Or, at least, an argument certainly can be made:
“There are tons of people who hate me. They hate my movies and whatnot. But you know, hey, my films have made a lot of money around the world. 2-something billion dollars, that’s a lot of tickets. They said that I wrecked cinema. They said that my, uh…cutting style. They say I cut too fast. And yet now you see it in movies everywhere. Do I take pride in people knowing my style? I think it’s nice people know a director has a style. And you can reinvent yourself, too.”
i.e., he told the critics and the movie snobs to Post Bizeek.
I remember when his 1st Transformer’s movie came out, a popular magazine called it:
“A fanboy’s wet dream”
Which may have been the most accurate media line ever penned.
All Michael Bay movies are like that.
I don’t care if it’s his magnificent movie “The Rock” or Transformers 2.
The reason Bay’s movies make so much money is because he caters to the fans. He does NOT cater to gatekeeping executives, snobby movie critics who probably can’t even use their iPhone’s camera much less a movie camera, or pedantic film nerds on Twitter and Facebook high on estrogen-fueled rage at Marvel movie casting decisions while typing just to hear themselves write.
Bay delivers exactly what his fans want:
Big explosions, hot chicks with big bewbs, and lots and lots of big action scenes.
More:
I’ve been an unrepentant Michael Bay fan since I first saw “The Rock” in 1996. To me that was the coolest movie I’d ever seen — and in some ways still is. And early on in my copywriting career, I deliberately used Michael Bay movies as my “template” for sales letters and emails much like Gene Schwartz used Joel Silver movies as his. My approach was to, no matter what clients, marketing goo-roos, or especially other copywriters said/thought of my ads/emails… cater to fans, just like in the way Bay does.
i.e., be the market’s wet dream.
If it’s writing to my own list, I give the fans what they want.
If it was writing for clients, I’d dig up what those fans wanted and cater to whatever it is.
Believe it or not, it was not unusual for some of my new clients to despise my work and drafts I’d hand in, argue with me about it, and only reluctantly run it… due to this approach. It wasn’t until after they ran one of my “fanboy” ads and saw the sales that they would trust me and let me do my job. Frankly, probably only one client ever really “got” this — and he was by far the biggest and most successful I’d ever worked for, as well as the most fun to work with. He was the kind of client where you think are you going to far and then he goes in and takes it even farther.
A true rarity.
It’s probably why at the time he floated the idea to me that, “We should write screenplays.”
To this day I take the same “cater to the fans” attitude in everything I write.
Yes, including articles and other non-copywriting content.
Example:
A couple weeks ago, I ghost wrote a newspaper article for the Oregon Eagle about our Low Stress Options Trading. While most financial articles are dry, boring, and stuffy… catering to boomers who think “buy and hold” is still a good idea in 2025 when most companies only last about 10 years now (vis 70-90 years in the past) on the S&P 500… I went the opposite way and wrote only to the FANBASE section of the market we cater to. And I did it by picking a “fight” with the so-called Warren Buffett approach to investing and showing why Troy’s low stress trading approach is safer, sounder, and superior.
“Our” kind of people want what we have to say and love that.
Guys worried about retirement who think Buffett walks on water?
Not so much.
They want to still believe it’s 1984 and will almost certainly turn their noses up at it in the same way Bay’s critics turn their noses up at his films, even as we collect more leads (fans), cater to them, have a long term mutually profitable relationship with them for months, years, and probably will continue to have even for decades.
One more thing.
Call it a fun juxtaposition of the times if you want.
But around the same time I saw that Michael Bay interview I also saw an interview clip on Twitter posted by a guy named Nerdrotic. The interview featured Troy Duffy who was the writer/director of the popular Boondock Saints movie.
And he put it like this:
“One of the very first lessons I learned in the movie business, which is if you are lucky enough to have a fan base, you do what they want 100% of the time or you’re f–cked”
Indeed.
Anyway, give the fans (market) what they want. Ignore all critics, clients, copywriters, your idiot Facebook friends, and anyone who tries to get you to do it any other way. And if you need some inspiration for this then fire up a Michael Bay movie.
Whatever movie you choose will NOT make you any smarter.
It may even temporarily seize an IQ point or two.
But I daresay it’ll make you better at copywriting, emails, content creation, and direct response.
And you want to know something else?
If you take the info in this email and combine it with what I teach in the paid Email Players newsletter you almost can’t lose, in my totally biased (but no less true) opinion.
More on Email Players here:
Ben Settle
