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'Dumb And Dumber' Is Universal's Latest Borrowed Franchise

This article is more than 9 years old.

Once studios latch onto something that theoretically could be a franchise property, they tend to hold onto them for dear life. Right now Sony is currently developing every theoretical Spider-Man spin-off or what-have-you under the sun partially to keep the rights to the character from falling back into Marvel and Walt Disney's clutches. But sometimes a film franchise will fall through the cracks or the studio in question will pass on another installment thus allowing another studio to swoop in and grab the rights. And over the last few decades, that studio is usually Universal ( Comcast Corp.). Dumb and Dumber was released by New Line Cinemas back in 1994, yet Warner Bros. ( Time Warner Inc.) let the property go in 2013. Dumb and Dumber To, which debuted with $36.1 million last weekend, is just the latest sequel distributed by Universal for a predecessor that Universal had absolutely nothing to do with.

For whatever reason, and it works out for them as often as it doesn't, Universal has been in the habit of scooping up Hollywood's hand-me-down franchises. To wit, as of today the eventual third Dumb and Dumber 3 will end up back with New Line/Warner Bros., thanks to the studio still having rights for a third installment (Hollywood Reporter). But the Dumb and Dumber situation, where New Line executives inexplicably passed on distributing a $40 million comedy sequel that seemed, on paper, like a pretty safe investment, is just the latest in an odd trend of Universal sweeping up established franchises.

The original Halloween was distributed in theaters by Compass, a distribution studio that debuted with the Carpenter classic and otherwise has barely existed since. The rights to the franchise, to the extent that it was a franchise at all back in 1978, ended up with famed super producer Dino De Laurentiis who did most of his business with Universal at the time. Thus Halloween II and Halloween III: Season of the Witch ended up with the Universal logo at the front. The disappointing figures for Halloween III (which of course told a stand-alone story sans Michael Myers) led to the eventual Halloween IV: The Return of Michael Myers and Halloween V: The Revenge of Michael Myers being independently distributed by Galaxy International, another small-time distribution house, The next five incarnations (Halloween: The Curse of Michael MyersHalloween: H20, Halloween: Ressurection, and the two Rob Zombie remakes), between 1995 and 2009, went through Dimension and then The Weinstein Company.

Speaking of Mr. Dino De Laurentiis, he produced a little-seen Michael Mann film in 1986 called Manhunter, which starred William Petersen as a damaged FBI agent brought out of self-imposed retirement to seek the advice of an imprisoned serial killer which would hopefully lead to the capture of a new and active serial killer. When Orion Pictures wanted to make Silence of the Lambs in 1991, they bought the rights to the novel and Mr. De Laurentiis lent them the rights to the name "Hannibal Leckter" for free since Manhunter had bombed so brutally give years earlier. Silence of the Lambs of course was a pop culture zeitgeist moment, earning $272 million worldwide in 1991 and winning the top five Oscars (Picture, Director, Screenplay, Actor, Actress). Orion went bankrupt soon after. When Thomas Harris finished a follow-up novel in 1999, De Laurentiis was ready to go and bought the movie rights for $10m.

Hannibal ended up as an MGM/Universal co-production and opened with $58 million in February 2001, the third biggest debut on record at the time. MGM distributed the film in America while Universal got the overseas and DVD rights. Red Dragon, a more faithful adaptation of the book that inspired Manhunter came out in 2002 as a straight Universal distribution deal, with Anthony Hopkins playing Hannibal Lector for a third time. A Hannibal Rising (based on the fourth and last book that Thomas Harris ever wrote involving the character) was distributed by MGM and The Weinstein Company to a lousy $82m worldwide gross (on a $50m budget) in 2007. And today of course the franchise lives on in the NBC/Universal television show Hannibal.

Also in the horror realm is the Evil Dead series. Sam Raimi's The Evil Dead and Evil Dead II were independent films, released in 1981 and 1987 respectively. The Evil Dead ended up on the New Line slate thanks to a rave review from Stephen King and they eventually gave the film a simultaneous theatrical and home video release.  Evil Dead II was distributed in America Rosebud Releasing with Paramount handling some of the overseas markets for the unrated horror sequel. But the somewhat more mainstream threequel, Army of Darkness, fell into the Universal banner for its 1993 release after the studio was pleased with the relative success of Sam Raimi's Darkman in 1990. Raimi clashed with the studio and in the ends the film barely made $20m worldwide, but obviously all three Evil Dead films are huge cult properties.

Bridget Jones's Diary was a big hit for Miramax back in 2001. The Renee Zellweger/Hugh Grant/Colin Firth adaption, produced by Studio Canal, earned a strong $282 million worldwide. The film was distributed by Miramax in America but by Universal overseas, which is where it made $210 million of its $281m worldwide cume. So in 2004, the whole caboodle ended up with Universal, as Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason was distributed all over the world by Universal. The film's poor reviews and comparatively weaker domestic box office (despite earning $262m worldwide) basically put a kibosh on the franchise. This is similar to how Pitch Black started as a USA Films production and then ended up straight Universal for The Chronicles of Riddick and last year's Riddick. USA Films was Universal's art house division before becoming Focus Features, and Universal was always the distribution arm for the DVD releases.

The next would-be franchise theft occurred in 2008. Columbia was allegedly set to go forward with a sequel to Guillermo del Toro's Hellboy, which had earned strong reviews and a $99 million worldwide cume on a $66m budget in 2004. But production company Revolution went bankrupt and Universal snapped up the rights. Universal wanted a stable of promised action-centric franchise pictures for summer 2008, so it included Hellboy II: The Golden Army alongside The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon EmperorWanted, and The Incredible Hulk. Relativity financed the $85 million sequel. Universal spearheaded an impressive marketing campaign which integrated Ron Perlman's hero with other NBC/Universal properties, such as NBC's "The More You Know" commercials and Inside the Actors Studio. The film debuted with a robust $35m, but The Dark Knight opened the next weekend. Cue a 71% drop in weekend two, a horrible 2.1x weekend-to-final domestic cume of $75m, a $160m worldwide cume on an $85m budget.

The first Kick-Ass was a comic-con sensation that Lionsgate picked up, back when they were mostly known for horror films, liberal documentaries, and Tyler Perry productions. The film ended up being distributed outside of America by Universal. The film didn't quite play as well with general audiences as it did with the online geek contingent, although $96m worldwide in April of 2010 isn't too bad for a lower-budget R-rated superhero deconstruction.  Cue Kick-Ass 2, distributed this time entirely by Universal, but the frankly lousy $28m sequel earned just $$60m worldwide.

Next up in terms of Universal's sloppy seconds will be Pacific Rim 2, as Universal will be distributing the Legendary Pictures production for April of 2017 since Legendary and Warner Bros. are no longer partners in crime.  Obviously none of these franchises were literally "stolen" and there is a difference between franchises that started at an entirely different studio versus ones that originated with Universal's hands only partially in the cookie jar ((as was the case with Elizabeth and Elizabeth: The Golden Age). And I'm not claiming that the above list is even a comprehensive one, so feel free to sound off about any that I might have missed.

There are obviously advantages to picking up sloppy seconds, as you get the benefits of a sequel (built-in awareness, potential to build upon a fan base, etc.) without having to do the hard work of setting up a franchise in the first place. And this isn't entirely exclusive to Universal, as Disney bought Marvel and Lucasfilm while the Terminator franchise has had a four distribution studios for five films thus far, bouncing from Orion to Tri-Star to Warner Bros. and now to Paramount (Viacom Inc.) for Terminator Genisys.

I don't have any grand and/or profound "big picture" statement to tie all of this together. It was just a fun bit of history that I felt like sharing. With the news of a theoretical Dumb and Dumber 3 going back to Warner Bros. and Sony dropping its planned Aaron Sorkin-penned Steve Jobs film only to have Universal potentially snap it up (Deadline), it felt like as good a time as any.

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