Some are blaming streaming. Some are blaming the ongoing WGA strike. Some are blaming budgets. For whatever reason, the summer of 2023 saw some of the worst tentpole bombs in ages. We started off fine with "Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 3" riding a wave of good reviews to a solid $350 million domestic gross and over $800 million worldwide. "Fast X" has made nearly as much, but its budget was so high that it hasn't broken even yet. Neither has "The Little Mermaid," though it's getting pretty close. Early June saw the encouraging success of "Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse," which is now the highest domestic grosser after "The Super Mario Bros. Movie." And everything else since then has been a disaster.
"Transformers: Rise of the Beasts" is currently the lowest grossing "Transformers" movie at $400 million worldwide. "Ruby Gillman," the Dreamworks Animation film you haven't heard of, hasn't made back half of its modest $70 million budget. "Elemental" is at $250 million, which is at least better than "Lightyear," but not by much. The biggest bomb of the summer so far, however, is "The Flash," which "Elemental" just passed on the domestic chart, despite making half of what "Flash" did on their shared opening weekend. Warner's massively hyped, long delayed superhero film fell completely flat at $260 million worldwide, and is projected to lose as much as $200 million. The latest "Indiana Jones" might be in an even worse spot, but it's too soon to tell. It opened bigger, but reportedly had a much higher budget.
Things are looking better in July with "Mission Impossible" and "Barbie" coming up, but Hollywood is still reeling from a disastrous June, which looks an awful lot like the realization of the ominous prediction that Steven Spielberg made ten years ago, about multiple $250 million movies flopping one after another at the box office, forcing the industry to change. There's been all sorts of doom-and-gloom predictions, especially after "The Flash" bombing, that this might be the end, or at least the beginning of the end of several major trends that have kept the summer box office going over the past two decades. After the underperformance of "Black Adam," "Shazam," and "Quantumania," superhero films might finally be starting to ebb. "The Little Mermaid" is the last major Disney renaissance film to get a live action adaptation, and the goodwill toward them may have also finally run dry. And while the top two box office earners this year are animated films, PIXAR hasn't had a hit since "Toy Story 4."
The total box office for this year is improving on last year, and the theaters have been making money even if the studios have not. Despite so many of the bigger disappointments coming from Disney, they still have a bigger market share than any other studio. However, only one film this year, "Super Mario," has managed to crack a billion dollar worldwide gross so far. In 2019, five summer films hit that mark - all of them Disney tentpoles. Disney's only managed one since: "Avatar: The Way of Water." Universal's "Jurassic World Dominion," Sony's "Spider-man: No Way Home," and Paramount's "Top Gun: Maverick" are the other post-pandemic billion dollar earners. In my completely uninformed opinion, the biggest reason that so many of these films flopped is that attendance levels aren't fully back to pre-pandemic levels and this may be the new normal.
There are plenty of other contributing factors. June was over-programmed, with too many big titles crammed into too few weekends. Budgets for some of these films have been out of control, especially with pandemic measures and costly delays factored in. The WGA strike has shut down many late night shows and other marketing vectors, impeding advertising campaigns. Streaming may have changed consumer habits permanently, with many opting to wait for films to become available online. PIXAR in particular seems to have been adversely affected by so many of their recent films being released as Disney+ exclusives, and skipping theatrical runs.
The success "Across the Spider-verse" suggests that audiences are absolutely willing to show up for the right film - even if it's the umpteenth superhero film that takes place in a multiverse, but they're getting more discerning, which means more films are getting the cold shoulder. It'll be interesting to see how many of these flops and bombs spell the end of their franchises. "Indiana Jones" and the DCEU are on ice for sure. "Transformers" may finally be done. "The Fast & the Furious" is guaranteed at least one more film, but that could be it.
And honestly, that may not be such a bad thing.
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