Epic Trailers That Were Wasted On The Worst Movies

It's a sad, cinematic truth: many movies are nowhere near as entertaining as their epic,
exciting trailers suggest.
What are trailers but semi-spoilery commercials designed to get butts in seats anyhow?
Once that thrilling, transcendent trailer lures you into a sticky theater with a bucket
of popcorn under your arm, you find out the horrible truth.
Here are just a few epic trailers that were wasted on disappointing movies.
Prometheus
After 15 years away from the Alien franchise, Prometheus promised to be a ground-breaking
return to form for director Ridley Scott.
Plus, we'd totally get to see, like, billions of xenomorphs, right?
Or see where they came from?
Maybe have coffee with that Space Jockey guy?
He seemed cool.
The first trailer does an amazing job reminding the audience of just how awesome the Aliens
franchise can be, despite its long time out of theaters and that whole Alien versus Predator
thing.
The name Prometheus fades in just like in Alien, and we slowly catch glimpses of elements
from the original movie.
In the space of one minute, it's a masterclass in visual storytelling, and tons of trailers
have copied the same format.
But despite average to positive reviews, Prometheus never hit the same highs as Alien, and it
just left audiences with even more questions.
Judging by the trailer, however, it could have been much, much more.
And would it kill Ridley Scott to throw in a few more xenomorphs?
The Phantom Menace
In the dark ages before YouTube, watching movie trailers was hard.
You had to know which films the trailers were attached to, and hope your theater was showing
the right ones.
When the trailer for The Phantom Menace dropped, fans were so hyped that they bought tickets
to other movies just to see the trailer, not even staying for the movie afterwards.
All through November 1998, theaters sold out tickets to movies like A Bug's Life, only
to have seats empty out before the opening titles even rolled.
We all know how The Phantom Menace turned out, but the trailer was actually really good.
The opening shot of a fog-covered swamp with the Force Theme is still spine-tingling.
The visuals look awesome, and even the awkward Yoda lines feel epic.
It's so good that it almost makes us want to go back and watch Episode I again.
Almost.
In the Heart of the Sea
Whaling doesn't top many lists of "Things There Aren't Enough Movies About," but In
the Heart of the Sea looked like it was ready to change that.
This trailer had everything: beautiful cinematography, cool special effects shots, some kind of secret
water monster, and Thor looking badass holding a spear!
What's not to love?
The trailer was so good that at least four million people watched it on purpose, many
of whom never even knew they wanted to see a whaling movie.
Unfortunately, the only good things about the movie were all packed into the trailer.
Despite being stocked with talented actors and having Ron Howard in the director's chair,
the film never connected with the audience.
It earned a meager 42% on Rotten Tomatoes, with reviewers mostly calling the film boring,
unconvincing, and dry.
Which is saying something, considering the movie takes place in the water.
In the end, all it did was prove that not even Chris Hemsworth's rippling muscles can
save a sinking ship.
Battle: Los Angeles
Most movie trailers are just made of attractive scenes slapped together in some kind of coherent
order, but a few become pieces of art on their own.
Battle: Los Angeles is pure trailer art.
Opening with shots of UFO sightings from around the world, it gave us a feast of the best
visuals from the movie, set to Johann Johannsson's haunting "Part Five."
The movie looked like a mixture of Saving Private Ryan and Independence Day; a reinvention
the alien invasion genre.
Or so we thought.
In reality, Battle: Los Angeles earned poor ratings for a reason.
Roger Ebert gave the film one half of a star and called it "ugly and stupid", continuing,
"If you attend this crap with friends who admire it, tactfully inform them they are
idiots."
The trailer was another story.
It was so good, in fact, that two years later, Edge of Tomorrow copied it shot-for-shot and
even used another Johann Johannsson song as its soundtrack—only this time, the movie
actually delivered on its trailer's promise.
Tron: Legacy
1982's Tron acquired a cult following after mediocre returns at the box office.
Decades after the original whiffed, the studio tried hard to make Tron trendy—and with
their awesome trailer for Tron: Legacy, they almost succeeded.
There are many things to love about the trailer for Legacy: nostalgia, great music, neon junk
everywhere, and who could forget Olivia Wilde?
11 million views on YouTube proved that the world was ready for a Tron sequel.
Until it actually came out.
USA Today summed up most reviewers' sentiments by calling it "impenetrable and nonsensical."
Despite its excellent trailer, it failed to win over critics or restart the franchise.
Even today, people only really remember it for its soundtrack, and maybe that's the best
way to look at it: a two hour long Daft Punk music video.
The Last Airbender
It seemed like the movie to that was going to save M. Night Shyamalan from himself.
All he had to do was adapt the story of a hit franchise, write semi-competent dialogue,
and ride the brand-recognition of The Last Airbender all the way to the bank.
This was a slam dunk, and the trailer tricked us into thinking he'd scored.
It had all the elements that we loved from the cartoon show, faithfully adapted to live
action.
It even actually looked good.
And then it bombed.
At 6% on Rotten Tomatoes, The Last Airbender is the lowest-rated Shyamalan film, and that
includes The Happening, the movie where trees are the villains.
The Atlantic compared the film to
"A chronic illness that worsens and worsens without ever quite proving terminal."
TIME magazine also summoned up spectres of death, saying,
"The actors who didn't get to be in The Last Airbender are like the passengers who arrived
too late to catch the final flight of the Hindenburg."
Oh, the humanity.
But perhaps one fan said it best.
"I want my money back… and I actually wish I had my hair back too."
Thanks for watching!
Click the Looper icon to subscribe to our YouTube channel.
Plus check out all this cool stuff we know you'll love, too!

Epic Trailers That Were Wasted On The Worst Movies

Latest Posts