One of the main issues Joss Whedon has encountered in his career is the level of control he has over his projects.  My paper will explore the conflicts between Whedon and various other contributors to the films and television series he has worked on, including directors, studios, and television channels, and how they affected both the finished product and Whedon’s perception of it.  One of the earliest examples of such a conflict in Whedon’s career was with the movie of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.   Whedon was unhappy over several issues, most famously actor Donald Sutherland’s rewriting of his lines.  Similarly, Whedon was unsatisfied with the film Alien: Resurrection, for which he wrote the script but had to rewrite it five times based on 20^th Century Fox’s demands.  He also felt that the movie was terribly miscast and that director Jean-Pierre Jeunet changed the intended delivery of many of the lines.

Later in his career, Whedon was involved in two well-known feuds with the Fox television channel over his shows Firefly and Dollhouse.  Both shows were cancelled after relatively short runs.  They both had low ratings, but this was partially due to being shown on Friday nights, a decision which was made because of Fox’s discomfort with the subject matter of both shows.  More recently, Whedon had to fight with Marvel Studios over Avengers: Age of Ultron in order to keep scenes like the farmhouse and the dream sequences in the film, and he ended up having to compromise with the studio by putting in other scenes that he felt did not fit into the film.  Whedon is not the only screenwriter or director to fight with a studio or another artist, and I might discuss some other notable examples not involving Whedon.  I am still working on finding sources to use as references.

This unofficial Cabin in the Woods poster by graphic designer Maria Kaner has a classic appearance as a throwback to older horror movie posters.  The largest image on the poster is one of Fran Kranz as Marty holding the makeshift weapon he has made out of his mug/pipe.  Marty is the most comedic character in the film, being the stoner who is closest to seeing the manipulations of the underground workers.  The background of the poster is a blood red color which suggests the horror aspect of the film.  However, several ironic taglines are written at the top, suggesting the more comedic twists on the genre that Cabin has.  The tagline on top is “you think you know the story,” which implies that the familiarity of the situation will be made unfamiliar, and the taglines below it, such as “if an old man warns you not to go there… make fun of him,” indicate a self-awareness of the conventions of the horror genre.  Finally, at the bottom of the image, the characters Hadley and Sitterson are shown at their computer setup, watching the group of friends at the cabin.  This part of the image reveals the voyeuristic aspect of Cabin that is shown in the film through the many monitors of the underground complex that are used to watch the group above.  Compared to the official poster for the film, this poster gives a much more accurate impression of what the film is like.  The official poster simply shows a Rubik’s cube-esque cabin on a murky white woods background with the lone tagline, “you think you know the story.”  Kaner’s poster reveals more about mix of horror and comedy in the film and also gives some idea of the characters and situation of the story.

Kaner poster: http://www.repostered.com/posters/003925/The-Cabin-in-the-Woods

Official poster: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/b8/CitwTeaserSmall.jpg

Nick Fury is finishing a line about why SHIELD used the tesseract to create weapons.  He is seen through a darkened transparent screen showing the designs of these weapons, representing the darkened way the other heroes now see him.  After Thor comments, Fury states that “the world’s filling up with people who can’t be… controlled.”  Although these are SHIELD’s views and not Fury’s own, they parallel Loki’s mission to rule humanity to control them.  As the Avengers begin to argue, the camera begins to quickly pan between them, creating a temporary blur with a dizzying effect.  When Stark sarcastically remarks that “a nuclear deterrent… always calms everything right down,” Fury’s retort, which points out that Stark’s money came from selling weaponry, suggests that Fury believes Stark is a hypocrite for passing himself as a hero when his technology has taken so many lives.  Captain America makes a jab at Stark, implying he is selfish, and the camera passes directly between them, suggesting a rift forming between the two.  The camera again begins to shift in a disorienting manner between the Avengers as their argument grows, zooming in first on Thor, then Natasha, and finally Banner, but each on the far left edge of the frame.  After passing each one of them, the argument becomes unintelligible, and the camera zooms in on the glowing gem at the head of Loki’s spear and flips over, showing the Avengers arguing from an upside-down perspective.  The disorientation of this series of shots followed by the focus on the gem in Loki’s spear reveals the manipulating effect Loki has had on the group to cause them to break apart from the inside.