The Cloverfield Paradox (formerly The God Particle)

hatrickpatrick

Remember there were a lot of Boardsies who got into the clue hunting marketing campaigns for Cloverfield and 10 Cloverfield Lane, so a heads up that there's another one coming out in April (formerly working title "God Particle" but now referred to simply as "Untitled Cloverfield Movie" by Paramount).

The first two viral websites are:

www.tagruato.jp - same as for the first two movies, except now the site appears to have been "hacked" and had all its content replaced with cryptic error messages and hash ciphers

www.04182028.com - a strange, scrambled video with some faces hidden in various frames and a corrupted audio track

This is basically the entrance to the rabbit hole, you can keep up with ongoing discoveries and clue hunting on our Reddit hub at www.reddit.com/r/Cloververse

Already psyched for this! There are some indications that unlike 10 Cloverfield Lane which had a tangential connection to the first movie, this one might feature a story directly connected to the original monster attack. Have a read of the stickies at the subreddit if you want to get immersed in this.

kerplun k

Recent rumors about this do not sound good. Release date has shifted a few times. I’ve heard strong rumors that it still needs a lot of post production work and The God Particle title and plot have been dropped altogether.

J.J was supposed to step in and try and fix it, but his unexpected commitment to Star Wars left him unavailable. The budget has already spiraled, and is currently sitting at about 40m, to put that in perspective, 10CL cost 15m. Now it’s in a position where Paramount don’t have the confidence to spend more money to promote and distribute it, and instead are looking at the option of flogging the current version to Netflix.

It’s a shame, because the original God Particle idea sounded fun, and slotted right into the CloverVerse anthology set of films and something I definitely would have liked to watch in the cinema.

I hope that, if it goes down the Netflix route, they spend the time and money to deliver something that’s not a complete mess and has a coherent and complete story.

From a marketing perspective, I wouldn’t be opposed to the idea of dropping the connection of this to CloverVerse and let it be its own thing, then, in a few years, let J.J and Co. redo the God Particle idea and attach the new film to the Cloverfield Anthology.

ps3lover

This hits Netflix after the Super Bowl! What the Christ? Feels like a real dump job!

Slydice

Agent Coulson

Love me some Gugu.

yerwanthere123

It's going on Netflix? Christ.

Bacchus

Just woke up with a notification from Netflix that this is available. WTF!

pixelburp

It was bound to happen really wasn't it? With streaming services on the rise it was always going to happen that someone would go 'wait a minute, we have the film right now, ready to upload; why not just release right now and let viral marketing take over?' Cloverfield has kinda spun itself into a bit of a mystery-box franchise in its own right, so it feels tailor made for that kind of guerilla marketing tactic. It's sorta the series' 'thing'.

That said, the scuttlebutt is suggesting it ain't that great; certainly not on a par of the previous Cloverfield films - the bar set particularly high by 10 Cloverfield Lane

evad_lhorg

I watched the first 40 minutes or so on the bus this morning. Looking alright so far. Reviews aren't great but that doesn't bother me with alien/action type films.

pixelburp

evad_lhorg wrote: »

I watched the first 40 minutes or so on the bus this morning. Looking alright so far. Reviews aren't great but that doesn't bother me with alien/action type films.

Watching films in 2018 everyone

evad_lhorg

pixelburp wrote: »

Watching films in 2018 everyone

First time but I was very excited when watching the superbowl and I saw that. Had to see if it was dog ****e. So far so good.

seamus

Interesting. On IMDB this morning it was at 9.1 with a couple of hundred ratings. Obviously people who were interested enough to watch it as soon as it dropped. Now in the thousands, it's down to 6.9, which puts it in the "watchable, but not great" bracket.

Decuc500

Big budget sci fi spectacle...streaming on a hand held device near you.

Bacchus

pixelburp wrote: »

It was bound to happen really wasn't it? With streaming services on the rise it was always going to happen that someone would go 'wait a minute, we have the film right now, ready to upload; why not just release right now and let viral marketing take over?' Cloverfield has kinda spun itself into a bit of a mystery-box franchise in its own right, so it feels tailor made for that kind of guerilla marketing tactic. It's sorta the series' 'thing'.

That'd be my take on it too. Another traditional viral campaign could have been successful but there could also have been an element of fatigue over another viral campaign like that. So, what better way to instantly generate a whole lot of buzz than to release it on Sunday night out of the blue! The water cooler chat in the office on Monday morning will be up to 90. It's win-win. Whether or not it's any good, Netflix will get a bump from this chatter and so will the movie.

kerplun k

pixelburp wrote: »

Watching films in 2018 everyone

I'm super busy on Instagram atm, I Hadn't got time to watch the actual film so I read the plot on Wikipedia instead.

My Review
Strong performance from the cast, let down by the Predicable plot, The weakest film of the Cloverfield franchise. 6/10

A-Trak

Well I'd the day off so watched this instead of cleaning the oven.

It's not great, and I loved both Cloverfield an 10 Cloverfield Lane.
It's a mishmash of Sunshine and event horizon, both of which are superior films.

Even the "Twist," at the end was rubbish and just fan service.
I'd have been very disappointed if I'd have paid cash to see this in cinema.

Bacchus

A-Trak wrote: »

Well I'd the day off so watched this instead of cleaning the oven.

It's not great, and I loved both Cloverfield an 10 Cloverfield Lane.
It's a mishmash of Sunshine and event horizon, both of which are superior films.

Even the "Twist," at the end was rubbish and just fan service.
I'd have been very disappointed if I'd have paid cash to see this in cinema.

Don't blurt out there's a twist at the end like that. Now I'm gonna be watching it trying to see it coming.

kerplun k

Bacchus wrote: »

Don't blurt out there's a twist at the end like that. Now I'm gonna be watching it trying to see it coming.

Fan service.... I think that's a pretty big clue as to what Trak is alluding too. It sounds more like an Easter Egg than a twist TBF.

Bacchus

kerplun k wrote: »

Fan service.... I think that's a pretty big clue as to what Trak is alluding too. It sounds more like an Easter Egg than a twist TBF.

Don't want clues TBH. Or any sort of indication about twists or nods to the other Cloverfield movies that happens at the end of the movie. It isn't even out 24 hours, at least spoiler tag chat about the end of the movie.

pixelburp

Yeah, the film is a surprise to all of us, I think a little discretion by folks would be appreciated. The fact that there's a something at the end now is itself a spoiler. Let people discover for themselves, even those already familiar with the Cloverfield franchise

kerplun k

Bacchus wrote: »

Don't want clues TBH. Or any sort of indication about twists or nods to the other Cloverfield movies that happens at the end of the movie. It isn't even out 24 hours, at least spoiler tag chat about the end of the movie.

I can see your point, But just to be clear, I haven't seen this myself yet. I'm hoping to watch it tonight.

klose

It's a bit confusing now when/where all three films have taken place now. Grand Sci fi standalone, but as part of the franchise I feel a bit disappointed. Not a fan of Chris o dowd either, rolled my eyes more time.

ArthurG

Jaysus 2 hours of my life I’ll never get back. Utter rubbish.

Sad Professor

Derivative, tedious mess. Terrible script, amateurish direction. Hard to believe it was ever intended for anywhere but Netflix. It feels like a pilot for SyFy that wasn’t picked up. Do yourself a favour and watch Sunshine again.

RocketRaccoon

Watched it this morning and really enjoyed it.

Occono

Yeah, it's hard to believe they'd give it over to Netflix worldwide for any price if they thought it was great, I'm not surprised. It's hard to resist not trying it anyway, but I know to give up quick if it's not.

Netflix doesn't have a high reputation with me for some film pickups. Rebirth, TMHWIA, and some other stuff felt like films with good concepts and poor execution that makes sense as a cheap buy for Netflix that looks appealling in trailers and is affordable to acquire but aren't very good. They need to maintain some standards with their film acquisitions.

(They aren't all poor. Okja, IDFAHITWA, Jadotville, BONN and others are great. But I've watched an above average amount of Netflix Originals.)

crushproof

Put it in the background this evening. Considering it went straight to Netflix I wasn't expecting much despite the decent casting. The beginning caught my interest but faded after around half an hour, turned into an unoriginal bog standard sci fi. No idea how all three movies of the franchise intertwine now, I think it's pretty clear to me that apart from the you know what that they aren't linked at all. 
Missing a John Goodman character, that's for sure :)

kerplun k

Just finished it now. I was pleasantly surprised and found it very enjoyable, but then again this is exactly the type of movie I normally like, so I’m probably being a bit biased.

I have lots of questions, which I won’t go into right now. I’ll wait for the spoiler removal before freely discussing.

I think if you enjoyed the first two CloverVerse films, you’ll enjoy this one as well.

kerplun k

crushproof wrote: »

Put it in the background this evening. Considering it went straight to Netflix I wasn't expecting much despite the decent casting. The beginning caught my interest but faded after around half an hour, turned into an unoriginal bog standard sci fi. No idea how all three movies of the franchise intertwine now, I think it's pretty clear to me that apart from the you know what that they aren't linked at all. 
Missing a John Goodman character, that's for sure :)

To be fair, if you put any film on in the background, you are not giving it a fair chance. I think that’s a big problem with modern audiences. The attention span is non existent. I can’t go to the cinema anymore without someone playing on their phone during the film, this has also become more prevalent in theater, which I think is an absolute disgrace. I was at a play last week and I noticed this a good bit. As much as I like the Netflix approach, It definitely has it’s flaws, not only does it add to this kind of casual viewing behavior, it also deprives fans of that big screen collective experience. This film is something I would have liked to go the cinema to see with a bunch of friends and chat about it afterwards. I’d say it kills some directors at the thoughts of someone half watching their work in parts on their phone, during the commute to work

Agent Coulson

Chris O'Dowd making a great living being Chris O'Dowd in everything.

Occono

So yeah, that....well, it wasn't boring, but it definitely seems worse the more I think over it.

I think the reaction to Bright was hyperbolic but I think that response is fair for TCP. TCP has lots of nonsensical parts and poorly developed characters and is just bland and confused......but entertaining with modest expectations, it's not boring.

Bright isn't a great film but some reviews were far too hyperbolic about it being the worst movie of 2017 and such. It was a more focused movie than TCP, at the cost of some underexplored ideas left for sequels, and the fantasy racism metaphors were.....well, I can understand hating the movie purely for that if that's questionable to you. But I thought it was different from a lot of movies at the moment and it worked for me. Might be critical dissonance, or whatever the opposite of hype backlash is, affecting my perception though.

TCP doesn't explain lots of ****, forces in Cloverfield connections and, while it's entertaining, is also really like some random episode from halfway through a scifi TV show that makes no sense by itself.