Stimulated by a series of positive news, MGM's stock price has risen from $10.5 before the summer season to $13.7 after the media conference.

With the completion of the integration of the three companies, the total share capital of MGM reached 365 million shares, and when the stock price reached $13.7, MGM's market capitalization successfully exceeded $5 billion. Therefore, the next 70 million additional shares will bring MGM about $1 billion in cash, with this funding, MGM will also completely get rid of the debt shadow that has been entangled in its body, and embark on the road of benign development.

The additional share offering will be completed by MGM executives over the next few months, and after the media conference, Eric has set aside some of his energy to start planning for the MGM Agent Cinematic Universe.

"Breaking Bad" and "Mission Impossible" are both spy movies that have risen in the past two years, although they are both adapted from old TV series, but joining the Agent Cinematic Universe has not received too many opposition, but has caused a wave of anticipation among fans.

However, Eric allowed the 007 series to join the program, which caused some controversy. Much of the controversy is that this plan could dilute the brand of the 007 series. The media also specially interviewed the previous 007 actors, and the first 007 actor Sean Connery publicly expressed his opposition to this plan, claiming that MGM was messing around.

Eric laughed at the objections.

So far, the original novels of the 007 series, except for one "Casino Royale". All the others were filmed before 1987.

And, even the pre-1987 series, many of them have little to do with Ian Fleming's novels. It's just that in order to prove his 'pedigree', the title of almost every episode of the 007 series is used to a far-fetched association with Ian Fleming, or Ian Fleming's pet name, or Ian Fleming's vacation cottage name, or a phrase from Ian Fleming's novel.

Somewhat ironically, Skyfall is the only film in the 007 series to have earned more than $10 at the global box office. The title of this sequel has nothing to do with Ian Fleming, but the MGM writing team took the name themselves.

In Eric's opinion. This far-fetched is almost completely unnecessary, and the biggest advantage of the 007 series is actually the popularity it has built around the world over the decades. As for the box office appeal, it can be seen from the last "007: Murder License" that was only $34 million in North America. The box office appeal of the 007 series is actually not that high. If you can't shoot a story well, no matter how famous it is, the audience won't buy it.

The reason why Eric came up with the idea of the Agent Cinematic Universe was actually influenced by Daniel Craig's version of 007 in the original plane.

In the original time and space, the 007 series before and after the new century, "Casino Royale" is undoubtedly a very good word-of-mouth and box office.

Although the 007 series likes to flaunt its 'pedigree', most of the time, it is used to creating a new story with each episode. Often, because of this, the popularity accumulated by some previous characters is completely discarded, which has to be said to be a very regrettable waste.

Daniel Craig's version of 007 has gone the other way. In Eric's opinion, the emergence of this road was also very accidental.

After the success of Casino Royale, MGM couldn't wait to start working on a sequel, but unfortunately, the sequel was made just in time for the 2008 Hollywood writers' strike, and there was no way to gather big-name writers to create a new story series.

In desperation, the production team could only piece together piecemeal pieces on the basis of "Casino Royale" to create a 'sequel' with a plot that follows "Casino Royale", that is, "Quantum of Solace".

Viewers who haven't watched Casino Royale won't even understand the plot of this sequel. Therefore, it is conceivable that MGM originally had no expectations for this sequel, but what is surprising is that this 'sequel', which made many viewers a little confused, created a global box office of nearly $600 million on par with its predecessor.

So, starting from "Quantum of Solace", MGM seems to have opened up. They no longer completely get rid of the story of the previous episode in every episode, no longer racking their brains to find a villain for Bond in every episode, and no longer forcibly connecting the story to Ian Fleming for the so-called 'blood', but break free from all the constraints of the past and create a hidden story line that runs through several sequels.

Under this change, the subsequent "Dead by Skyfall" created a peak in the history of 007 in one fell swoop, reaching $1.1 billion at the global box office. Later, although "Spectre" received a bad review, it also got a global box office of nearly $900 million.

Inspired by Daniel Craig's 007 series, Eric plans to cut Pierce Brosnan's follow-up films such as "Die Another Day" and "Tomorrow's Empire" in his memory, put aside the world's search for villains, and use the ghost party as the ultimate boss to pull Charlie's angels and Ethan Hunter into this big background story setting to create a complete spy movie universe.

At the beginning of this story, Eric is set as the only novel by Ian Fleming that has not been brought to the big screen, Casino Royale. The currently being released "GoldenEye" will also be the last film of 007 to have a relationship with the old enemy Soviet Union.

Of course, while conceiving the main storyline, MGM also had to solve another problem, which was a lawsuit that had entangled the 007 series for decades.

More than 30 years ago, the villain group "Spectre" in Ian Fleming's novel was actually based on the setting of another novelist, Kevin McGrolley, who was awarded the copyright of the Spectre to Kevin McGregory after a long lawsuit.

In order to set the Ghost Party as the ultimate villain in the MGM Agent Cinematic Universe, MGM must address this copyright issue.

Of course. Perhaps in the past, MGM was reluctant to shell out millions of dollars in copyright fees.

But at this point, there is a question of money. It's not a big problem for MGM now. Kevin McGlorey was still alive at this time, and the $2 million copyright fee offered by the other party was completely acceptable to Eric, after all, the Ghost Party had appeared in the six previous 007 series films, although after the original verdict, MGM had not used it for many years. But the Phantom's fame is well worth the price.

Throughout the month of August, while working on the MGM Agent Cinematic Universe, Eric also took time out to make a trip to San Francisco's Silicon Valley.

After preparation. Firefly Electronics, a company responsible for the development of MP3 players and e-book readers, was established. At the same time, Firefly Electronics also signed a secret agreement with Seagate, a hard disk manufacturer, to commission the development of micro-hard drives.

Because the company does not have formal products, Firefly Electronics only set up an electronic product research and development center in Silicon Valley at this time. Over there in Boston. Yahoo's equity incentive plan was fully implemented. With the exception of a handful of departing executives, such as Jeff Locke, Yahoo's management has remained largely intact. At the same time as the establishment of the MP3 and e-book reader R&D center, Yahoo also started plans to build an online music store and an online e-book store.

The development of the micro-hard drive will take at least a year, and Eric's biggest hope for the R&D center in Silicon Valley is not that they will come up with a finished product as soon as possible, but that they will take the opportunity to register a full patent copyright covering all the technologies of MP3 players in the United States and overseas.

The technical content of MP3 players is actually not very high, but as long as most of the patents are obtained in advance, then no one will be able to produce them if they want to in the future. Eric can also rely on this advantage to grasp the absolute initiative in the era of online music.

Return to Los Angeles from San Francisco. There was also news from the Fireflies that the Wachowski brothers had completed the production of their director's neodymium work, "Amazing Flowers," which they used for practice.

Eric heard a call from Katzenberg on the plane, so after getting off the plane at Santa Monica Airport, he rushed directly to the nearby Preavista Firefly Studios, and got into the screening room with Katzenberg, the Wachowski brothers and others.

"Crazy Flowers" tells the story of a pair of gay girls who want to escape their current lives, and design to defraud the mafia boss of $2 million and provoke a mafia infighting because of it.

If you strip away the coats of homosexuality and heroine films, this is actually a typical black list film, and of course, it is also officially because of the female equivalent elements, which makes this film a little more charming.

In the screening room, Eric nodded with satisfaction after watching the film, and said to Katzenberg next to him: "According to the quality of this movie, let the new line operate, maybe it can recover the production cost of $4.5 million just at the box office, and you will never doubt the strength of the two of them now." ”

After making movies for so many years, Katzenberg certainly has no shortage of vision, nodded and said with a smile: "Of course, I have some expectations for the two of them now." ”

The two exchanged a few words in a low voice, the subtitles on the screen were finished, the lights in the screening room were on, Eric got up and said to the Wachowski brothers who came over with worried expressions: "You guys get ready, I hope you can rush to Sydney with the crew as soon as possible, most of the preparations have been completed, you just need to start filming as soon as possible." ”

The Wachowski brothers were stunned for a moment, and then they reacted, and Andy Wachowski said, "Eric, so we passed?"

"yes," Eric nodded, adding, "However, I'll be following the production of The Matrix from start to finish, so I hope you won't let me down." ”

"Of course, absolutely not," Andy Wachowski rubbed his hands excitedly.

After chatting for a while about the filming of "The Matrix", the Wachowski brothers left in a hurry, and Katzenberg took Eric to the office and talked about something else: "Eric, with the current scale of the digital field, even just supporting the production of Firefly and MGM is already a bit difficult, and we have a lot of orders from other studios, and Stan discussed with me yesterday that we hope to continue to expand the number of employees in the digital field." ”

After MGM is on the right track, the two companies will produce no less than five major CG special effects films each year, and according to the special effects team of even 500 people per film, 2,500 people will be needed.

At the same time, the application of CG special effects is becoming more and more extensive, even if it is not a movie that focuses on special effects, it also requires special effects companies to deal with a lot of shots, so it can be said that these years can be said to be the golden age of special effects companies. As long as you have enough technology, there is no shortage of projects at all, and industry giants like the digital field are very nourishing.

However, Eric knows that there are only a few years left in the good days of special effects companies, and when the new century comes, with the further development of computer technology and other software giants joining the ranks of special effects software development, special effects companies will soon fall from the aristocratic industry to the civilian class.

Eric is already planning to cash out the digital realm in the next few years, at the peak of special effects films. At this time, out of consideration for the future, it is impossible for him to continue to blindly expand the scale of the digital field.

Remembering the upcoming filming of "The Matrix" in Australia, Eric said: "It's okay to continue to expand in the United States, if possible, it's better for us to set up branches overseas, special effects companies will not consume too many social resources, but can create very considerable taxes, I think whether it is Canada, Australia or New Zealand will be very welcome, we can set up branches in these countries and ask them for tax incentives." ”

"That's a good idea," Katzenberg nodded, "and in which country do you think it's better for us to set up a branch?"

Eric immediately thought of New Zealand, the country from which Weta Digital, who had become famous in the digital world in his previous life.

However, Weta Studios was already established at this time, and was founded by Peter Jackson a few years ago to shoot his own film with a few friends. While Eric would have given the Lord of the Rings franchise to Peter Jackson, he would not have fostered a special effects company that had nothing to do with fireflies.

After thinking about it for a moment, Eric said, "Let's choose between Australia and New Zealand." Films such as "The Matrix" and "The Lord of the Rings" will be filmed in these two countries, which can save a lot of energy on the spot. Well, I'll talk to Fox and think that, after all, News Corp is based in Australia, and we can get more deals from the Australian government through them. ”

As he spoke, Eric looked at his watch, there were still more than two hours before he got off work, so he said to Katzenberg: "In that case, I'll go to Fox now, you can get busy first." (To be continued.) )