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Chapter 155: Stock Market God!
🕑 Added 2025-05-08 02:26:01 +0000 UTCRight now, there are two big players in the toy world: Hasbro, the folks behind "Transformers," and Mattel, the ones who gave us "Barbie."
Dunn’s got some pretty wild ambitions—he wants to snag the adaptation rights for everything these two toy giants have to offer. And you know what? It’s not as crazy as it sounds!
Hasbro and Mattel are old-school physical toy companies, far removed from the internet or Hollywood. A lot of their orders actually come from movie tie-ins out of Tinseltown. Movies are the big dogs of entertainment, and with their massive influence, they can push toy sales through the roof!
Here’s the kicker: Dunn Films might not even have to shell out a single penny for those adaptation rights. All they’d need is a solid partnership deal. Then, when the big movies roll out, they could rake in a fat sponsorship check from the toy companies.
That’s the Hollywood magic right there!
Of course, this kind of deal only flies in the year 2000. Back in my past life, once a movie hit it big and took the world by storm, everyone caught on to how valuable those toy rights were. By then, snagging those adaptation deals on the cheap was a pipe dream.
Hasbro, Mattel, and even the up-and-coming Lego all jumped into the game, setting up their own movie studios. Lego, especially, made a splash. Their films weren’t top-tier quality, but thanks to their powerhouse brand, they struck gold. Being animated helped too—their merchandise sales shot past everyone else’s!
Times change, though. Society’s tastes shifted, and Barbie’s “distorted, unrealistic” figure fell out of favor. People started vibing more with healthier, confident, independent body types like Beyoncé or the Kardashians—not that old-school, sickly classical aesthetic Barbie was stuck on.
Mattel’s conservative playbook kept fumbling, and Lego swooped in to claim the throne as the world’s top toy company.
Dunn? He couldn’t care less about toy companies or Barbie dolls. His eyes are locked on movies—specifically, his grand Hollywood strategy.
Animated films are the golden goose for merchandise, and Dunn Films’ future is definitely going to lean hard into animation.
But here’s the million-dollar question: who’s gonna lead the charge?
Animated movies aren’t like live-action flicks. You can’t just grab a director and a producer and call it a day. The heart of animation is tech—especially in 2000, when special effects were still finding their footing.
Disney’s hand-drawn 2D classics? That’s yesterday’s news. The future’s all about 3D computer animation, led by trailblazers like Pixar.
Problem is, special effects teams are rare as hen’s teeth.
If you’re just churning out low-budget cartoons for kids’ TV, you can get away with slapdash work and goofy plots on the cheap. But movies? That’s a whole different ballgame.
To build an effects-driven animation team for Dunn Films, you need a visionary leader, years of steady funding, and a pipeline of trained tech talent. Without that, you’re not making anything worth watching.
Dunn’s head was spinning a bit. If he’d been reborn a few years earlier, he could’ve snapped up Blue Sky Studios no problem. They weren’t on Pixar or DreamWorks’ level, but they had a solid effects crew and legit animation pros.
Back when they shot that movie, a few of the effects shots came straight from Blue Sky’s rendering GI team.
And then, like clockwork, Bill Mechanic stepped up to save the day—again.
“Dunn, I’ve got an old colleague,” Bill said.
Dunn chuckled. Half the department heads at Dunn Films were Bill Mechanic’s old buddies at this point. “Who’s that?”
“Chris. Chris Meledandri.”
The name rang a bell, but Dunn couldn’t quite place it.
“When I was at Disney, he was my production supervisor,” Bill explained. “Later, when I moved to Fox, I brought him along and put him in charge of Fox Animation.”
“Fox Animation?” Dunn smirked. “Didn’t they handle the effects for that movie? Total mess. I bet once it flops, Fox will shut their animation department down.”
Bill waved it off. “Fox Animation’s incompetence isn’t on Chris. It’s been a dumpster fire for years—he couldn’t turn it around. But there’s something else he did that I know you’ll respect.”
“Oh yeah? What’s that?”
“He’s the one who convinced me to let Fox buy Blue Sky Studios.”
Dunn’s face darkened.
Chris Meledandri. So this was the guy screwing over Dunn Films! If he hadn’t pushed that acquisition, Blue Sky would’ve been Dunn’s by now… Wait a sec—Chris Meledandri?!
Dunn’s eyes widened as it clicked. He finally remembered why that name sounded familiar.
This dude was a freaking god in Hollywood animation!
There are three legends in the animated movie game:
- Jeffrey Katzenberg, the soul of DreamWorks Animation!
- John Lasseter, the heart of Pixar!
- And Chris Meledandri, the guy Bill just name-dropped!
This titan worked miracles at Fox, launching Blue Sky Studios and the Ice Age series. Later, he split from Fox over creative differences and founded Illumination Entertainment.
Illumination might not have the brand clout of DreamWorks or Pixar, but their movies? Box office juggernauts that crushed the competition!
Think Despicable Me, Minions, The Secret Life of Pets, Sing… DreamWorks goes for wacky comedy, Disney’s all sugary sweet, Pixar’s warm and fuzzy, but Illumination? They’re cute—cute enough to melt your face off!
“Dig him up! Whatever it takes, get him on board!” Dunn couldn’t hide the excitement bubbling up.
Bill stared, stunned. “Dunn, Chris is a Fox exec now—head of their animation division. Poaching him won’t be easy.”
Dunn waved a hand dismissively. “Bill, Dunn Films needs an animation wing! I’ll even give him free rein—set up an independent studio, let him call the shots.”
Bill frowned. “Chris is an old friend—we’ve got over a decade of history. I’ll… I’ll talk to him. Hope he’s up for one more big fight, like I was.”
---
With the Cannes Film Festival right around the corner, Dunn’s secretary had his schedule locked in.
On opening day, he’d hit the red carpet with the Cast Away crew. The next couple of days, he’d hobnob with the festival judges—chat about movies, Hollywood, the works.
After that, he’d link up with the Cast Away team for a European promo tour.
The movie was set to drop in North America on June 22, with over 30 countries—mostly in Europe—syncing up for a global release that same day.
Late June is peak summer blockbuster season, when every film’s clawing for a piece of the pie.
Universal ponied up $60 million for Cast Away’s marketing, and Dunn Films kicked in another $40 million. They were going all out, building unstoppable hype to steamroll the competition and pave the way for The Matrix!
Meanwhile, Time Warner, Comcast, and Viacom were stepping up too, scrubbing away the dirt Disney and Fox had slung at Dunn over the past few months.
What caught Dunn off guard? Wall Street was getting in on the action too.
Wall Street was reeling from the dot-com crash—total chaos. Big securities firms and investment banks were tightening their belts.
Smaller funds, like Dunn Capital, could ride the chaos, shorting stocks and cashing in on the crash. But the big dogs? They couldn’t play that game.
It’s like a mansion’s on fire: petty thieves can sneak off with trinkets, but the owners are too busy putting out the flames.
Over half of NASDAQ was in the hands of Wall Street’s giants. Short their own stocks? Rob themselves blind? No way.
Their top priority was teaming up with the feds to stop the bubble crisis from spiraling further, minimizing losses in this bear market.
The media wasn’t helping—endless stories of investors divorcing, going broke, or worse, piling pressure on the market and crushing what little confidence was left.
It was like a death knell, forcing folks to dump their stocks.
That didn’t sit right with Wall Street. To stabilize the market, you cut selling and boost buying—simple as that.
So, the Wall Street titans hatched a plan: in this crisis, they’d give investors hope and pump fresh life into NASDAQ!
Their secret weapon? The most talked-about, controversial figure in America right now—Dunn Walker!
That day, over a dozen heavy hitters—Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers—sent their top negotiators to Dunn Films.
They holed up in Dunn’s office for an 8-hour marathon.
No one knew the nitty-gritty, but judging by Dunn’s and Wall Street’s vibes afterward, they’d struck a hush-hush deal.
Dunn dropped a bombshell: over the next one to two years, Dunn Capital would pour cash into high-tech companies—funding startups and snapping up their stocks on the market. Tech stocks weren’t dead; NASDAQ’s turbulence was just fallout from years of wild investing. High-tech was still the smartest bet!
Wall Street’s papers and TV stations ran with Dunn’s words, hyping up his stock market wizardry over the past three years—turning clouds into rain with a flick of his wrist.
Analysts from Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley went on record: “Dunn Walker is the stock market god of our time! Listen to him, load up on tech stocks—you won’t regret it!”
After Comcast, Time Warner, and Viacom, Wall Street swooped in, smashing Disney and Fox’s “moral blackmail” tactics to bits and crowning Dunn the Stock Market God.
In return, Dunn had to play the part—leading the charge with high-profile tech investments, giving investors and NASDAQ a shiny new beacon of hope…
