Pre-Legendary?
Pre-Legendary, yes. It was like the stars aligned. In the year 2000, shortly following Blizzcon, John called me. John and I are quite close and John is close to Chris also because we've been pitching with Chris. He stated, "Listen, I'm going over to Legendary." He then told us some details about it, and then he said, "You know, these are the WoW cataclysm Gold same guys who did Batman Begins, and we're making Superman Returns." He began sharing the information with us. Also, John is someone whom we have a great deal of trust and the fact John is working at Legendary in the role of their creative director gives us a more reassurance because we believe in him. He understands it. He's got it! We're blown to the point of exhaustion because we believe that on the side of business there's a total love connection. In the realm of creativity that's the most important area there's a total relationship of love, with someone who we've had five years of relationship with.
While we were talking to the studios and talking to Production companies John was there along with Chris and me. Chris. We were three out pitching. The guy we're talking about is who is our Hollywood person, happens to be now their Chief Creative Officer. It's an amazing situation because we believe we've have a person we can trust in this.
Could you share with me the stories of rejection?
Absolutely. At the beginning studios were telling the audience, "you know, we aren't going to take this risk. It's risky." We said, "Well, why is this?" They replied, "Well, fantasy movies do not sell." They'd also bring up films that were before them and that were pre-Lord of the Rings. It's one of those instances which they'd tell you, "You know, well there's no audience for this."Then, we thought, "That's because it's never been done correctly." But then Lord of the Rings was released and someone did the right thing, and the reaction was, "See?"
Then, we'd leave and tell each other, "Okay, well, everyone has said you were just waiting for it to be proven. So, let's go." They said, "Well, it's too close to the Lord of the Rings. It's not possible to do that." Then, there was a reason that was different.
It was difficult because it seemed like everywhere you looked there was a worry that was taking place in Hollywood which was stopping the event from taking place. In my opinion, the reason for this was due to people not understanding video games. If the novel is a good one, they can understand it. There are so many adaptations of buy Cataclysm Classic Gold novels, it's incredible. However, there hasn't been many video game-related films. The ones that have been released aren't doing very well, and they haven't been great. There's been a large amount of anxiety.