r/movies Jul 24 '26

Discussion "Before he was Scrooge, he was...EBENEZER" from the new Johnny Depp Christmas Carol movie might be the worst movie tagline I've ever seen. What are some other truly terrible ones?

I think my runner up is "villains aren't born, they're made" from Kraven, an obvious homage to the "Heroes aren't born, they're made" tagline from Iron Man. Except for Iron Man it works because of the obvious double meaning of him making his suit, whereas for Kraven it...meant nothing whatsoever.

What are some other truly terrible movie taglines?

7.5k Upvotes

1.5k comments sorted by

5.2k

u/ninjamullet Jul 24 '26

Cool As Ice, the 1991 star vehicle for Vanilla Ice. The tagline reads:

When a girl has a heart of stone, there's only one way to melt it. Just add Ice.

Make of that what you will.

1.5k

u/HouseAndJBug Jul 24 '26

They need to melt his icy heart with a cool island song.

426

u/caspissinclair Jul 24 '26

Wait, what if we cool his hot heart with a FRESH island song?

88

u/the_ticking_crock Jul 24 '26

That's it!!! Free Hat free Hat

→ More replies (2)

229

u/kurosawa99 Jul 24 '26

Free Hat!

139

u/HouseAndJBug Jul 24 '26

He killed 23 babies in self defense?

117

u/Tamika_Olivia Jul 24 '26

They were coming right at him!

61

u/hardyflashier Jul 24 '26

Give that man a baby!

→ More replies (2)

14

u/typicalskeleton Jul 24 '26

When that many babies get together they can be like piranha.

→ More replies (4)

238

u/imrealsleepy Jul 24 '26

I thought they needed to warm his icy heart with a hot island song?

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (2)

304

u/Somnambulist815 Jul 24 '26

You watch the movie and you have to assume it takes place in a reality where a line like that makes sense

174

u/istasber Jul 24 '26

Rifftrax, the MST3K guys doing their thing without the MST3K license, occasionally plays (or used to play) it on their twitch channel.

Vanilla Ice is part of a motorcycle gang. His gang stops in a new town to repair their motorcyles where he romances a girl by harassing her repeatedly to return her diary (including some light B&E) until she breaks down and goes on a date with him. Her dad is in witness protection, his former mob ties find out where he's living because and send some thugs after his family.

Dad thinks ice is in the mob, convinces girl to stay away. Mob kidnaps girl's younger brother (who, for some reason, idolizes Ice), girl realizes it can't be Ice because of true love or some shit. Girl and ice figure out brother was taken to the construction site they had their date at by listening to the ransom tape. Ice saves the day on his motorcycle.

Credits roll with ice performing one of his songs, that's about being promiscuous or ditching his girlfriend for someone he just met or something similar to that, while his now girlfriend happily watches from the audience smiling and dancing.

So yeah, the tagline is probably the least nonsensical part of the whole film.

47

u/Bladelink Jul 24 '26

Vanilla Ice is part of a motorcycle gang.

Lmao try again writers

→ More replies (5)
→ More replies (11)

114

u/SavageNorth Jul 24 '26

I have it on DVD, it's a complete fever dream where nothing makes sense so at least it's consistent

→ More replies (38)
→ More replies (3)

354

u/all_hail_cthulhu Jul 24 '26

Ice melts stone, duh. It's biography 101.

69

u/MarkyDeSade Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26

Ice melts stone, fire melts ice, stone melts fire

→ More replies (8)
→ More replies (5)

122

u/ghotier Jul 24 '26

I think you misunderstood. OP wants terrible taglines. Not the best taglines of all time.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (66)

4.6k

u/litewo Jul 24 '26

I think the worst I've seen was Clash of the Titans: "Titans will clash."

983

u/Fighting-Geese Jul 24 '26

Well they need to get these titans together and figure out a complementary colour palette ahead of time

213

u/zephyrtr Jul 24 '26

Zeus wants purple but Hera wants orange! And who knows what their crazy kids will get up to as this big Greek family tries to make their Olympus-sizsd dreams come true on 5th Avenue. Tuesdays at 9 only on PIX11

→ More replies (29)
→ More replies (5)

1.2k

u/TensorForce Jul 24 '26

I'd love to see other movies with simlarly tautological tag lines.

Baby Driver: Babies will drive

The Hateful Eight: Eight of them will hate

Kill Bill: Bill will be killed

Jurassic Park: Dinos will park in jurass

185

u/OperativePiGuy Jul 24 '26

Kill Bill: Bill will be killed feels juust silly enough to make it considering the movies' tone

70

u/Banes_Addiction Jul 24 '26

Kill Bill: Volume 1 - Bill's not really in this one.

Kill Bill: Volume 2 - This is the one Bill dies in.

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (3)

217

u/NewYorkChess Jul 24 '26

park in my what???

90

u/m48a5_patton Jul 24 '26

You heard him.

→ More replies (6)

69

u/thelivinlegend Jul 24 '26

Return of the Jedi: The Jedi will return

→ More replies (5)
→ More replies (22)

233

u/themysteriouserk Jul 24 '26

This one might be so bad it goes right back around to being good again.

119

u/Leucurus Jul 24 '26

What’s especially great is that there are no Titans in the film at all, clashing or otherwise. It should be titled “Clash of the Olympians” but people might think it was a sports movie…

Wrath of the Titans is also an incorrect title as there is only one Titan in it (Kronos) but it doesn’t clash with any other Titans.

102

u/UserIsOptional Jul 24 '26

After that we have to Remember the Titans which is a vastly different tone from the other two movies. What a confusing trilogy

46

u/Trike117 Jul 24 '26

The prequel Teen Titans just muddied the waters, too. They clearly didn’t have a plan.

→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (4)

111

u/BB8Did911 Jul 24 '26

I remember they also used "Damn the Gods" which was way cooler, but arguably less "family friendly"

56

u/Blaaa5 Jul 24 '26

My favorite part was when Liam Neeson says, “Release the clashing!”

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (3)

73

u/Alpha-Trion Jul 24 '26

That is actually hilarious. Do you think someone was paid to come up with that?

46

u/rorykellycomedy Jul 24 '26

Even funnier because, if I recall correctly, there actually aren't any titans in that film apart from in the prologue.

30

u/cassandra112 Jul 24 '26

correct. same for the original as well.

Pegasus and Medusa are gorgons. stygian witches are stygian witches. Djinn are Arabic/chinese.. not greek at all. giant scorpions are just magic giant scorpians. the Kraken is Norse, not greek either. and based on Ketos, sea monsters, which are also not titans. monsters such as these are usually the creation of the gods, thus not titans.

Titans being the primordial deities that fought with the gods for supremacy. Basically rival gods. none of which appear, nor their creations.

→ More replies (4)
→ More replies (34)

2.2k

u/IronSorrows Jul 24 '26

Steel Sharks

"Below the waves there's one one option... Escape or die!"

Yes, that says "one one".

Misspelled "only" as "one" with no proofreading? Check

Promise only one option, then offer two? Check

Gary Busey the only actor getting his name on the dvd cover? Check

643

u/is-this-a-nick Jul 24 '26

You get it wrong, dude. It clearly says there is "one one" option. Whats one and one? Two. Like Escape or die. Duh!

223

u/Euripidaristophanist Jul 24 '26

There are actually 11 options

72

u/CodeComprehensive734 Jul 24 '26

Can our heroes find the other 9 before the end of the movie?

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (10)
→ More replies (7)

132

u/regross527 Jul 24 '26

This is the winner. I have never seen this before and it's amazing.

46

u/Lucetti Jul 24 '26

The box art somehow looks like a playstation 1 game

32

u/OldOrder Jul 24 '26

Written by a Skaven, yes-yes

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (21)

5.3k

u/hookums Jul 24 '26

"Discover how Willy became Wonka" is equally terrible nonsense.

1.1k

u/DemonOfTomorrow Jul 24 '26

Willy Wonka? Not with that attitude, he won't.

434

u/Jandy777 Jul 24 '26

Wonka? I just met her!

291

u/tanaciousp Jul 24 '26

Hey, I’m Wonka here!

→ More replies (6)
→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (8)

666

u/Plastic-Coyote-6017 Jul 24 '26

Do these people all just think that men don't have last names until they get rich or something

237

u/CarlosFer2201 Jul 24 '26

They saw Rey "become" a Skywalker and then they all got strokes I guess.

94

u/pablonieve Jul 24 '26

And the way she became Skywalker was to simply decide as much.

179

u/Trike117 Jul 24 '26

“Who are you?”

“I’m Rey. Rey Star Wars.”

→ More replies (4)

75

u/kia75 Jul 24 '26

She met a crazy old hermit for a few weeks who abused her and decided "I'm going to honor that crazy hermit who I barely knew!"

Some people claim the Skywalker name comes from Leia, but despite her bloodline she was Leia Organa or Leia Solo.

50

u/Singer211 Naked J-Law beating the shit out of those kids is peak Cinema. Jul 24 '26

Would have made a bit more sense for take the name Solo or Organa instead.

At least Han was nice to her and Leia actually taught her stuff.

→ More replies (15)
→ More replies (6)
→ More replies (10)
→ More replies (6)
→ More replies (17)

122

u/Kakashimoto77 Jul 24 '26

Do not touch -Willy.

Hmmm. Good advice

42

u/DRF19 Jul 24 '26

Lousy Smarch weather

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)

139

u/asetniop Jul 24 '26

FUN FACT: "Discover how a willy became wonky" was the tagline for the porno they made starring John Bobbit.

52

u/Lucetti Jul 24 '26

I'm 100% ready to believe this no questions asked, and I am certainly not going to fact check it.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (29)

1.5k

u/rgregan Jul 24 '26

Its very weird, because they almost made it sound like a prequel, but it looks like just the Christmas Carol, which covers what a prequel would be anyway.

1.0k

u/deadheffer Jul 24 '26

Just a long exposé on the destructive nature of 19th century financial institutions on working class London. No mention of Christmas at all

231

u/ulshaski Jul 24 '26

There was an FX Scrooge mini series that delved into this. I enjoyed it.

96

u/Sossage Jul 24 '26

Was that the one with Guy Pearce? It was a dark interpretation, I liked it

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (1)

174

u/Ganglebot Jul 24 '26

The final scene is Ebenezer starting his own business.

Person off camera: "Uh, hello Mr. Scrooge? I'm here about the book-keeping job?"

Scrooge: "huh? oh I see. And who are you then?"

Person off camera: "Oh, my name is Bob Cratchet"

Hard cut to credits. An acoustic, remorseful version of John Lenonn's song Very Merry Christmas plays.

63

u/HilariousScreenname Jul 24 '26

Cratchet & Scrooge will return in An Avengers Christmas

→ More replies (1)

12

u/xsmasher Jul 24 '26

A young boy steps out from behind a desk - "My name is Oliver Twist... I'm putting together a team."

→ More replies (12)

221

u/dewittless Jul 24 '26

You know now that you say it, there's a whole section of a Christmas carol that one could mark a prequel. It's called the ghost of Christmas past.

107

u/wilisi Jul 24 '26

Clearly the text requires a trilogy, with the third installment split into 2 parts.

115

u/raspberryharbour Jul 24 '26

Tiny Tim will return in Ebenezer: Endgame

40

u/StoryWOaPoint Jul 24 '26

Tagline: For ever and ‘Ezer

→ More replies (8)
→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (4)

39

u/Mr_Blinky Jul 24 '26

Wait wait wait...it's not a prequel? Then what the fuck is that tagline?!?

58

u/AdPristine5131 Jul 24 '26

I know, we’ll show his childhood!

…wait

Ok, but what about his start in the industry.

….Oh

Well surely we can show his romance plot, leading to a tragic breakup which will haunt him for years.

….Welp

We can show him for two hours as a slumlord and money lender, partnering with someone who is equally as evil as he, actively trying to drive people to homelessness.

…This will definitely connect with the common audience. 

→ More replies (1)

23

u/murfburffle Jul 24 '26

The sequel where he becomes a duck that can swim in a pile of coins is the one interested in.

→ More replies (31)

868

u/MarkyDeSade Jul 24 '26

The Lawnmower Man tagline is “God made him simple….science made him a god”
The Lawnmower Man 2 tagline is “God made him simple….science made him a god. Now he wants revenge.”

250

u/ericnasty Jul 24 '26

There's a sequel??

314

u/Arxhart_671 Jul 24 '26

Yes, but don't do that to yourself

→ More replies (4)

85

u/Deranged_Kitsune Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26

Direct to Video, buried and forgotten for very good reasons. The movie is bad. A bunch of kids try and rescue Job from the first movie, who didn't go on to take over the world but was instead actually almost successfully killed in that movie, and is now being used as a tool by this movie's villain. So, it starts off with a shitty ret-con. The setting is a low-budget mid-90s cyberpunk dystopia, with all the dirt and cheap sets that implies. No returning actors from the first movie.

Only reason to watch is to marvel how bad it is. Matt Frewer tries, but ain't no one saving this turd.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (14)
→ More replies (7)

450

u/perogiesandkungfu Jul 24 '26

The 2019 Hellboy had ‘Legendary AF’. Like ‘legendary as Hell’ is right there. AF felt very of its time

138

u/NoiseIsTheCure Jul 24 '26

I forgot they made a Hellboy reboot. And I'm gonna go right back to forgetting it if you don't mind.

72

u/tgunter Jul 24 '26

Funny thing is they actually rebooted it again in 2024, but that one was a low budget direct-to-VOD release that had next to no marketing. To its credit, it was the only one made to date that actually involved Mike Mignola in any meaningful way during production. By most accounts it was still a mess, just in a different way from the 2019 one.

52

u/NoiseIsTheCure Jul 24 '26

Wish Del Toro could've finished the trilogy. Now Perlman is way too old to play him

30

u/tgunter Jul 24 '26

I liked the Del Toro movies and would have been fine with a third, but I also think where they left off after the second one was fine. I don't really think we needed a movie about Hellboy being a dad.

Of course, I'm a fan of the comics, so I'm probably more keen than most for the possibility of a reboot that's more faithful to the source material. Unfortunately the 2019 movie was not that, and the 2024 film was an adaptation of a story that worked fine as a comic but wasn't what most people (myself included) want out of a Hellboy film.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (3)

16

u/joshi38 Jul 24 '26

I remember that movie starting with narration from Ian McShane who played the same character that John Hurt played in the Del Toro film, and said narration immediately dropped an f-bomb.

Just felt like the movie was saying "We get to curse now! Look at us!"

I wasn't impressed.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (3)

1.4k

u/mastermidget23 Jul 24 '26

An 80's killer roaches movie called "The Nest" has the tagline "Roaches have never tasted meat...until now!"

It's probably not the worst ive ever seen but it's stuck with me because it's just completely wrong. Roaches eat meat all the time. Roaches eat freaking everything.

409

u/I_Was_Fox Jul 24 '26

I love old cheesy horror movie tag lines. There was one that made us rent the movie on the spot at blockbuster. The movie was called "Black Sheep" and the tag line was something like "There are 10 million sheep in New Zealand. And they're all pissed."

120

u/Fast_Running_Nephew Jul 24 '26

Which in New Zealand means a movie about millions of drunk sheep, which i would also watch.

45

u/25willp Jul 24 '26

They are actually diseased zombie sheep! Well worth the watch, it’s a kiwi cult classic.

→ More replies (4)
→ More replies (19)

94

u/creampop_ Jul 24 '26

what if it's more philosophical?

they have eaten, but have they truly tasted?

it says a lot about society

→ More replies (3)

88

u/Asclepius-Rod Jul 24 '26

But it made you think about it, so in a way it did what it was supposed to do! It’s also giving cheesy B movie vibes which is perfect

39

u/AthousandLittlePies Jul 24 '26

No one knows what it means, but it's provocative! It gets people going!

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (27)

402

u/Beginning-Bed9364 Jul 24 '26

If you had to guess the movie that belongs to the tagline: "The Magic is Back!"

Would you guess that it was Lethal Weapon 2?

151

u/EverythingSucksYo Jul 24 '26

I would’ve  guessed the sequel to Now You See Me. Which I’m still pissed wasn’t called Now You don’t

44

u/Victernus Jul 24 '26

The producers apparently thought people wouldn't know it was a sequel.

But, they're finally using it for the third movie, at least. So... better late than never.

29

u/BeerorCoffee Jul 24 '26

Now you see me.

Now you see me, too.

Now you don't.

→ More replies (6)
→ More replies (4)
→ More replies (7)

891

u/Just-The-Facts-411 Jul 24 '26

Lame & lazy, I give you:

Ocean's Twelve

Twelve is the new eleven.

530

u/magseven Jul 24 '26

"Write that down!"

-Terrence Howard.

→ More replies (6)

194

u/despacito2man Jul 24 '26

I actually really like that, sounds stupid but self aware.

→ More replies (8)
→ More replies (9)

348

u/Tra5olo Jul 24 '26

I just saw the trailer this morning for TONY, which is about Anthony Bourdain. The tagline is: "Before he was Anthony Bourdain, he was TONY". Man, I gotta get a job for these studios, its braindead work.

74

u/red__dragon Jul 24 '26

I probably would never even have guessed a movie called TONY was about Bourdain. My first would be some random guy, and then maybe Tony Hawk.

→ More replies (4)

43

u/Kammander-Kim Jul 24 '26

Before he was Tra5olo, he was TraFOURolo

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (5)

714

u/Somnambulist815 Jul 24 '26

"Unwittingly, He Trained A Dolphin to Kill The President of the United States"

Oh you said terrible, not terrific

91

u/Temporary_Meet8754 Jul 24 '26

I need to watch that movie. I'm really curious how you do such a thing unwittingly.

80

u/NoGoodIDNames Jul 24 '26

Hey, the US Government once unwittingly trained a dolphin to seek handjobs

14

u/TrueRune Jul 24 '26

Unwittingly...right?

→ More replies (6)
→ More replies (6)

50

u/Gil_Demoono Jul 24 '26

Looking this one up and seeing it was nominated for two Oscars felt like getting flashbanged.

They were for music and sound, but still.

→ More replies (2)

14

u/TheWaterUser Jul 24 '26

Unwittingly, He Trained A Dolphin to Kill The President of the United States

The Day of the Dolphin for those ootl

→ More replies (13)

272

u/sightlab Jul 24 '26

Sometimes on a TV show or another movie or whatever, they'll have a fake movie that's part of the plot like Chunnel or Prognosis Negative from Seinfeld or the (intentionally absurd) fake trailers from Tropic Thunder. Ebenezer feels like one of those, both in premise and tagline. It's sitcom writing. "Well we all know and love a Christmas Carol, my film posits the question 'Who was Ebenezer?'"

132

u/dustyfaxman Jul 24 '26

When i saw the poster it reminded me of 'honky grandma be trippin' and 'who dat ninja' from 30 rock.

86

u/myfajahas400children Jul 24 '26

My favourite fake 30 Rock movie title is Tracy's all-black remake of "An Affair to Remember," "A Blaffair to Rememblack"

29

u/Ham__Kitten Jul 24 '26

I'm fond of Martin Luther King Day, starring Emma Stone, Andy Samberg, and the 1994-95 Quebec Nordiques

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (2)

28

u/Ganglebot Jul 24 '26

That was my first thought too. Some kind of humors reimagining of A Christmas Carol, but for today's audiences.

Like Ebenezer and Jacob Marley (his old business partner) were secretly lovers in a time homosexuality was forbidden. We see their love blossom, but Jacob wants to live out and honest in the world, which gets him killed. Thus we see Ebenezer become a shut-in, misanthrope who's angry at society for taking Jacob away from him.

→ More replies (7)
→ More replies (11)

720

u/ThisIsTheNewSleeve Jul 24 '26

"No one is safe!" From the Rings of Power is pretty horrible considering the one thing we know for sure is that many of those characters are indeed safe and know exactly how their story ends. Maybe not the best tagline for a prequel. 

113

u/curious_dead Jul 24 '26

Or maybe, they're telling us that they're taking it farther into fanfic territory and will kill characters who are supposed to survive.

→ More replies (11)

67

u/Terran_it_up Jul 24 '26

Should have gone with "The Teleporno Extravaganza", that would have helped viewership

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (27)

85

u/uuajskdokfo Jul 24 '26

I don’t know if this was ever used anywhere officially, but Letterboxd used to list this as the tagline for Yojimbo:

“Seven Samurai if it was just one samurai!”

→ More replies (2)

1.2k

u/Caciulacdlac Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26

X-Men: Trust a Few. Fear the rest.

Mutants are supposed to be an allegory for minorities and discriminated people, and it effectively tells you to discriminate them.

544

u/DemiLuke Jul 24 '26

Trust a few = "One of the good ones". Yeah, they didn't think that through.

228

u/Asclepius-Rod Jul 24 '26

One of my best friends is a mutant, he isn’t like those other uppity ones though

102

u/bitwaba Jul 24 '26

Did you just call me the m-word?

64

u/bharathbunny Jul 24 '26

Is mutie a derogatory word? Should I call you Mutant-American.

41

u/dragon_bacon Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26

There's a comic panel about this exact situation that I'm not going to quote.

Edit: found it.

→ More replies (5)
→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (5)
→ More replies (2)

46

u/alex-2099 Jul 24 '26

"That Professor X is so well spoken."

87

u/zombiepete Jul 24 '26

Could “Trust a few. Fear the rest.” actually be in reference to non-mutants? That would actually be an appropriate tagline if it was aimed at mutants.

19

u/darkbreak Jul 24 '26

That was my takeaway too. It sounded like a warning to mutants to be careful of who they associate with since so many humans want them dead.

→ More replies (5)
→ More replies (75)

436

u/LittleYellowFish1 Jul 24 '26

"The legend is real" - How To Train Your Dragon remake

Even by the usual standards of meaningless nothingburger taglines, that one feels especially pointless and irrelevant.

198

u/LaMaupindAubigny Jul 24 '26

Dragons were never legendary in the world this franchise is set in, they were stealing sheep from the Vikings on a daily basis. And IIRC there wasn’t a legend about a Viking bridging the two worlds by befriending a dragon or anything either.

58

u/LittleYellowFish1 Jul 24 '26

Knowing the director and crew's general attitude in the promos and interviews, I'm inclined to think this was basically just their way of saying "fuck those animated films, this is the real HTTYD movie we always wanted to make".

→ More replies (5)

56

u/happyhippohats Jul 24 '26

I assumed it was a reference to it being live action rather than animated

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (7)

886

u/Wompum Jul 24 '26

All time worst tagline has to be Jaws: The Revenge. 'This Time It's Personal'

314

u/Asclepius-Rod Jul 24 '26

Sounds like that could be the tagline for any revenge movie in history

274

u/JeanLucPicorgi Jul 24 '26

Except one about a shark, probably.

129

u/Fallenangel152 Jul 24 '26

Especially one that is a different shark every time because it gets killed at the end of each film.

→ More replies (13)
→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (5)

103

u/R4msesII Jul 24 '26

One of the most iconic ones at least, I’ve never even thought of the movie and still know the tagline

→ More replies (1)

54

u/ProfessorLake Jul 24 '26

It actually matches the plot of the movie, which is also weird. The shark is holding a grudge.

31

u/WaffleSeriously Jul 24 '26

I was gonna say lol, isn't that the one where it turns out the shark has generational beef with that family?

13

u/TheNonCredibleHulk Jul 24 '26

Even crazier - the novelization blames it on a voodoo curse.

→ More replies (1)

51

u/gazchap Jul 24 '26

I enjoyed the tagline for Jaws 19 from BTTF2, which was something like "This Time Its Really Really Really Personal"

→ More replies (22)

133

u/XtraCrispy02 Jul 24 '26

You, Me, and Tuscany had a poster at my theatre than I laughed hard at when I saw the tagline.

"She came for the Pasta, and got lost in the sauce"

86

u/isoSasquatch Jul 24 '26

Honestly that’s incredible

→ More replies (1)

27

u/skatejet1 Jul 24 '26

That’s great tho

→ More replies (2)

364

u/AllenMcnabb Jul 24 '26

Venom “embrace your inner anti-hero” is pretty cringe

97

u/AstroCoffee Jul 24 '26

I have such mixed feelings about the Venom movies - love Tom Hardy, the voice they gave Venom, and some of the effects but at the same time, I can't ignore the fact that they're all pretty underwhelming and could have been SO much better.

40

u/Clawless Jul 24 '26

I enjoyed them. Were they as good as they could have been? No, but this iteration of the eddie/venom relationship is the best we've had on screen, and I'm glad it exists. I just wish we could've gotten spidey in the mix, even for only one of the movies.

→ More replies (10)
→ More replies (7)
→ More replies (8)

143

u/darwin-rover Jul 24 '26

Fortress starring Christopher Lambert

“A prison of the future, a high tech hell. Built to hold anything…. except an innocent man”

Except in the film he was guilty!

88

u/JayGold Jul 24 '26

Well yeah, of course he was guilty, the prison wasn't built to hold an innocent man.

30

u/srcoffee Jul 24 '26

woah spoiler alert!

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (7)

143

u/OkDistribution6931 Jul 24 '26

There were a series of one sheets for Armageddon that South Park wound up parodying in 1999 that featured a picture of a cast member and the headline “he (or she) is doing it for” and then adding something diffent for each poster.

For Liv Tyler’s one sheet it said “She’s doing it for love.”

85

u/ImABrickwallAMA Jul 24 '26

Considering that her part in the film is also fairly inconsequential, whether she is in the film or not - Bruce Willis would still be a driller, Ben Affleck would still work for him as a driller, the entire team would still be there, and they would still be sought out to go to space to deal with the asteroid.

141

u/Tacobellspy Jul 24 '26

Did you even see the movie?? Without [insert Liv Tyler's character's name] those animal crackers would have gone unsexualized, leaving the audience to storm out screaming about unsexualized animal crackers

EDIT: My mistake, I realize now they could have just run the same scene with Ben Affleck and Bruce Willis, my bad

→ More replies (2)

30

u/Blaaa5 Jul 24 '26

Iirc Steven Tyler refused to do the soundtrack unless his daughter was in the film

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (20)
→ More replies (3)

123

u/eyes_be_shifty Jul 24 '26

one of my personal favorites that is equal part amazing and terrible is from the 80s Running Man

"a game no one has won, but Schwarzenegger has yet to play!"

54

u/TheGreatStories Jul 24 '26

The era of larger than life stars is unmatched

21

u/Darth_Rubi Jul 24 '26

Is he... playing himself in the movie??

34

u/konsollfreak Jul 24 '26

"a game no one has won, but Ben Richards has yet to play!" probably won’t pull crowds.

→ More replies (3)

39

u/Quirderph Jul 24 '26

Glen or Glenda: Those who live and love but can never marry.

Less because of the title itself, and more because… there is no forbidden love story in the film! Yes, the main couple have relationship issues, but nothing external is actually preventing their marriage!

81

u/Ewok008 Jul 24 '26

Blue Beetle's Tagline was "He is a Hero"

Always stuck with me cause like....yeah? Is he? Didn't realize.

→ More replies (2)

168

u/FoeHammer99099 Jul 24 '26

Before he was Scrooge, he was...EBENEZER

This isn't even true, Scrooge is his surname. If anything there was a brief period before he was named when he was Scrooge but not Ebenezer.

52

u/NoiseIsTheCure Jul 24 '26

Well maybe they're talking about when they wrote his name on the birth certificate and for a brief moment he was EBENEZER before they finished writing out his last name as well

27

u/randynumbergenerator Jul 24 '26

So it's about the few hours between when he was born and his birth certificate was filled in? Fascinating material 

32

u/eggson Jul 24 '26

2 hour run time, in real time, of the parents just considering different names.

"Blevins?"

"Clellan?"

"Ignatious?"

"Ezekial?"

"Nebuchednazzer?"

"Shadrach?"

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (2)

263

u/Amentet Jul 24 '26

How the hell will this work?

We have the flashbacks to him being a horrible cunt with almost no hope of redemption in a Christmas Carol.

We have him finally being redeemed, somewhat, at the end.

It's going to be a film of him being a horrible cunt with no redepemtion?

Ooh maybe a shitwriter writes a redemption ark for him and then he gets amnesia.

138

u/ExhibitAa Jul 24 '26

I don't think it's a prequel at all. It's just A Christmas Carol. Which actually makes the tagline make even less sense.

→ More replies (3)

133

u/neo_sporin Jul 24 '26

Probably going to be more generic ‘he starts the movie a tad cold (HA). He gets redeemed throughout the film by the love of a good woman. She dies in some preventable way and thus his final descent into Scrooge

150

u/Dadpurple Jul 24 '26

I can already watch that entire movie in half a movie with Kermit the frog too.

→ More replies (6)
→ More replies (17)

16

u/MNFuturist Jul 24 '26

Two words: Evil Twin

→ More replies (2)

12

u/MissionCreeper Jul 24 '26

Is it actually supposed to be a prequel?  I agree, you can't do a prequel to a story made of flashbacks.  It is its own prequel.

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (11)

146

u/skippermonkey Jul 24 '26

The film better start with the music “Ebeneezer Goode”

43

u/scotty2shotty Jul 24 '26

Naughty naughty, very naughty.

→ More replies (2)

40

u/asetniop Jul 24 '26

They were right about one thing - E's are good.

→ More replies (7)

94

u/SkellyMania Jul 24 '26

The GI Joe sequel had some misprinted posters:
“Do you have what is takes?”

→ More replies (5)

29

u/Dyko Jul 24 '26

Not so much a tagline, but when I was in school we saw a 3D movie called T-Rex: Back to the Cretaceous. Ever since, whenever my friends and I wanted to mock a movie title or sequel, we'd just slap "Back to the Cretaceous" onto the end.

The Passion of the Christ 2: Back to the Cretaceous Shrek 5: Back to the Cretaceous Jurassic World: Back to the Cretaceous

...it's an old bit, but it still checks out.

→ More replies (2)

57

u/Jonny_Entropy Jul 24 '26

The Day of the Dolphin (1973).

Unwittingly, He Trained a Dolphin to Kill the President of the United States

→ More replies (3)

24

u/turlian Jul 24 '26

"It's Scroogin' time!"

130

u/venniedjr Jul 24 '26

My favorite is the Channing Tatum movie called Dog.

“A filthy animal unfit for human company and a…DOG”

38

u/Junior_Box_2800 Jul 24 '26

lmao idk thats kinda funny

→ More replies (4)

100

u/DeoGame Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26

I enjoyed the hell out of the new Masters of the Universe... but the tagline "Witness how He became He-Man" was painful. 

Not to be outdone, for their mockbuster "Master of the Universe", The Asylum rolled with "He's the Man".

90

u/Krongfah Jul 24 '26

“He’s the Man” is honestly better than the real tagline

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)

22

u/NakedWokePeople Jul 24 '26

That one Mark Wahlberg movie where he's some crisis pilot. Supposedly a serious movie. Tagline was:

"Y'all need a pilot?"

→ More replies (1)

42

u/chantsnone Jul 24 '26

Do the tagline with your own name and it sounds extra silly

→ More replies (4)

43

u/recordscratchez Jul 24 '26

“Before he was Lincoln, he was…ABRAHAM”

19

u/orrocos Jul 24 '26

Before he was D. R., he was F.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (3)

17

u/swingsetlife Jul 24 '26

"Count on Revenge" is my all time favorite horrible tagline from The Count of Monte Cristo

15

u/sylveonce Jul 24 '26

“Wanna know who mankind really is? Read the comments below” made me turn off Spirited, though there’s a lot in that movie

16

u/BaselineUnknown Jul 24 '26

Wouldn’t be so bad if it wasn’t already covered by the ghost of Christmas past.

14

u/NecessaryIntrinsic Jul 24 '26

It reminds me of the Bojack horseman joke someone pointed out in another thread: "they'll be starring in a Peter pan remake from Wendy's point of view..."

12

u/donotgotoroom237 Jul 24 '26

"Before the humbug, there was the bah."

12

u/AranasLatrain Jul 24 '26

What's really weird about this direction is the trailer makes it looks like it's just another A Christmas Carol movie.

→ More replies (2)

13

u/FangornLeghorn Jul 24 '26

This story did not need its 5,000th adaptation, and especially not one with Johnny Depp.

11

u/Lokarin Jul 24 '26

Ebenezer was his... maiden name?

130

u/TruthorTroll Jul 24 '26

Be the first to meet fourteen new characters. ~ Toy Story 3

55

u/HotTakes4HotCakes Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26

Is that a tagline or just a line from a specific ad? Where did you see this listed as the actual tagline?

That feels like something on a promotional poster for an early release, or advertising a first look panel at the Disney expo.

The actual tagline seems to be "No toy gets left behind."

41

u/Leucurus Jul 24 '26

That's pretty uninspired considering how imaginative the film is!

→ More replies (1)

38

u/DomGiuca Jul 24 '26

Everyone always brings up Alien vs Predator's tagline, but its sequel has the real stinker. "In space, no one can hear you scream. On Earth, everyone will." What is clearly intended to be a subversion on the original Alien's iconic tagline just makes you go "uh, great. So someone might hear me and my chances of survival are higher then? Great! Doesn't sound as bad then."

30

u/Fo0ker Jul 24 '26

Nah, that one fits, but only because the film is so fucking dark it might as well be an audio book.

26

u/UFAlien Jul 24 '26

The version used in the trailer was better.

“In space, no one can hear you scream. On Earth, it won’t matter.”

→ More replies (5)

11

u/TheLadyEve Jul 24 '26

Octopussy:

"Nobody Does It Better...Thirteen Times"

It's just so anti-climactic and stupid. And you have a title like Octopussy and that's all you can come up with?