.com
A Hippie in the House of Mouse (Jim Henson at Disney, 1980)
- Thread starter Geekhis Khan
- Start date
- Status
www.imdb.com
Did we ever get a definitive answer if this will exist ITTL:
‘The Spirit’ movie that could have been
For every movie that makes it to the screen, there are a thousand projects that fall to the wayside. Later ...web.archive.org
The Spirit will come up later. Right now it's still unproduced.
Yes, Winston gets more lines, being a sort of sardonic outide observer in it for the money. The byplay between him and Akroyd becomes a driving part of the late 2nd act.
The Three Caballeros is indeed The Three Amigos. It had that original title in OTL, but theyr changed it because Viewers Are Morons. ITTL Disney just happens to have an old animated short of the same name...
It looks like wietze beat me to the punch on Buffalo Bill and Tom Patchett, though Terry Pratchett will make an appearance.
Fun fact, while we'retalking about Terry Pratchett, Disney where apparently looking into adapting Mort (the Discworld novel) into an animated film a few years ago but a number of factors such as the Discworld rights only being sold as a package deal and (allegedly) some higher ups not liking the idea of Death being a major character led to it being passed up in favour of a script based on Polynesian mythology (which would become Moana).
Last edited:
I'm still wondering what's going on at Universal and Columbia now that two of their films and subsequent properties are butterflied.
Anyone know of unproduced projects of the time that may have gotten the green here?
Like how is Dune doing?
Anyone know of unproduced projects of the time that may have gotten the green here?
Like how is Dune doing?
Universal and Columbia will come up later. Dune was made and released on schedule with a similar reaction and box office (unless you have a better idea, see below!).
And speaking of unproduced projects, and in honor of the fact that my reaction score just went positive after a 2800 point deficit from my years before "Likes" were a thing on AH.com (thank you all!), and now that the takeover drama is past, it's time once again for a...
Reader Participation Challenge: The Greatest (Or Worst) Movies Never Made, 1980's Edition!
What movie or movies (or TV shows) were never produced in our timeline? What would you like to see different? What would you like to see happen, and from/with whom?
Let me know now!
Hat-tips are standing by.
I'm not sure if this was already mentioned, but did we establish if Roger Moore was still playing Bond in the 80's? If not, maybe we could see Timothy Dalton take over starting with For Your Eyes Only, and kickstart the "darker and edgier" Bond a few years earlier.
Other than that, I definitely second seeing Brad Bird's The Spirit come to fruition ITTL.
As of the current year of TTL, where are the following men:
- Michael Eisner
- Frank Wells
- Jeffrey Katzenberg
- Roy E. Disney
- Michael Eisner
- Frank Wells
- Jeffrey Katzenberg
- Roy E. Disney
Ooooh, what fun!
I always make this suggestion in every 1980s pop culture TL, and nobody ever takes me up on it, so I suppose I'll give it one more try:
Star Trek: The Next Generation is cancelled after two seasons. Or Patrick Stewart leaves after the third season finale, for reasons which should be obvious to anyone aware of that episode's contents. Or it doesn't get on the air at all!
But since I have a feeling you won't bite, a less controversial Trek suggestion: noted Trekkie Eddie Murphy plays the Catherine Hicks part in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, as was originally proposed (!).
Speaking of Eddie Murphy, Saturday Night Live is cancelled in the wake of the notoriously awful 1985-86 season, the second of the show's three nadirs (a 1981 cancellation is more interesting, but alas, too late for TTL).
Another common 1980s TL suggestion I've made: Nicholas Colasanto doesn't die in the middle of the third season of Cheers, or if you feel you can't butterfly that, Shelley Long doesn't leave at the end of the fifth. Or, Kelsey Grammer is not chosen to play the role of Dr. Frasier Crane. (John Lithgow was the first choice - sadly he declined to work in television at that point in his career.)
Eric Stoltz is not replaced as Marty McFly on Back to the Future, since it doesn't appear you've actually gone into casting for the film yet ITTL. (Just to throw one out I don't actually want.) Or C. Thomas Howell is chosen, since he was the runner-up once Michael J. Fox was unavailable. Save him from his perennial placing on Hollywood's B-list.
The planned Michael Jackson-Freddie Mercury duet "State of Shock" is released as planned (IOTL Mick Jagger wound up singing it with Jackson instead). The Jackson 5 Victory tour has an initial promoter who accepts a sponsorship deal from Quaker Oats and not Pepsi, thus resulting in Jackson not burning his scalp from the pyrotechnics in the Pepsi commercial the terms of that contract forced him to appear in. Whether that changes other things about Jackson's personality and private life is another question entirely, but it is a classically butterflied incident. Speaking of Freddie Mercury, David Bowie appears on-stage with Queen to perform "Under Pressure" live, either at Live Aid (the only way they could have improved upon that set) or during the Magic tour that followed (apparently there was talk of it happening at Wembley but it never came to be). Their final-ever show as a touring band (because as we all know Queen did not tour ever again after 1986) at Knebworth Park is filmed for posterity (IOTL the cameras apparently failed to record as the result of a technical glitch). Obviously I would like Freddie to not get AIDS but sadly it's difficult to avoid that scenario.
Going to be tough to have to talk about The Cosby Show, but it was a massive phenomenon in the '80s, and difficult to butterfly.
These are all off the top of my head, I'm sure more will come to mind eventually.
I'll think about bond. Bird has a plan.
Roy: on the Disney Board, now the #2 shareholder and more to come. Wells helped with the takeover defence and will come up again soon.
Eisner and K'berg: coming soon, so stay tuned! 📺
Thanks, BB lots of interesting suggestions! BttF is coming very soon.
No MJF them not BTTF, he and cristopher where the doc and marty, Stolz was dropped as a pair of old shoes as he was terrible in early filming
I know it’s sports and not entertainment, but what happens if the Cubs hold on in the 84 NLCS against the Padres? Detroit seemed unbeatable that year, but could there be a World Championship at Wrigley 32 years earlier?
There are a few things I'd like to see from this timeline. For the 80's, I'd like to see Henson's Natural History Project made, because I've seen the concept art and MAN it looks good! I'd like NHP to come out to rave reviews.
The next few things all happen as a result of the NHP being made. Firstly, I'm sorry if I'm banging on here, @Geekhis Khan, I'd like to see Jurassic Park, directed by Tim Burton and produced by Steven Spielberg and Jim Henson (fingers crossed!) at Fantasia Films with animatronics done by Jim Henson's Creature Shop. I've even thought the story behind it out.
Given Spielberg and Amblin (who were pretty much the driving forces behind getting Crichton's novel filmed OTL) have Disney shares and already have a good working relationship with them (what with Ghostbusters and Back to the Future), I can see them trying to get the JP film rights to Disney, rather than Universal. If the NHP gets made, that will also convince Crichton that Fantasia Films are the right guys to film his novel. If Henson lives into the 90's, I can also see him reading Crichton's novel and being interested in some of its themes.
However, here, Spielberg doesn't take the directors' chair so he can do Schindler's List, instead producing. With Burton being one of the key figures behind the Black Cauldron's success (ITTL, were Burton's character designs cited as a positive element of the film?), he likely won't get fired by Disney and his star will be in the ascendancy at the company. So, for what's going to be the big live-action project of 1993, he's the natural choice for director - he says yes, on the condition that Disney make Frankenweenie. They acquiesce and Tim Burton's JP gets made in all its weird, 50s B-movie glory. Despite some controversy from parents, the film comes out to rave reviews.
Jurassic Park's rise in popularity leads to Universal looking to remake King Kong in the 90's to capitalise on its popularity (billing it as "The Film That Inspired Jurassic Park", which is technically correct) - they get Peter Jackson to make it in 1996. Kong comes out to rave reviews and makes Peter Jackson a household name, which means that he starts making Lord of the Rings at Universal (not New Line, as he did OTL).
With Disney, with Jurassic Park's popularity, a sequel is, quite obviously, fast-tracked into development. However, the Disney execs, concerned about the overly dark tone of the first JP and not wanting another controversy, start shopping around for a more kid-friendly dinosaur project to serve as the B-release that year. George Lucas reveals that his kids have been reading a very interesting book called... Dinotopia. So Disney get the Dinotopia rights from James Gurney - I don't know who ends up directing. So we've got two dinosaur films coming out in 1997 - The Lost World and Dinotopia: A Land Apart From Time. Maybe The Lost World's the big summer movie, whilst Dinotopia's the Thanksgiving movie (I'm British, so I don't really know what sort of films get released in that season)....
I'd also like, if Henson lives into the 90's, for him or HA to make films based on After Man: A Zoology of the Future. The reason for that is I met Dougal Dixon once and he said that there'd been a lot of buzz in Hollywood about an After Man movie - however, none of it really came to fruition (sad, really). I have no idea if Henson knew about After Man, but it seems like it'd be right up his alley.
It's like they've never read Pratchett's work before greenlighting a movie pitch! Honestly if there was any studio I think would be up to the challenge of bringing the Discworld to life it'd be this version of Disney, although I'd wait until the late 90s before making adaptations. As much as I love Sir Terry's work his early books really did rely on lampooning fantasy tropes that were already going out of style by the time he was writing so they haven't aged well.
I would imagine Jim and a few others at Disney would get a perverse joy at adapting Witches Abroad, since the land of Genua is an overt parody of Walt Disney's 'Magic Kingdom' crossed with New Orleans.
Now then, as for the 'Best/Worst media of the 80s Never Made In This Timeline':
Transformers: The Movie must have been cursed, for production to be delayed twice due to to staff illness (screenwriter Ron Friedman would be hospitalized with a near-lethal bout of influenza), then the Toei animation studio suffering a catastrophic fire that destroyed virtually everything that had been produced. Hasbro called it quits on the whole production before 1985 was over out of sheer frustration. The first four episodes of Season 3 would be rewritten to provide the 20 year transition the movie had been expected to cover, allowing the staff the luxury of spreading out the pacing so more time could be spent on each planet as the central mystery of 'what happened to Optimus Prime?' unfolded and the role of Unicron unveiled.
Fans would have to wait until the mid 90s before finally getting seeing The Transformers on the silver screen, by which time the brand had lost much of its luster. The feature-length film Transformers: The Doom of Cybertron would serve as a 'grand finale' to the classic Transformers generation and hint at the future of the franchise that would arrive two years later with Beast Wars.
That is a Pratcheet Ability, Rhianna played the cliched football, ran with it and scored a TD with Overlord, the second was more conventional but still very well done too
I think the following makes for a good timeline involving Brad Bird:
I think @Geekhis Khan might transform this into Dinotopia.
Superman III: Supergirl
Superman III: Supergirl was going to be the original version of Superman III starring Christopher Reeve and this version was supposed to be extended to a smaller scale unlike the previous films featuring the villains Brainiac and Mister Mxyzptlk with an appearance by Supergirl. The original...
The Velveteen Rabbit (Don Bluth version)
The Velveteen Rabbit was a planned film adaptation of the book of the same name. It was to be directed by Don Bluth and Gary Goldman. A stuffed rabbit is given to a boy as a Christmas present. Through the boy's love, the rabbit begins to desire for a chance to be real. As of right now, there are...
One of the biggest reasons is the fact it did CGI real well and still holds up to this day. If Fantasia or Hyperion does do Jurassic Park no animatronics unless it for close up shots.
Absolutely. - I can see Henson seeing the opportunity to integrate CGI with animatronics and puppetry with the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park, given that Henson, OTL, was very interested in computer animation.
I should point out the first Dinotopia book wasn't written until 1992, whilst the NHP was conceived in 1986 - if Henson gets it made ITTL, I assume it'd be released in the late '80s/early 90's.
Also, what I liked about what @Geekhis Khan did with this timeline is, really, do tiny alterations that have massive, timeline-altering effects - for example, somebody siding with Burton and Musker on The Black Cauldron massively changing the film's reception.
The NHP being made would have massive, timeline-altering effects - watching it convinces Michael Crichton that Fantasia/Hyperion are the right people to adapt Jurassic Park. This leads to JP being made at Fantasia with Tim Burton at the helm. To capitalise on this, Universal remake King Kong in 1996 - and inspired by Jurassic Park's popularity, Disney, HA and Lucasfilm contact James Gurney about making a Dinotopia film in, say, 1998, as well as a Jurassic Park sequel.
Yeah, I've got lots of ideas for these hypothetical films and I'd really like to share them.
I think the reason the NHP was cancelled OTL was that it was to similar to The Land Before Time. I think that @Plateosaurus has the right idea of transforming NHP into a documentary style show similar to this:
Speaking of The Land Before Time, I wonder how Bluth and his animation studio fare in this timeline. Assuming the changes at Disney start butterflying the Disney Renaissance in the 90s it's possible his version of Beauty and the Beast gets completed.
It'll also be interesting if he makes the same partnership with Spielberg or if the close association with Henson and Lucas will butterfly that pairing away (and with it An American Tail, and The Land Before Time, and ... all Bluth's big successes really).
I fully support the idea of turning the Natural History Project into a documentary/docu-fiction series, as outlined in posts above.
It'll also be interesting if he makes the same partnership with Spielberg or if the close association with Henson and Lucas will butterfly that pairing away (and with it An American Tail, and The Land Before Time, and ... all Bluth's big successes really).
I fully support the idea of turning the Natural History Project into a documentary/docu-fiction series, as outlined in posts above.
- Status