I'm not so much in the business myself. Most of my friend are, but I've gone more the business/government route because I actually like things like...paychecks that show up on time, and food, and sleep. Honestly, I've had pets that get treated better than Hollywood CGI workers.
But my understanding is...sadly, that it's not only common, but it's BY FAR the norm. It's a business, they are there to make money. Half the time even the toys start production before the story is finalized. That old commercial where they talk about banging out the script over the weekend wasn't parody, it was practically a documentary.
Having said that, this movie seems to be as obvious about it as any I've ever seen. Motorcycles...a dinosaur...there's just no pretending that things like that didn't happen because there was a board room meeting and one suit said "They should have motorcycles! Motorcycles are cool!" and another said "What about a dinosaur? That dinosaur movie looks like it's going to be huge this year!"
In the end, we're just lucky the notes didn't get mixed up and they aren't actually riding the dinosaur.
But having said that...NOT AT ALL uncommon. Especially with casting. Getting some names attached often precedes much of the funding, so it's often the case that the writer hasn't even been hired before the cast is chosen. From a business side, it makes perfect sense. The names are a huge part of what puts butts in the seats. The same movie starring an unknown vs. starring Tom Cruise could be a 50 million dollar swing. I might be willing to invest some bucks in the next Stallone movie because if its even in English it'll sell some tickets. Doesn't matter if it sucks. As long as it covers the spread opening weekend, before anyone even finds out what a turd it is, we'll still make bank.
But is sucks form a story sense, and is the reason why we get so many oddball sequels that run the exact same gags as each other. Because those suits are not story tellers. They are businessmen, and there is a checklist in a sense. It may not be written down, but "things that movies do that make millions of dollars" is often just thought of as another way of saying "Things we're damn well going to do in our next film even if we have to waterboard the writer and director into including it."
Now for this movie, I have no way of knowing if thats really whats going on here, and even if it is, that does NOT always mean the movie will be bad. The right people can save even the weakest script, and even the most obvious cliches can become funny parodies in the right hands. But it's certainly not the slam dunk they seem to think it is.
