The Disastrous History of Howard the Duck

foreign this episode of yesterworld is sponsored by audible go to audible.com yesterworld or text yesterworld to 500-500 to sign up for a free 30-day trial to support the channel you'll also get a free audible title which I'll reveal in this episode's intermission because boy is this a long one and you'll need a break when it comes to movies with Infamous production problems there's quite a few with inspiring success stories from Star Wars A New Hope jaw is The Wizard of Oz Blade Runner to The Shining they all became iconic cinematic masterpieces despite their troubles getting made George Lucas is Howard the Duck however is not one of them as the only thing worse than the movie's disastrous production were the scathing reviews in abysmal ticket sales the movie is a true Enigma and on more than one occasion instills discomfort and viewers with the white HUD intensity of a thousand suns but the origins of Howard the Duck and his journey to the big screen is filled to the brim with just as much if not more chaos and absurdity than the film itself so strap yourself in for a deep dive into one of the most bizarre movies ever made with the disastrous history of Howard the Duck [Music] foreign back to 1970 with Marvel's horror comic book series fear fear was initially written by the legendary Stan Lee and as you can probably guess featured horror stories many of which involving specific monsters however While most of the comic was original the monster stories were not as they were actually reprints of previous comics from the 50s and 60s but that all changed in 1973 with Issue Number 10 as fear was given the new title of Adventure into fear with the introduction of an original Monster Story man thing the new creature also came with a new writer to the series by the name of Steve Gerber who had a special knack for the Absurd with Steve Gerber at the helm Adventure interfere with man thing pressed on for quite some time but most important to our story was issue number 19 the land between night and day in this particular issue and I swear this all connects to Howard the Duck he introduced a plot device involving a jar of peanut butter that transformed into an ancient Barbarian Warrior you see it turned out that man thing swamp was the Nexus point of cosmic forces which was now being disturbed if left unchecked much like peanut butter man even more bizarre Creations could emerge well later in the comic that's precisely what happens and were introduced to a wisecracking duck smoking a cigar wearing the top half of a suit with a tiny hat and no pants in fact according to artist Val nairik who drew the original duck the most important part of his visual Incarnation was to not look too much like Donald Duck his appearance is brief and he isn't even given a name as the comic ends on a cliffhanger a few pages later now the unnamed duck story was supposed to continue in the next issue but instead Marvel began a new story with a new monster morbius who would ironically one day star in Marvel's second worst movie ever made as far as what happened to man thing it turned out Steve Gerber was given his very own comic book series to continue the story and the wisecracking duck was intended to be a reoccurring character however Marvel's then editor-in-chief Roy Thomas had a few reservations about the mallard as he felt a humorous duck was wasn't a good fit with the more serious horror-centric nature of the comic series because you know a barbarian Warrior magically manifesting from a jar of peanut butter wasn't silly at all so Steve Gerber was told to get rid of the duck ASAP and when the man thing Standalone series debuted a few months later he did just that and by that I mean he's officially introduced as Howard heroically battles the bad guys but then six pages later is traveling across magic Stepping Stones when he clumsily trips and falls into Oblivion never to be seen again at least that was supposed to be his fate but evidently Marvel's mail room was bombarded with letters from Angry fans who demanded Howard the Duck to be brought back one especially Disturbed fan even sent Marvel the bones of a dead duck in protest and Marvel Executives like Stan Lee were hounded on a regular basis so Howard the Duck was indeed resurrected and the next year made his Grand reappearance and the man thing spin-off series giant size man thing Howard the Duck Story picks up as he's tumbling through an unworldly void of time and space where days turn into weeks and weeks into months finally he lands in the state state of Cleveland in his tale of adjusting to the world of humans continues from there though he was just a Side Story within the man thing spin-off comic the edgy duck was a hit and left fans desperately wanting more so the next year in 1976 he was given his very own comic book series Howard the Duck someone was mentioned about you mentioned I think earlier about Howard the Duck Howard the Duck no uh this comic book right here still very hard to find we sold out yesterday we had 35 copies and we sold out so there is a phenomena for Howard the Duck you can't keep in stock at any price over the course of 31 issues spanning three years Howard faced all kinds of villains and monsters and his off-brand sense of wood and snarkiness were by and large the primary jaw ultimately he was a good guy but was also incredibly obnoxious and rude so basically the true definition of an anti-hero the series also contained loads of social and political commentary satire parody existentialism and the truly awkward albeit primarily hinted at romance between Howard and a woman named Beverly Switzer but just as Howard the duck's popularity was Rising with comic book fans in the late 1970s a director by the name of George Lucas was finishing up a little film called Star Wars and as strange as it seems he would prove Idol in not only bringing Howard the Duck to life on the big screen but creating Marvel's first ever theatrical film George Lucas the director of American Graffiti and Star Wars is a long time dedicated fan of the comics the comic book comic books and comic art is is a really strong and a very very close to the pulse of the culture kind of art and in that way I don't think it'll ever die out I don't think it'll you know I think what is drawn today will become very important it's the uh the hieroglyphs of the or the graffiti of our times now to properly tell the story of George Lucas and Howard the Duck we have to backtrack to his first commercial movie American Graffiti which he was directing for Universal pictures but not so much the making of the movie itself but his trips to Universal's Executive offices in New York City you see Lucas had been a fan of comic books and comic book artwork all of his life especially the Flash Gordon series by cartoonist Alex Raymond so it's no surprise that on one of his trips to New York he wound up visiting a nearby comic book shop the store was super snipe comic book euphorium and George Lucas wound up becoming fast friends with the Shop's owner and fellow filmmaker Edward Summers the two bonded over their passion for Comics filmmaking and especially the writings and artwork of Flash Gordon which would ultimately play a significant part of developing his next project Star Wars but the Friendship soon evolved into a partnership as when American Graffiti became a massive hit Lucas used his earnings to become co-owner of the comic shops Art Gallery though he was more of a silent partner his ownership played a vital roll in a certain let's say Discovery a few years later okay I swear that's the only duck panel making this video Flash Forward to July of 1976 just after filming wrapped for Star Wars Adele Street Studios in London you see as George Lucas made his way back to California he spent some time in New York and while he was there paid a visit to his comic book shop as fate would have it this is also when a certain new comic series was flying off the shelves Howard the Duck at some point he grabbed a copy for himself and was instantly drawn to the comics blend of Science Fiction with absurdist humor as well as its clever social commentary and hints of film Noir he also felt the comic had potential as a feature film and would serve as quite the creative challenge to bring to life on the big screen but George Lucas had no desire to direct or write the film himself especially since he was knee-deep in wrapping up Star Wars instead he envisioned Howard the Duck as a project for his good friends Gloria Katz and her husband Willard hike Lucas had originally met the couple during his time at USC and the trio became Fast Friends a few years later he also chose them to write the screenplay for American Graffiti to which they received critical Acclaim the couple had even lent a hand with writing Star Wars specifically character dialogue though officially without credit their contributions to A New Hope led to some of the film's most clever and Woody banter in fact by their account they supplied somewhere around 30 of dialogue for the entire film short for a stormtrooper huh do you think a princess and a guy like me no but as far as how the Riders were plagued with I mean given the idea to make Howard the Duck it happened on a lunch date between the old friends you see one day while taking a break from the grilling post-production of Star Wars George Lucas Gloria Katz and Willard hike were workshopping another in development script radio land murders at some point on that fateful afternoon Lucas told them all about Howard the doc and according to Gloria Katz had even brought back the first issue from his comic book shop to show them going further he expressed how he felt the humor of the comics shared their same comedic sensibilities and both hike and cats were immediately interested but the notion of George Lucas producing the film with them as the writers was about as far as the conversation went as any further discussions beyond that would have to wait until after the release of Star Wars after all if his risky and expensive sci-fi epic was a dud it was basically game over for him in the film industry this may seem absurd today but back then it was a real possibility as the film's bizarre story and characters countless production troubles overly ambitious special effects and ever increasing budge it led many to believe it would be a flock so the future of Howard the Duck quite literally hinged on whether Star Wars wound up being a financial disaster or box office hit but luckily for them or in a way unlucky it was the latter the people in this crowd will soon be among almost 40 000 who have seen a new science fiction movie at North Park cinema 2. the movie is called Star Wars and since it opened here nine days ago capacity crowds have filled the 1100 seats in the theater almost daily although lines at North Park cinema stretched to more than a half mile long and the movie cost 375 a person no one tonight seemed to mine the crowds when Star Wars hit theaters in May of 1977 it wasn't just a box office hit it changed the film industry and pop culture Forever on top of that much like the movie Jaws did for its director Steven Spielberg it also thrust George Lucas in a stardom and then some so it should come as no surprise that in the midst of Star Wars Mania the question soon arose of what the filmmaker would be doing next now at first George Lucas wasn't sure he even wanted to do another Star Wars at least not yet he did have a rough story outline for the sequel ready to go but two other films were also on the table a movie about the Lost Ark of the Covenant with Steven Spielberg and Howard the Duck with Gloria katzenwillard hike now this lost Arc idea was still in its infancy and although it did have Inspirations from 1930s and 40s action B movies it was an original story requiring no licensing however the duck on the other hand was of course the property of Marvel Comics so before even possibly moving forward they would have to inquire about the rights some sources claim Lucas himself reached out to Marvel but others say it was cats and hike in fact quick tangent this story contains more conflicting statements and contradictory information than anything I've ever done before and the amount of research required given the subject matter was a bit absurd I was able to verify most of the information with concurring statements from a wide variety of sources but sometimes like this it's more he said she said anyway regardless of who reached out to Marvel for the rights of Howard the Duck the answer was the same no but the reason wasn't for lack of interest it's that they'd recently licensed Tower the duck to someone else the head of Universal Pictures Television Frank price now for those unaware Frank price was behind a slew of incredibly popular and successful Universal shows most of you under the age of 25 have probably never heard of the specifics of his deal with Marvel was to license a dozen characters for a number of in the works Marvel TV shows and Marvel TV movies the characters to be licensed included Thor the Incredible Hulk Miss Marvel Power Man Doctor Strange Iron Fist the Submariner Captain America the human torch and Tower the duck Now by 1977 when George Lucas and slash or the writers inquired to Marvel about the rights to Howard the Duck the only shows actually in production was the Incredible Hulk starring Lou Ferrigno when or if they would ever get around to Howard the Duck or the others for that matter remain to be seen although within a couple of years Universal would have a Captain America TV movie and a pilot featuring Doctor Strange have I become the sorcerer you should learn whose Powers come along for a fantastic Adventure into the fourth dimension with Dr Strange with the rights to Howard the Duck tied up with universal George Lucas turned his gaze back to the Lost Ark project and to the relief of Star Wars fans a sequel to the science fiction Masterpiece wizard hike and Gloria cats would also turn to other projects which meant for almost a decade a movie version of Howard the Duck was off the table kind of you see this is when the story takes a very bizarre turn as there was another Doom Tower the Duck movie that has more or less been lost to time it is a bit of a detour away from George Lucas's hour of the doc but it's an important part of the character's disastrous Journey to the big screen it begins at the height of Howard the duck's popularity in March of 1978 when the character's Creator Steve Gerber was suddenly fired from Marvel the reason for his termination was chronic lateness with his scripts as he often missed important deadlines and Publications for the series so the Howard the Duck Comics went on for two more issues without Gerber and there was even a magazine series but the Publications were poorly received and soon came to an end although the magazine did feature the first explicit bedroom scene between Howard the Duck and his human love interest Beverly so there is that anyway two years after his dismissal in 1980 Steve Gerber got word that Marvel was creating a Howard the Duck animated TV show not only that but Marvel was also negotiating with a movie studio to make a Howard the Duck feature film neither of which had Steve Gerber's approval or even so much as the Creator's blessing now you might be thinking wait didn't Universal own the rights isn't that why George Lucas sand slash or the writers couldn't license Howard the Duck did spending months knee-deep in Howard the Duck history caused Mark to lose his mind and contradict himself well yes and no you see remember Frank price the executive who had bought the Marvel character rights for a universal well in 1978 he wound up resigning from Universal to become the president of Columbia Pictures and this led to the rights for Howard the Duck to go back to Marvel although some sources say he took the rights with him and let them expire or even sold them back to Marvel but regardless of how the rights reverted back when Steve Gerber heard about these new Howard the Duck projects without his involvement he immediately reached out to Marvel claiming ownership of Howard the doc he offered to license the property to Marvel but they quote refused to negotiate or agree to anything basically their stance was we can do whatever the Frank we want because we own Howard the doc not you so he hired a lawyer and sent Marvel a cease and desist letter demanding them to go no for further with the in-development movie or TV show but despite his legal threats and is spearheaded by Stan Lee Marvel went forward anyway and officially made a deal with the company called cellular wood Productions Inc specifically it was the rights for a Howard the Duck radio show starring Jim Belushi and a one-year licensing option for the feature film signed on to direct and write the movie where filmmakers Dennis hacken and Neil dabrowsky who'd recently produced and wrote the movie Bronco Billy for Clint Eastwood the yet to be named Howard the Duck movie was also given a budget of 8 million dollars for close to 30 million dollars today but to bring Howard the Duck to life on the big screen was going to be no easy task so they reached out to then mostly unknown but now legendary special effects genius Dan Winston who quick fun fact had recently done The Wookie costumes for the infamous Star Wars holiday special foreign [Music] however unlike the unintentionally terrifying lumpy The Wookie for Howard the Duck he would utilize a combination of suit and puppetry much like Yoda from The Empire Strikes Back the intention was to stay faithful to Steve Gerber's design of the iconic dock but also adapt Howard's look to better fit a live-action world in the words of Stan Winston he would use the best techniques the industry had to offer to create the quote ultimate Muppet now obviously this version of the film never became a reality nor did the Animated Series so what happened well after learning Marvel went forward with the movie deal even after a cease and desist letter Steve Gerber sued Marvel over the ownership of Howard the Duck the case itself is incredibly fascinating but way too much to get into here so check out the description for links to the court documents if you want to give them a read yourself but to summarize the case Steve Gerber did have a strong argument at least in regards to being the character's Creator which remember he did while he was freelancing for Marvel the problem was that once he became an official employee of Marvel he signed away all the ownership and copyrights of Howard the doc there were stipulations in his contract that would have given him creative control for a Howard the Duck feature film or TV show but once he was fired this was made no one call void so the moral of the story is always read the fine print Marvel did eventually offer Steve Gerber at least some sort of compensation to drop the case which he accepted the specifics were never revealed as far as Howard the Duck the movie those involved assured fans that wasn't canceled and was actually going full speed ahead with the new Rider by the name of Edwin heaven but then that's it that's the last official statement regarding this version of the movie as allegedly it wound up losing funding due to all the negative press of the lawsuit and possibly the undisclosed settlement terms so the rights to Howard the Duck once again reverted back to Marvel who at this point had also abandoned the Animated Series mentioned earlier however his fate would have it and not necessarily good fate another attempt at bringing Howard the Duck to life on the big screen was just around the corner but before we continue the episode and get to the really juicy stuff we're gonna take a quick 90 second break in that time you could grab a snack feed your fish pet your doggo or sign up for a free 30-day 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audible Originals so whether you sign up during this break or after the episode go to audible.com yesterworld or text yesterworld to 500 500 to begin your free 30-day trial today and with that we continue the story of Howard the Duck which picks up with the release of Indiana Jones in the Temple of Doom Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom premieres in less than two weeks we're starting our show with a treat an exclusive behind-the-scenes look courtesy of The Producers at Steven Spielberg and Harrison Ford at work with a cast of thousands despite the Troubles of getting Howard the Duck off the ground George Lucas wizard hike and Gloria Katz teamed up for the sequel to Raiders of the Lost Ark but aside from being the movie that brought the trio back together Temple of Doom was also the final film Lucas planned to be intricately involved in for quite some time as during its production he announced a sabbatical from making movies you see on top of the two Indiana Jones films he'd also just wrapped up Return of the Jedi the final installments of his original Star Wars trilogy but the non-stop work on a Sci-Fi franchise had taken a toll in his personal life and George Lucas's workaholic nature in part led to his wife Marsha Lucas asking for a divorce in his words he was burned out from Star Wars and had been for years and desperately needed time to focus on getting his life back so his plan was to instead focus on raising his daughter building his film facility Skywalker Ranch and most important to our story producing movies for other filmmakers oh yeah and playing himself in truly bizarre Japanese Panasonic camera commercials which are about as awkward as you might expect my personal favorite is the one where he's pondering in a field awkwardly doing whatever that is and smiling at the camera then going hand in hand with two Ewoks to meet up with all the other Star Wars characters Panasonic always new dreams wonderful friends [Applause] [Music] anyway put simply George Lucas wanted to find stories he could assist in getting made but take more of a backseat to the day-to-day work of actual production and lucky for him or unlucky such a project would soon come his way you see after writing Temple of Doom withered hike and Gloria Katz decided to inquire once again about the rights to Howard the Duck lucky for them or ultimately unlucky this time they were available Marvel even allowed them to option the film for free which basically means they were allowed to write the script and Pitch it to movie studios before paying a dime so over the course of the next few months they wrote several versions of the script and it was around this time that George Lucas officially came aboard according to Gloria Katz they were struggling with the logistics of developing Howard the Duck as a feature film so they reached out to Lucas due to his past interest in the project now at this point in George Lucas's quasi retirement he was producing a number of Star Wars TV shows albeit with very little involvement outside of this he had also been quietly producing a number of feature films without credit mostly to help out his filmmaking Buddies the most famous example was Disney's Return to Oz as when his directing friend Walter merch was fired for going over schedule he got him his job back and saved the production from getting shot down although given just how unintentionally terrifying the film turned out this more than likely would have saved a lot of kids from future therapy costs foreign [Music] Lucas serving as a so-called silent producer for Lawrence kazdan's directorial debut who was the writer of Raiders of the Lost Ark in the last two Star Wars films to help his friend get his film made he was even the film's financial guarantor which meant if the movie went over budget he'd personally cover the cost but and this is a big but for everything that wasn't Star Wars George Lucas's name was virtually absent from marketing which was done to avoid false expectations of the projects so when hiking cats went to Lucas with Howard the Duck he agreed to be the film's executive producer but with a sort of asterisk you see much like the previous examples he was initially going to be more of a silent partner to Simply assist in the film getting made both as a favor to his friends and because of his interest in the source material unfortunately that's not how Hollywood saw it especially as the film was being pitched Studio to Studio they saw it as the next big budget science fiction film from the creator of Star Wars and Indiana Jones along with the writers of the incredibly successful American Graffiti and Temple of Doom to boot so it soon became the Talk of the Town but of all the movie studios they pitched to Universal showed by far the most interest and for good reason long story short in 1972 George Lucas had signed a two-picture deal with universal to produce two live-action films the first was American Graffiti which of course went on to become a huge success the second was supposed to be Star Wars but due to its high budget ahead of its time special effects and bizarre sci-fi story they passed after Star Wars released and you know became a pop culture phenomenon Executives at Universal realized they'd shot themselves on the foot so now almost a decade later the chance to make a science fiction movie with George Lucas was a no-brainer in fact One Source claims that two of Universal's most powerful Executives lobbied very hard to get Howard the dock president Lou Wasserman and coo Sid scheinberg also contrary to popular belief George Lucas doing Howard the Duck for Universal had nothing to do with the two-picture deal he signed in the 70s in reality he fulfilled that contract in 1979 by producing more American Graffiti which was Universal's way to capitalize on the success of Star Wars and featured a rather unenthusiastic Cameo from Harrison Ford make it easy for you lady it's five four three six two my name is a but as far as the person who actually secured the deal in Greenland Howard the Duck oddly enough it was Frank price you see a few years after leaving Universal for Columbia Pictures he actually wound up coming back to Universal according to one of the filmmakers he also hadn't lost interest in making Howard the Duck into a movie and jump to the chance to do it with George Lucas attached however one of Frank Price's stipulations before moving forward was that Howard the Duck had to be a live action film this was the first let's say creative compromise for the writing Partners as to properly capture Steve Gerber's world and characters they envisioned Howard the Duck as an animated film but this would have required far more cash and resources than Universal was willing to invest and they also wanted to release Howard the Duck by the next summer an alternative idea was to create a CGI Howard within a live action World sort of like what Disney was experimenting with around the same time for the original abandoned version of who Framed Roger Rabbit unfortunately the initial test of the CGI Howard came out so bad that the artists and designers were fired so with the insistence of George Lucas the decision was made to instead do the film with puppets and have the special effects done by ilm now the time frame of the script's development is a little iffy as is George Lucas's true involvement which we'll get to a bit later but as far as I can tell the original version of this screenplay was submitted to Universal in early 1985 with the hopes of beginning production ASAP specifics of this version are vague but the writers claim it was a much smaller and more realistic story with Howard already on Earth as a detective and was heavily inspired by the film Noir genre in fact initially duckworld wasn't to be shown at all or used as a plot device especially since it only appeared in the poorly received Comics after Steve Gerber left Marvel one actor compared the original script to the best-selling novel Stranger in a Strange Land with a more serious undertone and character-driven story of course whether or not this more grounded version of Howard the dock would have jump started Marvel Cinematic Universe verse 20 years earlier is pure speculation but as far as why it was never even given a chance the blame partially lies on of all things Ghostbusters Columbia Pictures have spared no expense to make this a fine science fiction comedy a bunch of good sports they are and it is PG I'm telling you it's PG you see a few years earlier a little movie by the name of Ghostbusters was greenlit for Columbia Pictures and the person responsible for this was take a guess Frank price it was the first big budget special effects driven action comedy of its kind far from a guaranteed success given its Uncharted cinematic territory it was also given just over eight months to go from a finalized script to the big screen which considering the movie's complicated special effects was very very little time but boy did they pull it off as the film was not only a critical success but also wound up earning nearly 300 million dollars worldwide around 10 times its 30 million dollar budget so when Frank price resigned from Colombia pictures to go back to Universal and landed Howard the Duck he requested quite a few Ghostbusters like changes to be made to the script and by request I mean demand in order for the movie to be made first and foremost Howard the Duck was to be more of a special effects driven action adventure Blockbuster less character driven and more of an event film there were also to be a couple nerdy scientists interdimensional portals a good character who's taken over by an evil entity and a special effects creature driven climax it's the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man so withered hike and Gloria Katz set about rewriting the script and at this point it seems Howard the Ducks Creator Steve Gerber was brought in as a consultant of sorts although for the record it does seem like he met up with the filmmakers before this point but since his interview specifically reference elements of the Rewritten script it appears this is when he got more involved now Steve Gerber always went back and forth on his actual contributions to the screenplay but at the very least he did offer input on what the characters would or wouldn't do he was also in his own words highly impressed and borderline ecstatic with how the script turned out praising The Writer's treatment of the character but in the midst of finalizing the shooting script another problem Rose to the surface Disney's Donald Duck this was an issue that went all the way back to Howard the Ducks debut in the 70s as Disney noticed the obvious similarities between the two ducks and contacted Marvel the two companies were able to come to an agreement and Howard was to undergo minor cosmetic alterations to appease Disney most notably the inclusion of pants but supposedly there was a massive oversight within Marvel's legal team game because Howard the Duck remained as is that is aside from a single issue where Steve Gerber did apply the Wardrobe changes only to end the comic with Howard throwing away his clothes in protest eventually however Disney noticed the changes weren't being followed and actually threatened to sue so a new agreement was reached and these appearance alterations were finally implemented in the short-lived magazine series a couple years later when it came to Howard the Duck the movie it involved serious legal meetings and multiple redesigns to appease Disney once again the end result was a sort of Frankenstein hybrid of Howard the Duck Donald Duck and the stuff of nightmares but speaking of appeasing a major Studio Universal finally approved Willard hike and Glory Cat's new script in May of 1985 and the movie was officially given a go with the catch evidently one of the final stipulations from Universal and Frank price was to heavily Market Howard the Duck as George Lucas's next major film Post Star Wars initially though he was incredibly reluctant to agree as he knew having his name attached would set up certain expectations to the public as mentioned earlier this is the reason he kept his name off the promotion of movies he produced outside of Star Wars but from a desire to help out his longtime friends and since he you know gave them the idea in the first place he agreed to sponsor the film even beyond the duties of executive producer so in August of 1985 Howard the Duck was officially announced as an upcoming movie from Universal Pictures in lucasfilm going further it was often marketed as George Lucas's new movie and quote the duck version of Indiana Jones signed on to direct was Willard hike with Gloria Katz producing alongside George Lucas much like Ghostbusters it was also given a budget of 30 million dollars or roughly 80 million dollars today also like Ghostbusters the filmmakers were given just eight months to go from the beginning of filming to its scheduled release this forced almost every aspect of Howard the duck's production to be rushed but unlike Ghostbusters it was to feature a complex animatronic puppet as its lead actor skiing of which was less than two months before filming was to begin Howard himself wasn't even finished you seem much like the previously mentioned abandoned version of Howard the Duck this one was also inspired by the puppeteering feet of Yoda in Star Wars as they felt this was the best way to bring the talking duck to life on the big screen for wide shots however they'd utilize a body double which much like Hoggle and Jim Henson's Labyrinth would also use animatronics in the face to speak and convey emotion the artist building both versions of Howard the Duck was a Lane Baker the ex-wife of legendary Hollywood creature designer Rick Baker but after seven months of work the duck was having major complications and at this point filming was just over a month away so George Lucas reached out to a past Star Wars crew member who had a lot of experience in this field a puppeteer by the name of Tim Rose to achieve the desired credibility there were two versions of Akbar one for wide shots and this one for close-ups here are Puppeteer Tim Rose who plays Admiral Akbar in the movie Works painstakingly to put mouth and words into perfect synchronization Tim Rose was the Puppeteer and voice for the return of the Jedi's Admiral Akbar and also brought to life creatures like salacious B crumb and the original pre-cgi size noodles so when George Lucas gave Tim Rose a call and asked him for his help Tim Rose then reached out to a designer named tajnotsky the guy who actually did the animatronics and controls for Labyrinth Hoggle the two agreed to come aboard Howard the dock flew out to California with just three weeks until filming was to begin and immediately got to work now the most advanced Mechanics for facial expressions were designated for the Howard puppets as remember these were intended for close-ups and medium shots quite a bit of work also went towards the animatronic faces on the duck suits but since they were supposed to be for wide shots and required space for the actor's head their capabilities were far more limited as far as who was hired to actually wear the suits at just under 3 foot Hall was a 12 year old actor by the name of Jordan Prentiss who was chosen to be the primary Howard Ed Gale was another actor chosen for the part but since he was slightly taller at three foot four he was to do Howard stunt work speaking of actors for the role of Howard's love interest Beverly was Leah Thompson who had just come off the massively successful Back to the Future to play the goofy aspirational scientist who tries to get Howard back to duck world was Tim Robbins who at the time of casting was virtually unknown for the other scientists who also transforms into the movie's villain was actor Jeffrey Jones but due to his disgusting crimes later in real life we'll avoid talking about him as much as possible anyway with all the production troubles behind them or so they thought Howard the doc officially began filming in November of 1985 with barely over seven months until its release who has feathers smokes a cigar and carries the fate of the world on his shoulders his name is Howard the Duck and he's the lead in the new movie produced by Star Wars Creator George Lucas and directed by Willard hike now the actual filming and production of Howard the Duck was pretty straightforward and smooth I'm kidding it was a disaster again just to re-emphasize the articulated puppets were planned to be used for the vast majority of the movie The Duck suits which at this point had very limited facial expressions and movements were intended only for wide shots however on the first day of shooting just as Howard opened his mouth to speak the puppet's skin literally split open on the first take and was quote a disaster in fact according to Gloria Katz in the weeks leading up to filming they kept having to rebuild the Ducks after routinely exploding so this wasn't the first instance by far when editing the film they also had issues with the puppets matching the humans in the duck suits and getting the puppets across the room in a single take was in her words a nightmare so while the duck puppets did eventually improve and were used in quite a few close-ups on Stunt work they were utilized far less than originally planned instead the vast majority of Howard the duck's appearance in the movie would consist of the body doubles in the suits Jordan Prentice and edgale but since these weren't intended for close-ups they had to scramble to give these versions of Howard's face more complex unrealistic movement so as improvements were made to Howard's appearance they'd reshoot the character scene and with each additional Improvement they'd reshoot again and again and again but the problems of Howard's physical form only seem to get worse as there were growing concerns with Jordan Prentice the 12 year old inside the suit for one like many kids he often had to go to the bathroom so after an hour plus of getting him in the suit sometimes they'd immediately have to get him back out then spend another hour getting him back in child labor laws also meant he could only work very strict hours so production was constantly going over schedule he also experienced quite a bit of claustrophobia in the suit with painful burns from all the mechanics in the face to top it all off the film's editor was having a tough time matching the more childish movements of Jordan Prentiss with the more mature movements of the other costume duck Actor Ed Gale if that wasn't bad enough there was also an issue of child endangerment one of the incidents occurred when shooting the film's climax as the young actors duck costume caught fire from a nearby explosion my biggest challenge in playing this role was surviving it so ultimately they decided to use edgale for both stunt work and the primary Howard the Duck however to make all the scenes match they once again had to reshoot quite a bit of the movie which pushed the film over budget and even further behind schedule this led to various members of the crew to be fired for no particular reason just because well that's Hollywood I guess and someone has to be blamed when it came to who is to voice Howard the Duck that was another Fiasco God I tried the voice for them they wanted different voices I was when I talked to George Lucas who's a friend he wanted me to try it just to give them an idea about different voices I tried different voices I tried real tough duck they want a sensitive kind of 1980s Yuppie duck you see the prospect of doing the voice for a George Lucas production was incredibly alluring so a ton of well-known actors and TV personalities auditioned for the part but of all those who showed interest Jeff Goldblum Jay Leno and then up and comer Robin Williams were in the top three and even made visits to the set ultimately however the part went to Robin Williams who had risen to Fame in the early 80s from the TV show Mork and Mindy in fact when Puppeteer Tim Rose was on Saturday morning rewind with Tim nidel he told a fascinating story of Robin Williams eventual departure so we're shooting the scene with um Howard and Leah up in the The Loft in her place you know when things are all getting a little Amorous and around the corner here comes Robin Williams because they're they're showing him around you know the the film that he's going to voice over so when he came around the corner I said well sit down and have a go at the puppet controls he starts doing a voice for the duck that sounded like me doing the Ducks and the director screams out oh how many times have I told you not to talk over that microphone when I'm out here directing and the first lady ran over to us that's not Tim Rose that's Robin Williams quick as I go I love what you're doing oh man and Robin turned to me and he says um is that the way things are around here and I looked I said well to be honest with you he's in a pretty good mood today and he said oh life is too short to work for people like that now this is the first time I've heard this particular reason for Robin Williams leaving the picture and from what I gathered director Willett hike was a tremendously kind person to those who worked for him that said his eventual replacement ship sign gave another reason entirely for Robin Williams walking away he says it was that Williams felt way too constrained by Howard's flapping duck bill as Voice work is usually done before the character's facial movements are set in stone and in this case he was doing it after so in the end he walked away from Howard the dock and it's a really good thing he did why aside from the obvious well a few years earlier he'd starred in one of the worst critical and box office bombs of all time Popeye so Hattie voiced Howard the Duck and had two financially disastrous movies almost back to back I doubt he would have landed the starring role in Good Morning Vietnam a year after Howard the doc without Good Morning Vietnam launching him in a stardom earning him an Oscar nomination and Paving the road for his career well we probably would have missed out on a lot of amazing Robin Williams movies and I'm there's nothing any Persona that's identifiable yet with me and that's probably some reasons why I'm not more like a box office for that type of draw because I keep doing different things anyway focusing back on Howard the doc with all the previously mentioned problems the atmosphere of this app was often described as tense but as far as where George Lucas was during all this chaos he was only on set for a total of three days of the almost five month shoe and that's backed up by the director himself this was in stark contrast to his extensive visit to the set of Labyrinth earlier that year which was another film he was producing or even Captain EO prior to that both of which he was very involved with their production had he simply lost interest in the project did he sense and pending doom and want to distance himself as much as possible we'll dive further into this aspect a bit later but at the very least he did suggest Phil Tippett for the horrifying and genuinely well done stop-motion creature for the film's climax but speaking of the movie's ending filming wrapped on Howard the Duck in April of 1986 which gave the filmmakers less than four months to finish the film before its scheduled release all told Howard the Duck wound up costing 37 million dollars or just over 100 million dollars today for comparison The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi had a production budget of 30.5 and 32.5 million dollars respectively but how are the Ducks cost of 37 million dollars was before its marketing which leads us into yet another bizarre aspect of Howard the duck's cinematic journey I would give anything to run my fingers through his feathers [Music] George Lucas presents an electrifying new comedy Howard the Duck one of the more cheap I mean unique aspects of Howard the Ducks marketing campaign was refusing to show the character's face it wasn't just for posters as in all the various trailers and most of the promotional footage keeping his appearance secret was a major part of its marketing the official reason given for this was to build up hype and mystery but most agree it was to avoid people being like what the is that Abomination there was also a tie-in with Budweiser beer which only added to the growing confusion for parents as to whether or not it was a kids movie another bizarre aspect was treating Howard the Duck as if he was a real person or duck in virtually every interview by the custom crew this is the first film that actually we have cast with a Creature From Another World he just wrote us a fan letter and we asked that essentially we listened to his story because he thought it was pretty amazing let's put it this way all the girls love him he's real sexy duck Howard is going to be a major trendsetter probably bigger than Donna he's our leader now it may seem like a harmless bit but this whole Howard the Duck was a real duck from outer space gimmick did have consequences one example was Ed Gale who played Howard in the suit being Uninvited to the premiere and forbidden to attend just to keep up the illusion it also proved a bit Troublesome for those nodding on the joke both in print and video and led to at least one very confused interviewer in the rundown of credits it shows that you have eight different Howard the Ducks now uh explain to me what eight different Howard the Ducks do well Howard is a very complicated actor and for him to actually perform we need eight different people to be helping him but it is eight different people inside Howard or making Howard making Howard work were they little people dwarfs I mean or no no no no children uh no I just want to clarify is there ever a human inside Howard yes at times there is yeah yeah and at times there is it how are the Ducks marketing also came with a bunch of TV commercials as well as a Marvel produced comic book series and graphic novel there was even dial 1 900 410 doc to your voice messages from Howard himself but the icing on the marketing cake was a massive three-dimensional billboard in the city of Los Angeles with a giant Duck Beacon smoke effects all in all this desperate I mean intricate marketing campaign cost another eight million dollars which brought the final budget to just over 45 million dollars 50 over its original budget now so far Howard the Ducks production chaos has all been behind the scenes but for the public the first real sign of trouble came with a nationwide test screening that June why because it was simply canceled due to delays in post-production and visual effects the movie's prospects did seem to improve with the test screening that wasn't canceled a month later as universal reported that the film was very well received and although it did receive some praise as later revealed by producer Gloria Katz she'd actually ripped up all the negative review cards to give Universal about a report there was also supposed to be a sneak preview a week before the movie came out however this one was also canceled at the last minute Universal's reasoning was to further build a pipe for the movie but it was more than likely to avoid negative press before its official released on August 1st and holy crap did the movie get bad press basically it's about Howard who gets transported across Interstellar Space by some laser experiment on earth and the rest of the story deals with him trying to get back to his home planet I'd love to show you some clips but I can't they didn't send me any do you think if it worked that they would have sent me some sure let me show you what they sent me this is all you're going to sea of Howard the Duck and friends to me it's a lot like the old bait and switch game where you promise them Howard the Duck and you give them Howard the turkey now if you've been a subscriber to the channel for the last couple of years and if not you should totally start now by hitting that subscribe button you would know we've covered a fair amount of mix to poorly reviewed movies upon their initial release but none of these even compare to the universal dislike nay hatred of Howard the Duck the reviews were scathing and negative in every sense of the word and also came with an absurd amount of duck ponds a large portion of the hatred went towards Howard the Duck himself but even as George Lucas later said quote it always looked like a person in a duck suit and at the time there just wasn't a way around it his association with the film didn't help as people were expecting the next Indiana Jones the next Luke Skywalker in gut well Howard the Duck many also complained that the movie had far too much mature content to be a kids movie because you know duckboobies got condoms and anything goes adult spa and a very suggestive bedroom scene between Howard and Beverly at the same time however the movie was deemed too silly and juvenile for older teens and adults so it had no real target audience to appeal to it also failed to satisfy fans of the comics with many turned off by Howard's difference in appearance as well as the film's overall lack of the wit social commentary self-awareness and parody of its source material the film's box office fared even worse debuting at number three dropping to number eight and falling out of the top 10 completely by its third week all in all Howard the Duck made a measly 16.2 million dollars domestically and under 40 million worldwide not even enough to cover its entire budget as far as Howard's Creator Steve Gerber according to Gloria Katz he began to badmouth the movie after it was released although I wasn't able to find any direct quotes however in later years is he did Bash the film quite a bit which of course goes against his High Praise before the film's release but those early interviews might have been before he saw the Finnish film what a miscalculation well the film is based on a comic book where he's sort of a wisecracking like you know cynical Groucho Marx type duck if they had done that that would have worked or make it warm a Donald kind of thing kind of fun but instead there is this wandering all over the case where the central character the duck the one that we're going to be rooting for I have a rooting interest in is he neither funny nor bitter funny and it doesn't work at all now as far as the instant ramifications after the film's release there were quite a few remember Universal Studios head honcho said scheinberg who allegedly lobbied for the movie well he outright denied any involvement in Howard the doc and went so far as saying he never even read the script the official blame was put on universal pictures president Frank price and according to insiders an actual fist fight broke out between the two Executives over who was to blame for the movie so Frank price was more or less forced to resign from Universal with the whole situation a major blight on his otherwise prolific career in the film industry another person affected by Howard the Duck was Marvel publisher Stan Lee you see a lot of movie studios were convinced Howard the Duck would be a hit so to jump on the comic book adaptation bandwagon Stan Lee was pitching other Marvel characters to those interested and a lot were that is until Howard the doc proved to be a laughing stock which scared off virtually any and all potential interest it's the reason no Studio would dare take a risk on another Marvel character for well over a decade and Stan Lee was basically Guilty by association for many many years Howard the doc was also the last film withered hike ever directed and aside from eventually getting radio and murders made both him and his writing partner Gloria Katz's future work was by and large uncredited now I could go on and on about all the anecdotes from those involved about just how bad the reception was but I think you get the point not now Dorothy this man is still buried down about his financial situation he was one of the principal backers of Howard the Duck foreign for nearly three decades Howard the duck's Legacy is one of the worst movies ever made endured and was often the butt of many jokes in pop culture his comic book presence was also limited to a holiday special a bizarre reboot of sorts with him as a rat is a job at Disney and another short-lived reboot a few years later he also did make an appearance in the critically acclaimed and George Lucas approved short film George Lucas and love kind of as he was just another joke hey George check out my new Duck question I brought up earlier just how much is George Lucas to blame for Howard the Duck well if you go by the filmmakers Willard hike and Gloria Katz while he was only on set those three days he was very much involved in the writing editing and post-production after filming interviews by those on the production also confirm he was involved with the duck puppets and duck suits as well as everything else I mentioned earlier in the episode sources at Universal on the other hand say he wasn't involved in the riding and was virtually absent from the entire creative process then you have one of the few statements from George Lucas himself in the book The Creative impulse which is the only officially commissioned biography of George Lucas he states that by the time he got involved quote the die had pretty much been cast and that he had major reservations from the very beginning and basically only put his name on it to help out his friends the direct interview with Lucas implies he was barely involved from start to finish but this goes against with the filmmakers and those involved in the film have said so personally I imagine the truth lies somewhere in between and while there's a lot of contradictory information out there I did my best to tell the story either using direct quotes or information backed up by more than one source that said George I'm waiting for your exclusive interview on my channel of just how involved you were in the creation of Howard the Duck Dell this is your Blockbuster card what are you afraid you might go crazy and want to rent Howard the Duck but even with how the movie turned out Howard the doc did lead to quite a few great things for one it was the first movie to digitally erase cables such as when Howard is getting transported to Earth this of course soon became a staple for virtually every action film ever made and is still used today also while countless headlines State Howard the Duck was responsible for the creation at Pixar this is only a partial truth true before Howard the duck's release George Lucas was facing some Financial issues he was in the middle of a costly divorce from his wife Marsha Lucas Building Skywalker Ranch and on top of this the growing production costs of Howard the Duck he also did just so happen to have a computer division within lucasfilm which had recently developed the Pixar Imaging computer but the sale of lucasfilm's Graphics group division was in February of 1986. long long before the film wound up a financial disaster nevertheless the buyer was none other than Apple founder Steve Jobs and later that year the graphics group became Pixar but now it's time to get back to Howard the dock and its Resurgence in the 2000 thousands for the first time on television back to the Futures give me outrageous adventures of debut Network special presentation coming up next now the movie did have its small group of fans in the 80s and even in the 90s had begun to grow into a bit of a cult classic however with the release of Guardians of the Galaxy in 2014 a simple end credit sequence brought Howard the Duck to life for the first time in almost 30 years what do you let it licky like that for gross though brief it was the first real glimpse of Howard the duck's potential with proper technology and you know not in a duck suit his new digital form even made a second on-screen appearance in the film sequel with another a few years later in Avengers end game sadly Steve Gerber never got to see Howard the duck's true return to the spotlight as he passed away in 2008 however the original filmmakers of Howard the Duck did though Gloria cats would tragically pass away of cancer in 2018 but Howard the duck's true return to the spotlight came in 2019 with the announcement of an animated TV show for Hulu that is until it was abruptly canceled the next year he did make an appearance on the Marvel Disney plus there series what if in 2021 but beyond that as of the making of this episode Howard's cinematic future is unknown the reason why is pretty understandable as no one wants to be the person to bring back Howard the Duck to life in a feature film or TV show only to once again fail but my money is on the prediction that someday Howard the Duck will get his own feature film again but whether or not it'll be another financial disaster we'll have to wait and see [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music]

Channel: Yesterworld Entertainment

Views: 606,138

Keywords: yesterworld, the disastrous history of howard the duck, George Lucas howard the duck, HOWARD THE DUCK movie history, howard the duck history, George Lucas and howard the duck, marvel Howard the duck, worst movies ever made, Howard the Duck 1986, Willard Huyck Gloria Katz howard the duck, Yesterworld: The Disastrous History of Howard the Duck, interesting movie history, marvel movie history

Id: qCvoXrCwrhs

Length: 56min 2sec (3362 seconds)

Published: Fri Dec 16 2022