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The Lone Ranger is a character that has spanned decades. One of the most iconic characters in media history, every new generation has had their version of The Lone Ranger and Tonto. When Disney threw their hat in the wring trying to replicate the success of Pirates of the Caribbean, it seemed they couldn't strike twice with a Johnny Depp led vehicle. Making The Lone Ranger one of the worst live action Disney movie's in a long long time.
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What's Kevin this
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Better go. Out of the distant past comes a shining icon of Americana
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From the beloved tones of the William Tell overture to the gleaming silver bullets in the domino mask
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individuals from all walks of life love The Lone Ranger. And yet, just a few short years ago
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one of the biggest stars on the planet, with the backing of a team of award-winning writers
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and directors and the largest studio on earth, tried to revive this beloved totem of yesteryear
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However, it failed horribly. Hi-yo, silver! Away! Don't ever do that again
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Created in 1933 by Fran Stryker and George W. Trindle, The Lone Ranger was a staple of the early days of radio adventure programs
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The radio show, in concert with a menagerie of films, serials, and the iconic Clayton Moore TV show
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have cemented The Lone Ranger and Tonto into the psyches of Americans across generations
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Most adaptations and reinterpretations of the character center on a lone survivor of an ambush
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being rescued and nursed back to health by a kindly Native American named Tonto
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in order to find the dastardly Butch Cavendish and seek revenge. From there, Tonto and the newly christened Lone Ranger seek to help people across the frontier
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pursuing justice for those who cannot seek it themselves. While the Lone Ranger has existed in our pop culture imaginations for close to 100 years
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He's waxed and waned in popularity, his heyday being the 1950s and 60s
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The successive attempts at reviving him have had meddling results, the prime example of which being The Legend of the Lone Ranger, released in 1981
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It was such a colossal failure that there wasn't another major attempt for close to 30 years
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The film is so bad, all of the rangers' dialogue was replaced in post-production
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I want you to take me to Cavendish. The first serious attempt post-Legend at rebooting everyone's favorite recently
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resurrected cowboy was in March of 2002 Columbia Pictures announced that they wanted to make a lone ranger picture after the success of Antonio Banderas vehicle The Mask of Zorro This version of a Ranger script was intended to play off
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the will-they-won't-they magic that Banderas and Zeta Jones had. I dishonored my father
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That is not so bad. Maybe your father deserved it. What did you say
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By pivoting Tonto into being a woman, so that she and the Lone Ranger could have steamy romantic
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tension throughout the film. However, after three years of no movement, the project was placed in turnaround and died a slow death
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The project evolved into something closer to what we have today when Jerry Bruckheimer boarded the project
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Bruckheimer, agreeing that the film needed a Zorro-esque take, went to his old buddies, Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio
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the writers of Zorro and Pirates of the Caribbean, and said, what if we combined our successes
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Elliott and Rossio signed on in late March of 2008, and Johnny Depp joined the project in September of the same year
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Their take was that Depp would be the star of the film. Tanta would be the secret main character
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the competent one of the iconic duo at the heart of the story. The team brought the project to Disney and positioned it as a follow-up to the worldwide
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juggernaut that was Pirates. They pitched a supernatural take on the ranger, a story of
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resurrection, grief, and werewolf fighting. They literally pitched a movie about the lone ranger
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and Tonto fighting werewolves. And what's even crazier, Disney said yes. You sure about this? Mmm
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In September of 2010, after circling a few different directors for the project
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Gore Verbinski, the noted visualist and director of the Pirates of the Caribbean films
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came on board. However, it wouldn't be an instant green light for the project
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Even with all of the core members of the Pirates team on board, Disney's CEO at the time, Bob Iger
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was not convinced that the public needed a massively expensive supernatural western
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The hyperviolence, the horror-fueled grittiness, and a reimagining of the ranger's longtime nemesis, Butch Cavendish, as a literal werewolf
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caused him to almost pull the plug In an attempt to try and address these notes the script was worked on for almost an additional year All of the literal interpretations of Native American folklore like skinwalkers wendigos and werewolves were removed Shockingly it was enough
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Pirates 4 came out, made an ungodly amount of money, and Disney said, let's keep this train a-moving
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We have to stop the train! Go, Tom! Buster, Jim! Upon its release, the film was not received well for multiple reasons
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One of the main reasons being the issue of Johnny Depp's casting overshadowed much of the film's discussion
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Johnny Depp is a white man. thus further perpetuating many of the hurtful casting stereotypes that these films reinforce
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It was reported during the launch of the film that Depp believed he had some Native American blood
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from his great-grandmother. However, nothing concrete was ever proven. The production even
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went so far as to have Depp adopted into the Comanche tribe and given a Comanche name
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Ma Wume, meaning shapeshifter. But that's just not the same thing as hiring an actual Native
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actor to portray Tonto. Additionally, this discussion is baked into the literal structure
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of the film. Tonto's a Comanche. He's one of you. No more. His mind is broken. The central narrative
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dynamic of the film pivots the titular Texas Ranger away from being a protagonist who's a
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do-gooding superhero and devolves him into something much more of a buffoon, while it places
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increased narrative primacy on Depp's Tonto. The film attempts to push Tonto from being a sidekick
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into being the truly capable one, and to push the Lone Ranger into being a haphazard bumbling idiot
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However, the problem with this approach is that the audience is going to see a movie called The Lone Ranger
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The film has such little respect for John Reed that they literally drag his head through horse manure for laughs
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Some horse. Don't be stupid. But even more frustratingly, the film is so self-conscious about being a Lone Ranger movie
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The film spends a solid two hours of its runtime ostensibly making fun of the Lone Ranger and telling you he's not cool and that nothing ever goes his way
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The main plot of Dude Got Ambushed and Then Saved by a Native American Warrior doesn start until 50 minutes into the film Does the movie use that time to develop The Lone Ranger No
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I boxed in law school. He's not a tactician, not physically gifted, and not a good horse rider
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Until the movie needs him to be able to do these things for the over-the-top third act train fight scene
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But at that point, the movie hasn't earned any sort of arc. It just humbly asks you to accept him as the protagonist
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and therefore he's going to be good at doing stuff. All the things you'd want to see in a Lone Ranger film are kind of there
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He does wear a white hat, even though they initially make fun of him for it. It's a nice hat, by the way
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Didn't have a bigger one? They don't put him in the iconic Clayton Moore costume
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He just wears a plain black suit. It's like making a Superman movie without the blue and red costume
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They give him the silver bullets, the William Tell overture, and the white horse
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But the movie has little to no reverence for these icons that it feels hollow and lackluster
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Additionally, the movie sets up John Reed as a lawyer, not a Texas Ranger
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He's a bookish legal mind, not a rugged hero. In theory, this is an attempt at giving him something of an emotional arc
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However, the Lone Ranger is a pulp hero. You want them to always be so capable and the star of their story
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In the film, John Reed is literally only deputized by his brother just a few short hours before the ambush happens
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He's barely a Ranger. This just isn't what anyone wants. What's with the mask
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See, I told you, I feel ridiculous. It's obvious that this film was being positioned as a second run at Pirates of the Caribbean's success
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However, the playbook that was utilized was much too close to a rinse and repeat approach
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Despite five seconds of sequel talk, the numbers, critical reception, and fan disinterest
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quashed that possibility almost immediately. These days, a possibility of a new Lone Ranger project seem very far off
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If there's one thing that John Reed has done over and over and over again for the close to 100-year legacy he's built, it's Return from the Dead
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