With regard to the humor in the film in general, I and others have theorized based on things we've read or read between the lines in a few different articles that it may have been something Warner Brothers pushed for to get the film made - and the more articles I read, the more I'm thinking that could have indeed been the case. In one of the most recent articles (sorry that I can't check which one exactly because I've lent all the recent magazines I've purchased (with the exception of Fangoria, which is set aside in its bag in a drawer
) to a friend - though I think it's Total Film) Burton actually goes so far as to say that initially the film was a tough sell with Warner Brothers and that he also got notes from them that things were too dark - and he makes the latter comment in such a way as to suggest that Warner Brothers could have asked for changes. Add to that that Seth Grahame-Smith was brought in to add humor to the script and the fact that Warner Brothers is emphasizing the humor in the film above everything else in every trailer and TV spot and the evidence for that theory being true would certainly seem to be mounting.
Would I have preferred a film with less humor? Probably? Would I have preferred no film rather than a film with humor? Too hard to answer without having see the film yet. But will the humor necessarily ruin the film? I'm not so sure - particularly because I do enjoy a good deal of the humor that I'm seeing in the trailers and TV spots- and one can't ignore that DC himself brought more overt humor to DS with the '91 DS. So I suppose for me what will make or break the film is how much of a flavor of DS it has both apart from the humor and within its humor. And if enough flavor is there, I'll probably have no trouble accepting it as DS. And I am seeing hinting flavors of DS in the trailers and TV spots, so that gives me hope that I will enjoy the film on its own terms and as something that does resemble DS. Not DS as we've seen it before. But DS nonetheless. Though I won't know that for sure until I've actually seen the finished film for myself...
15 days 12 hours 30 minutes 52 seconds until the day the Depp/Burton Dark Shadows is released(ET)!!