Jandrew's 2016 Winners and Losers

[SteveJaros]

1 hour ago, jandrew said:

I couldn't even read all of that. It's just not that important. Man, it's quite simple. Multiplier shows us "reception." Like he said, BvS's under 2 multiplier was something still shocking, even in the age of frontloadedness. The reception was not good. You cannot spin that. This movie essentially had no ceiling, so all the fans rushing out on OW means nothing.

 

Again, even Deathly Hallows had better staying power and that was probably the most anticipated movie since Phantom Menace.

 

 

Er, but still more important than your longer blog entry, right?

 

Hey, if you don't want to learn anything but rather just mouth unsupported claims about multipliers, have at it. But why bother posting at all then? 

Edited January 14, 2017 by SteveJaros

[Jandrew]

Youre not making any sense, and I dont have time to sit and read short novels like that, especially when its about something so mundane as this.

 

If you dont like it, why dont you just ignore this thread?

Edited January 14, 2017 by jandrew

[JonathanLB]

I understand that a movie's total box office gross at the end is the ultimate prize, but there's no question that when a movie has such a low multiple relative to other films of its type, it left a lot of money on the table and a bad taste in people's mouths. One of my best friends just told me yesterday he tried watching BVS and he turned it off. He thought it was terrible. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who thought that, and now it's going to be a lot more difficult to get those people into theaters for Wonder Woman or Justice League.

 

I know from a personal perspective, Marvel's quality every time out is what made me see something like Ant Man -- a movie I really knew nothing about and a character I knew nothing about -- because it was Marvel. Same with Guardians of the Galaxy. There's a certain "goodwill" that you build. If BVS was a one-off movie, like some big action picture with no sequel prospects (which would be odd...?), then maybe the multiple wouldn't matter. But when it's part of a large cinematic universe, it seems like it matters quite a lot.

 

I know if Rogue One opened to $155M and struggled to hit $300M just barely, we'd all be talking about what this means for future Anthology movies and how Disney will have to adjust their expectations, budgets, and projects because that just doesn't cut it. Even though $300M would by itself be a solid gross. I mean FB did less than that and they have more planned.

[Jonwo]

On 11/01/2017 at 4:05 PM, Wrath said:

 

That's fair, though Stork's occasional ridiculousness was, imo, one of its selling points. Like how the customer-service was so good that returned packages were effectively teleported back to the warehouse. And the wolf-pack's extremely impressive improvisational abilities (which they lampshade the hell out of. Junior and Tulip are like "Huh. They can do that?") were, imo, one of the very best parts of the movie.

 

 

The ridiculousness of Storks IMO is what made a good film and when the gags landed, they really worked. I think it's an honourable failure for WAG and hopefully it won't have an impact on future original films

[rukaio101]

9 hours ago, SteveJaros said:

 

Er, but still more important than your longer blog entry, right?

 

Hey, if you don't want to learn anything but rather just mouth unsupported claims about multipliers, have at it. But why bother posting at all then? 

Dude, the fact that you think something that is common sense to anyone who knows even the slightest thing about Box Office on this site is just 'unsupported claims' kinda indicates why no one wants to read your essay. Especially since you appear to be ignorant of the basic concepts of 'repeat viewings' and 'WOM attracting/putting people off' as to why multipliers matter.

 

But no, clearly we should drop everything we already know and listen to the genius mind behind the 2016 Fox > Disney DOM club.

[Wrath]

10 hours ago, SteveJaros said:

 

Er, but still more important than your longer blog entry, right?

 

Hey, if you don't want to learn anything but rather just mouth unsupported claims about multipliers, have at it. But why bother posting at all then? 

 

What is it that you think you have to teach people such that jandrew is apparently a bad person for not wanting to read all of your posts? I mean that seriously. Do you think you're Mythbustering the significance of a movie's OW multiplier? Because if that's what you're trying to do, you haven't put together a compelling argument yet.

 

Its like you're walking up to a baseball fan and trying to convince them that batting average as a concept is stupid. I mean, what does it matter what the ratio of hits to at-bats is? All that matters is whether the batter gets a hit, and even that only matters if the team manages to score more runs! How stupid those baseball fans are for caring about pointless stats like batting average! And they never seem to want to talk to me about it and learn, either.

 

That's what it feels like you're trying to do.

Edited January 15, 2017 by Wrath

[SteveJaros]

6 hours ago, rukaio101 said:

Dude, the fact that you think something that is common sense to anyone who knows even the slightest thing about Box Office on this site is just 'unsupported claims' kinda indicates why no one wants to read your essay. Especially since you appear to be ignorant of the basic concepts of 'repeat viewings' and 'WOM attracting/putting people off' as to why multipliers matter.

 

But no, clearly we should drop everything we already know and listen to the genius mind behind the 2016 Fox > Disney DOM club.

 

If it's "common sense", why hasn't the OP been able to explain the importance of multipliers in the face of my objections?

 

As for your post, your concepts of "repeat viewings" and "WOM" don't hold water, because it all adds up to total box office. Why does it matter if a film reaches $200m DOM because many people saw it multiple times and/or a small number of initial viewers spread the positive word to their friends, as opposed to just a whole bunch of people rushing out and seeing it once? That's not a rhetorical question, btw. Hope you have a better answer than the OP, LOL. 

Edited January 15, 2017 by SteveJaros

[SteveJaros]

5 hours ago, Wrath said:

 

What is it that you think you have to teach people such that jandrew is apparently a bad person for not wanting to read all of your posts? I mean that seriously. Do you think you're Mythbustering the significance of a movie's OW multiplier? Because if that's what you're trying to do, you haven't put together a compelling argument yet.

 

Its like you're walking up to a baseball fan and trying to convince them that batting average as a concept is stupid. I mean, what does it matter what the ratio of hits to at-bats is? All that matters is whether the batter gets a hit, and even that only matters if the team manages to score more runs! How stupid those baseball fans are for caring about pointless stats like batting average! And they never seem to want to talk to me about it and learn, either.

 

That's what it feels like you're trying to do.

 

 

 

My arguments must be compelling, since nobody - not the OP nor you here - has been able to rebut them. You don't even try here - I've said that multipliers can be interesting on their own terms for the purpose of tracking the arc of a movie's box office appeal, and I've asked whether multipliers have been linked to relevant outcomes like sequel prospects and video sales, like batting average has been to runs, but nobody has said whether it has or not. What I question is the value of using multipliers to call a film a "loser", and for the reasons I've stated.

 

As for reading posts, it was hypocritical for jandrew to say he wasn't reading mine when twice on page 2 he complained about others allegedly not reading his posts and/or blog. It was thus a ridiculous thing for him to say and yes, in the context of this thread, made him a "bad person" for declining to read mine.

Edited January 15, 2017 by SteveJaros

[rukaio101]

3 minutes ago, SteveJaros said:

 

If it's "common sense", why hasn't the OP been able to explain the importance of multipliers in the face of my objections?

HE HAS! MULTIPLE FUCKING TIMES!

 

Quote

My arguments must be compelling, since nobody - not the OP nor you here - have been able to rebut them.

You ignoring other people's points does not equal 'failing to rebut them'.

 

Edited January 15, 2017 by rukaio101

[SteveJaros]

13 minutes ago, rukaio101 said:

HE HAS! MULTIPLE FUCKING TIMES!

 

 

Are you on drugs? He hasn't been able to explain the import of multipliers in any sensible way, and I haven't ignored his posts - I've answered all of his 'points' defending multipliers. It's one thing to not bother reading my 'essay', but since you apparently haven't bothered to read any of the exchanges, why are you bothering to comment here at all?

Edited January 15, 2017 by SteveJaros

[aabattery]

 

Are you on drugs? He hasn't been able to explain the import of multipliers in any sensible way, and I haven't ignored his posts - I've answered all of his 'points' defending multipliers. It's one thing to not bother reading my 'essay', but since you apparently haven't bothered to read any of the exchanges, why are you bothering to comment here at all?

They are almost universally considered a good way of looking at a films WOM. Yes, they are not the be-all-and-end-all but BvS' multiplier was objectively terrible compared to pretty much every other blockbuster. You seem to be trying to reinvent the wheel here; we all use multipliers to gauge a films box office performance. It's not like it's a new concept.

[chasmmi]

Importance of Multipliers:

 

In this day and age a 4x multiplier or bigger generally means great word of mouth, that people loved it and went to see it again and that people who didn't see it opening week were drawn into seeing that film that everyone was liking and talking about. 

 

3x means the film is pretty popular and nobody who put off seeing the film opening week was turned away by horrid reviews or toxic WOM.

 

A 2x multiplier essentially suggests that not only did everyone who wanted to see the film see it OW weekend, but pretty much none of them went to see it again and on top of that new business was also pretty dismal too suggesting that people were actively turned off by the reviews / consensus.

 

When a film opens to 165M, that is a sign of massive interest in a film. Not just anything can open to that kind of number. To fail to make that amount again over the total course of its run pretty much means that the vast majority of those diehard interested people, decided that they did not want to see the film again. ON top of this anybody avoiding the rush or on the fence about the film pretty much unanimously were turned off from seeing it and went to Jungle Book or Zootopia (or something else they heard good things about instead. (Hence why both of those films were able to easily leg it past BvS's total).

 

Even Civil War which had a surprisingly low multiplier, managed to get a 20% or more higher return rate of admissions after OW than BvS despite opening another $15M higher and in a more multiplier unfriendly period.

 

A super low multiplier also has a knock on impact for VOD, DVD and all post cinema sales as those are driven by WOM and a film's popularity. (BvS got around this by releasing and different and better cut that drove up Home Video sales).

 

So yeah multipliers are important. Pretty much any film released would prefer to hit $330M the Zootopia way than the BVS way.   

[SteveJaros]

11 hours ago, chasmmi said:

Importance of Multipliers:

 

In this day and age a 4x multiplier or bigger generally means great word of mouth, that people loved it and went to see it again and that people who didn't see it opening week were drawn into seeing that film that everyone was liking and talking about. 

 

3x means the film is pretty popular and nobody who put off seeing the film opening week was turned away by horrid reviews or toxic WOM.

 

A 2x multiplier essentially suggests that not only did everyone who wanted to see the film see it OW weekend, but pretty much none of them went to see it again and on top of that new business was also pretty dismal too suggesting that people were actively turned off by the reviews / consensus.

 

When a film opens to 165M, that is a sign of massive interest in a film. Not just anything can open to that kind of number. To fail to make that amount again over the total course of its run pretty much means that the vast majority of those diehard interested people, decided that they did not want to see the film again. ON top of this anybody avoiding the rush or on the fence about the film pretty much unanimously were turned off from seeing it and went to Jungle Book or Zootopia (or something else they heard good things about instead. (Hence why both of those films were able to easily leg it past BvS's total).

 

Even Civil War which had a surprisingly low multiplier, managed to get a 20% or more higher return rate of admissions after OW than BvS despite opening another $15M higher and in a more multiplier unfriendly period.

 

A super low multiplier also has a knock on impact for VOD, DVD and all post cinema sales as those are driven by WOM and a film's popularity. (BvS got around this by releasing and different and better cut that drove up Home Video sales).

 

Appreciate the comprehensive explanation of multiplier importance, so felt obligated to respond point by point:

 

First, I understand what multipliers mean mathematically, and also what they tend to mean in terms of word-of-mouth and repeat viewings. A bigger multiplier often means that folks who weren't motivated enough to see a film the weekend it is released go to see it in later weeks because good reviews and recommendations from friends who did see it motivate them to do so, and that those who saw it opening weekend wanted to see it again. Never had an issue with that, it makes sense. 

 

Second, I also understand that (a) BvS's opening weekend of $166m was massive, one of the best ever, thus indicating enormous initial interest in the movie. Obviously, there was a great mass of people, such as hardcore fanboys and also members of the GA who are well aware of Batman and Superman, who were eager to see it and rushed out to do so upon release. And (b) the multiplier of 1.95x meant that BvS did not generate much WOM or repeat business, relative to its opening weekend. 

 

So obviously (and again, something I've never questioned), all else equal, it would have been better had BvS had say a 3x multiplier, because that would have meant a DOM gross of $500m, not $330m. 

 

But .... that said, it also seems to me that a multiplier could have causes other than the "bad" ones of poor WOM or lack of interest in multiple viewings. E.g., compare Captain America Civil War to Suicide Squad. Suicide Squad actually had a better DOM multiplier than CACW, despite all the direct indicators of how "good" a movie is perceived to be by critics and the public - such as rotten tomatoes ratings and cinemascore - saying that CAWS was the better and better-liked movie. Go figure. That indicates to me that multiplier is a function of a lot of factors, some of which aren't negative about a movie, so we should be cautious in drawing negative conclusions about a film because of it. The better indicator of how well-received a movie is is, well, money made, and CACW made more money. For its part, BvS made $330m DOM. Was that disappointing? Given that the two previous Batman movies made $550m and $470m DOM, surely. But to call it a loser, as the OP did, based on that and multiplier, is IMO taking things way too far. If a movie that makes 330/870 WW is a "loser", what do we call a movie like Alice II, that also had a huge budget and yet did 77/300 WW? A super-duper loser? BvS wasn't a loser, it was disappointing given very high expectations. Big difference, IMO. 

 

Heck, IIRC, Alice II had a better multiplier than BvS, so I guess according to the OP that makes it actually less of a loser, despite making hundreds of millions less? IMO, that is nonsensical. That is way-overvaluing the import of multiplier. 

 

And that last thing does bring up what I have objected to, which is calling a film a 'loser' based on multiplier, when we have the actual gross. IMO, unless the goal is to develop insights about how different film audiences evolve, a multiplier is only meaningful to the extent it translates into money. You say that a bad multiplier hurts home video sales, and someone else said it can hurt sequel prospects. That would make multipliers very relevant, but again, have actual studies shown this? Not a rhetorical question. If someone could say "yes, it's been shown that for films of equal gross, a poorer multiplier leads to lower video sales and/or poorer sequel prospects than a higher multiplier" and here's a study that shows it, then that would make the multiplier relevant. But nobody has confirmed that.

 

In the anecdotal case of BvS, as i indicated earlier, its home video sales are actually better than Jungle Book,  a movie with comparable gross but which had far better legs. And the first post-BvS DCU movie, Suicide Squad, did excellent box office. So the lousy BvS multiplier didn't seem to hurt video sales or sequel prospects. Go figure. 

 

So as of now, I'm not convinced that a multiplier matters independent of gross. E.g. that a BvS that oppened at $66m DOM and finished at $330m (5x multiplier) would be somehow better than the actual BvS that opened at $166m and finished at $330m DOM. Had BvS opened at $66m, we'd probably all say "wow, what a lousy job of pre-release marketing! A Batman/Superman movie should have opened massively!". But I'm definitely open to being educated on this point. 

 

 

Edited January 16, 2017 by SteveJaros

[Jandrew]

On ‎1‎/‎15‎/‎2017 at 6:16 AM, SteveJaros said:

As for reading posts, it was hypocritical for jandrew to say he wasn't reading mine when twice on page 2 he complained about others allegedly not reading his posts and/or blog. It was thus a ridiculous thing for him to say and yes, in the context of this thread, made him a "bad person" for declining to read mine.

 

I was "complaining" because you guys were complaining about things that I already explained. Trust me, I don't need to beg people to read my blog considering it's been seen in over 90 countries. I'm not trying to be rude to you on purpose, but your persistence is turning into annoyance.

 

I'm not the only one: like half a dozen other people are telling you the same thing. Maybe you should stop and think that maybe we're all on to something and there's no anti-BVS agenda here. When I say I don't have time to read your post, I'm not being snarky - I literally don't. Sorry.

 

 

[SteveJaros]

14 hours ago, jandrew said:

 

I was "complaining" because you guys were complaining about things that I already explained. Trust me, I don't need to beg people to read my blog considering it's been seen in over 90 countries. I'm not trying to be rude to you on purpose, but your persistence is turning into annoyance.

 

I'm not the only one: like half a dozen other people are telling you the same thing. Maybe you should stop and think that maybe we're all on to something and there's no anti-BVS agenda here. When I say I don't have time to read your post, I'm not being snarky - I literally don't. Sorry.

 

 

 

The problem was, your explanation was rebutted, and then your response to that rebuttal was, in essence, "I didn't bother to read your reply but I know I'm right anyway". And then you carried on, like you do right here, as if your rebutted explanation still has currency. That's just poor form on a forum that exists for debate and discussion.

 

And your last line here is disingenuous, because you could have read any of my posts in the time it took you to write this one - and you also did manage to read the one of mine you responded to. So even if you are, say, Donald Trump's nominee to be Secretary of Defense and literally have to be in Senate committee confirmation hearings for the next 10 hours, well, you still could have read my rebuttal. So sorry, you do seem to be snarky. And that's not becoming of someone who has shown himself to be unable to defend his point of view here.

 

 

 

Edited January 17, 2017 by SteveJaros

[aabattery]

 
The problem was, your explanation was rebutted, and then your response to that rebuttal was, in essence, "I didn't bother to read your reply but I know I'm right anyway". And then you carried on, like you do right here, as if your rebutted explanation still has currency. That's just poor form on a forum that exists for debate and discussion.
 
And your last line here is disingenuous, because you could have read any of my posts in the time it took you to write this one - and you also did manage to read the one of mine you responded to. So even if you are, say, Donald Trump's nominee to be Secretary of Defense and literally have to be in Senate committee confirmation hearings for the next 10 hours, well, you still could have read my rebuttal. So sorry, you do seem to be snarky. And that's not becoming of someone who has shown himself to be unable to defend his point of view here.
 
 
 

The issue is your rebuttal doesn't hold water. Almost everyone here disagrees with what you are saying, but you keep acting like your argument invalidates jandrews points. He explained pretty clearly what his thought process is behind his decision to call BvS a loser. He doesn't really have to read your posts because you're pretty much just regurgitating the same argument that he has already disagreed with.

[SteveJaros]

1 hour ago, AABATTERY said:

 

The issue is your rebuttal doesn't hold water. Almost everyone here disagrees with what you are saying, but you keep acting like your argument invalidates jandrews points. He explained pretty clearly what his thought process is behind his decision to call BvS a loser. He doesn't really have to read your posts because you're pretty much just regurgitating the same argument that he has already disagreed with.

 

 

Maybe it doesn't, but neither you nor him have been able to show that. I act like my arguments invalidate jandrews points because, well, they  do. Sorry, but that's how it stands. 

 

Now perhaps you can change that, but so far, like him all you've basically done is declare that multiplier is widely used to evaluate films, as if that by itself validates it and justifies calling BvS a loser. But it doesn't. 

Edited January 17, 2017 by SteveJaros

[aabattery]

12 hours ago, SteveJaros said:

 

Maybe it doesn't, but neither you nor him have been able to show that. I act like my arguments invalidate jandrews points because, well, they  do. Sorry, but that's how it stands. 

 

Now perhaps you can change that, but so far, like him all you've basically done is declare that multiplier is widely used to evaluate films, as if that by itself validates it and justifies calling BvS a loser. But it doesn't. 

 

Well, you seem to be comparing BvS to films that opened much lower like Alice 2. You've bought up the Alice 2 comparison a couple of times, but I don't think it can really be compared to BvS. Pretty much everyone was expecting Alice 2 to flop, although it flopped a lot harder than most people were expecting. BvS, on the other hand, had an enormous amount of interest which we could see from the trailer views and the opening weekend. The opening was in line with expectations; it was the legs that made it a "loser" from jandrews point of view. If you have a look at the 42 films that opened above 100M, BvS is the only one to not get a multiplier above 2. You are right that it's hard to compare multipliers due to the multitude of factors that go into them, but BvS had an especially bad one. It's safe to say it had one of the worst multipliers of any modern blockbuster. This in itself is enough to make the film seem pretty disappointing but coupled with how much BvS was expected to make, I think it's pretty clear why jandrew is calling it a loser. If you have a look back to the predictions on here and in the trades in 2015, even the most pessimistic predictions had it over 350M. The fact is that this movie had a perfect release date, with several weeks clear of competition and an opening on Easter Weekend. It had (generally) pretty good marketing and the public interest was clearly present, which we can see by looking at how much the last two Batman films made along with the general dominance of the superhero genre. Despite all this it fell off a cliff after the first week and what should have been one of the highest grossing films of the year didn't even make the top 5 DOM or WW.

 

Note: Sort by Rank or any other column to view all wide releases.

Rank	Title (click to view)	Studio	Opening*	% of Total	Theaters	Avg.	Total Gross^	Date**
1	Star Wars: The Force Awakens	BV	$247,966,675	26.5%	4,134	$59,982	$936,662,225	12/18/2015
2	Jurassic World	Uni.	$208,806,270	32.0%	4,274	$48,855	$652,270,625	6/12/2015
3	Marvel's The Avengers	BV	$207,438,708	33.3%	4,349	$47,698	$623,357,910	5/4/2012
4	Avengers: Age of Ultron	BV	$191,271,109	41.7%	4,276	$44,731	$459,005,868	5/1/2015
5	Captain America: Civil War	BV	$179,139,142	43.9%	4,226	$42,390	$408,084,349	5/6/2016
6	Iron Man 3	BV	$174,144,585	42.6%	4,253	$40,946	$409,013,994	5/3/2013
7	Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2	WB	$169,189,427	44.4%	4,375	$38,672	$381,011,219	7/15/2011
8	Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice	WB	$166,007,347	50.3%	4,242	$39,134	$330,360,194	3/25/2016
9	The Dark Knight Rises	WB	$160,887,295	35.9%	4,404	$36,532	$448,139,099	7/20/2012
10	The Dark Knight	WB	$158,411,483	29.7%	4,366	$36,283	$533,345,358	7/18/2008
11	The Hunger Games: Catching Fire	LGF	$158,074,286	37.2%	4,163	$37,971	$424,668,047	11/22/2013
12	Rogue One: A Star Wars Story	BV	$155,081,681	30.9%	4,157	$37,306	$501,898,446	12/16/2016
13	The Hunger Games	LGF	$152,535,747	37.4%	4,137	$36,871	$408,010,692	3/23/2012
14	Spider-Man 3	Sony	$151,116,516	44.9%	4,252	$35,540	$336,530,303	5/4/2007
15	Furious 7	Uni.	$147,187,040	41.7%	4,004	$36,760	$353,007,020	4/3/2015
16	The Twilight Saga: New Moon	Sum.	$142,839,137	48.2%	4,024	$35,497	$296,623,634	11/20/2009
17	The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2	LG/S	$141,067,634	48.3%	4,070	$34,660	$292,324,737	11/16/2012
18	The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1	Sum.	$138,122,261	49.1%	4,061	$34,012	$281,287,133	11/18/2011
19	Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest	BV	$135,634,554	32.0%	4,133	$32,817	$423,315,812	7/7/2006
20	Finding Dory	BV	$135,060,273	27.8%	4,305	$31,373	$486,295,561	6/17/2016
21	Suicide Squad	WB	$133,682,248	41.1%	4,255	$31,418	$325,100,054	8/5/2016
22	Deadpool	Fox	$132,434,639	36.5%	3,558	$37,222	$363,070,709	2/12/2016
23	Iron Man 2	Par.	$128,122,480	41.0%	4,380	$29,252	$312,433,331	5/7/2010
24	Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1	WB	$125,017,372	42.2%	4,125	$30,307	$295,983,305	11/19/2010
25	The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1	LGF	$121,897,634	36.2%	4,151	$29,366	$337,135,885	11/21/2014
26	Shrek the Third	P/DW	$121,629,270	37.7%	4,122	$29,507	$322,719,944	5/18/2007
27	Man of Steel	WB	$116,619,362	40.1%	4,207	$27,720	$291,045,518	6/14/2013
28	Alice in Wonderland (2010)	BV	$116,101,023	34.7%	3,728	$31,143	$334,191,110	3/5/2010
29	Minions	Uni.	$115,718,405	34.4%	4,301	$26,905	$336,045,770	7/10/2015
30	Spider-Man	Sony	$114,844,116	28.4%	3,615	$31,768	$403,706,375	5/3/2002
31	Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End	BV	$114,732,820	37.1%	4,362	$26,302	$309,420,425	5/25/2007
32	Toy Story 3	BV	$110,307,189	26.6%	4,028	$27,385	$415,004,880	6/18/2010
33	Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen	P/DW	$108,966,307	27.1%	4,234	$25,736	$402,111,870	6/24/2009
34	Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith	Fox	$108,435,841	28.5%	3,661	$29,619	$380,270,577	5/19/2005
35	Shrek 2	DW	$108,037,878	24.5%	4,163	$25,951	$441,226,247	5/19/2004
36	The Secret Life of Pets	Uni.	$104,352,905	28.3%	4,370	$23,879	$368,384,330	7/8/2016
37	The Jungle Book (2016)	BV	$103,261,464	28.4%	4,028	$25,636	$364,001,123	4/15/2016
38	X-Men: The Last Stand	Fox	$102,750,665	43.8%	3,690	$27,845	$234,362,462	5/26/2006
39	Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire	WB	$102,685,961	35.4%	3,858	$26,616	$290,013,036	11/18/2005
40	The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2	LGF	$102,665,981	36.4%	4,175	$24,591	$281,723,902	11/20/2015
41	Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull	Par.	$100,137,835	31.6%	4,260	$23,507	$317,101,119	5/22/2008
42	Transformers: Age of Extinction	Par.	$100,038,390	40.8%	4,233	$23,633	$245,439,076	6/27/2014

 

Even when we look past the multiplier, it's gross compared to other Batman films is still really lackluster. It opened higher than any other Batman movie before it, but ended up with more than 100M less than TDKR. The adjusted grosses of all the live action Batman films shows just how poorly it did compared to the rest.

 

Adjusted for Ticket Price Inflation

Rank	Title (click to view)	Studio	Adjusted Gross	Unadjusted Gross	Release
1	The Dark Knight	WB	$632,029,400	$533,345,358	7/18/08
2	Batman	WB	$535,743,800	$251,188,924	6/23/89
3	The Dark Knight Rises	WB	$490,021,200	$448,139,099	7/20/12
4	Batman Forever	WB	$360,024,100	$184,031,112	6/16/95
5	Batman Returns	WB	$333,903,100	$162,831,698	6/19/92
6	Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice	WB	$325,598,000	$330,360,194	3/25/16
7	Batman Begins	WB	$272,617,100	$205,343,774	6/15/05
8	Batman and Robin	WB	$198,984,200	$107,325,195	6/20/97

 

It's easy to point at its final tally in a vacuum and say "hey, that's a lot of money", but it wasn't in a vacuum. It's characters make up one of the biggest movie franchises in the world. It's budget was the higher than TDKR (230M vs 250M), which indicates that Warner Brothers anticipated it to match that, yet it came in doing less than even the most pessimistic of predictions with $330M.

 

A key point I think you're missing from jandrews blog is how he is judging what is a winner and what is a loser. He isn't looking at just the total gross, as we can see in the first paragraph of his original post; This list isn't just about gross, but rather gross, reception, and expectations. So from these criteria we can say it's gross was significantly lower than expected and I don't think anyone can defend it's reception, both critically and by the GA. As a result, I think it is crystal clear why jandrew called it a loser. Especially considering that this further hurt the good will that audiences have towards DC films. They've had 3 movies in a row with mixed-to-poor critical and GA reception (although Suicide Squad did rectify it somewhat with the GA, in my opinion), so it seems likely that this might limit the financial potential of their future films.

 

I've got a bit too worked up over this, so I apologise. This kind of list does boil down to opinions and it's fine to disagree. Like Porthos said, they're fuzzy things. 

 

Edited January 18, 2017 by AABATTERY

[SteveJaros]

9 hours ago, AABATTERY said:

 

Well, you seem to be comparing BvS to films that opened much lower like Alice 2. You've bought up the Alice 2 comparison a couple of times, but I don't think it can really be compared to BvS. Pretty much everyone was expecting Alice 2 to flop, although it flopped a lot harder than most people were expecting. BvS, on the other hand, had an enormous amount of interest which we could see from the trailer views and the opening weekend. The opening was in line with expectations; it was the legs that made it a "loser" from jandrews point of view. If you have a look at the 42 films that opened above 100M, BvS is the only one to not get a multiplier above 2. You are right that it's hard to compare multipliers due to the multitude of factors that go into them, but BvS had an especially bad one. It's safe to say it had one of the worst multipliers of any modern blockbuster. This in itself is enough to make the film seem pretty disappointing but coupled with how much BvS was expected to make, I think it's pretty clear why jandrew is calling it a loser. If you have a look back to the predictions on here and in the trades in 2015, even the most pessimistic predictions had it over 350M. The fact is that this movie had a perfect release date, with several weeks clear of competition and an opening on Easter Weekend. It had (generally) pretty good marketing and the public interest was clearly present, which we can see by looking at how much the last two Batman films made along with the general dominance of the superhero genre. Despite all this it fell off a cliff after the first week and what should have been one of the highest grossing films of the year didn't even make the top 5 DOM or WW.

 

Note: Sort by Rank or any other column to view all wide releases.

Rank	Title (click to view)	Studio	Opening*	% of Total	Theaters	Avg.	Total Gross^	Date**
1	Star Wars: The Force Awakens	BV	$247,966,675	26.5%	4,134	$59,982	$936,662,225	12/18/2015
2	Jurassic World	Uni.	$208,806,270	32.0%	4,274	$48,855	$652,270,625	6/12/2015
3	Marvel's The Avengers	BV	$207,438,708	33.3%	4,349	$47,698	$623,357,910	5/4/2012
4	Avengers: Age of Ultron	BV	$191,271,109	41.7%	4,276	$44,731	$459,005,868	5/1/2015
5	Captain America: Civil War	BV	$179,139,142	43.9%	4,226	$42,390	$408,084,349	5/6/2016
6	Iron Man 3	BV	$174,144,585	42.6%	4,253	$40,946	$409,013,994	5/3/2013
7	Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2	WB	$169,189,427	44.4%	4,375	$38,672	$381,011,219	7/15/2011
8	Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice	WB	$166,007,347	50.3%	4,242	$39,134	$330,360,194	3/25/2016
9	The Dark Knight Rises	WB	$160,887,295	35.9%	4,404	$36,532	$448,139,099	7/20/2012
10	The Dark Knight	WB	$158,411,483	29.7%	4,366	$36,283	$533,345,358	7/18/2008
11	The Hunger Games: Catching Fire	LGF	$158,074,286	37.2%	4,163	$37,971	$424,668,047	11/22/2013
12	Rogue One: A Star Wars Story	BV	$155,081,681	30.9%	4,157	$37,306	$501,898,446	12/16/2016
13	The Hunger Games	LGF	$152,535,747	37.4%	4,137	$36,871	$408,010,692	3/23/2012
14	Spider-Man 3	Sony	$151,116,516	44.9%	4,252	$35,540	$336,530,303	5/4/2007
15	Furious 7	Uni.	$147,187,040	41.7%	4,004	$36,760	$353,007,020	4/3/2015
16	The Twilight Saga: New Moon	Sum.	$142,839,137	48.2%	4,024	$35,497	$296,623,634	11/20/2009
17	The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2	LG/S	$141,067,634	48.3%	4,070	$34,660	$292,324,737	11/16/2012
18	The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1	Sum.	$138,122,261	49.1%	4,061	$34,012	$281,287,133	11/18/2011
19	Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest	BV	$135,634,554	32.0%	4,133	$32,817	$423,315,812	7/7/2006
20	Finding Dory	BV	$135,060,273	27.8%	4,305	$31,373	$486,295,561	6/17/2016
21	Suicide Squad	WB	$133,682,248	41.1%	4,255	$31,418	$325,100,054	8/5/2016
22	Deadpool	Fox	$132,434,639	36.5%	3,558	$37,222	$363,070,709	2/12/2016
23	Iron Man 2	Par.	$128,122,480	41.0%	4,380	$29,252	$312,433,331	5/7/2010
24	Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1	WB	$125,017,372	42.2%	4,125	$30,307	$295,983,305	11/19/2010
25	The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1	LGF	$121,897,634	36.2%	4,151	$29,366	$337,135,885	11/21/2014
26	Shrek the Third	P/DW	$121,629,270	37.7%	4,122	$29,507	$322,719,944	5/18/2007
27	Man of Steel	WB	$116,619,362	40.1%	4,207	$27,720	$291,045,518	6/14/2013
28	Alice in Wonderland (2010)	BV	$116,101,023	34.7%	3,728	$31,143	$334,191,110	3/5/2010
29	Minions	Uni.	$115,718,405	34.4%	4,301	$26,905	$336,045,770	7/10/2015
30	Spider-Man	Sony	$114,844,116	28.4%	3,615	$31,768	$403,706,375	5/3/2002
31	Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End	BV	$114,732,820	37.1%	4,362	$26,302	$309,420,425	5/25/2007
32	Toy Story 3	BV	$110,307,189	26.6%	4,028	$27,385	$415,004,880	6/18/2010
33	Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen	P/DW	$108,966,307	27.1%	4,234	$25,736	$402,111,870	6/24/2009
34	Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith	Fox	$108,435,841	28.5%	3,661	$29,619	$380,270,577	5/19/2005
35	Shrek 2	DW	$108,037,878	24.5%	4,163	$25,951	$441,226,247	5/19/2004
36	The Secret Life of Pets	Uni.	$104,352,905	28.3%	4,370	$23,879	$368,384,330	7/8/2016
37	The Jungle Book (2016)	BV	$103,261,464	28.4%	4,028	$25,636	$364,001,123	4/15/2016
38	X-Men: The Last Stand	Fox	$102,750,665	43.8%	3,690	$27,845	$234,362,462	5/26/2006
39	Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire	WB	$102,685,961	35.4%	3,858	$26,616	$290,013,036	11/18/2005
40	The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2	LGF	$102,665,981	36.4%	4,175	$24,591	$281,723,902	11/20/2015
41	Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull	Par.	$100,137,835	31.6%	4,260	$23,507	$317,101,119	5/22/2008
42	Transformers: Age of Extinction	Par.	$100,038,390	40.8%	4,233	$23,633	$245,439,076	6/27/2014

 

Even when we look past the multiplier, it's gross compared to other Batman films is still really lackluster. It opened higher than any other Batman movie before it, but ended up with more than 100M less than TDKR. The adjusted grosses of all the live action Batman films shows just how poorly it did compared to the rest.

 

Adjusted for Ticket Price Inflation

Rank	Title (click to view)	Studio	Adjusted Gross	Unadjusted Gross	Release
1	The Dark Knight	WB	$632,029,400	$533,345,358	7/18/08
2	Batman	WB	$535,743,800	$251,188,924	6/23/89
3	The Dark Knight Rises	WB	$490,021,200	$448,139,099	7/20/12
4	Batman Forever	WB	$360,024,100	$184,031,112	6/16/95
5	Batman Returns	WB	$333,903,100	$162,831,698	6/19/92
6	Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice	WB	$325,598,000	$330,360,194	3/25/16
7	Batman Begins	WB	$272,617,100	$205,343,774	6/15/05
8	Batman and Robin	WB	$198,984,200	$107,325,195	6/20/97

 

It's easy to point at its final tally in a vacuum and say "hey, that's a lot of money", but it wasn't in a vacuum. It's characters make up one of the biggest movie franchises in the world. It's budget was the higher than TDKR (230M vs 250M), which indicates that Warner Brothers anticipated it to match that, yet it came in doing less than even the most pessimistic of predictions with $330M.

 

A key point I think you're missing from jandrews blog is how he is judging what is a winner and what is a loser. He isn't looking at just the total gross, as we can see in the first paragraph of his original post; This list isn't just about gross, but rather gross, reception, and expectations. So from these criteria we can say it's gross was significantly lower than expected and I don't think anyone can defend it's reception, both critically and by the GA. As a result, I think it is crystal clear why jandrew called it a loser. Especially considering that this further hurt the good will that audiences have towards DC films. They've had 3 movies in a row with mixed-to-poor critical and GA reception (although Suicide Squad did rectify it somewhat with the GA, in my opinion), so it seems likely that this might limit the financial potential of their future films.

 

I've got a bit too worked up over this, so I apologise. This kind of list does boil down to opinions and it's fine to disagree. Like Porthos said, they're fuzzy things. 

 

 

No need to apologize, I appreciate your reply, thanks for the comprehensive response. I'll do the same, replying to some points you made above.

 

1) About my bringing up Alice 2. IMO, that is a fair comparison because in key ways it was comparable to BvS: Like BvS, Alice 2 had a huge budget, had an A-list cast, was being marketed by one of the powerhouse studios, arguably the hottest one in Disney, it had a primo Memorial Day weekend slot, and was a sequel to a film that had done over $1 Billion WW at the box office. No, it's not a perfect comparison - e.g., we can argue over the relative desirability of having Easter alone vs a more-crowded Memorial day, about whether Batman and Superman have more or less built-in cultural awareness as Alice in Wonderland, and Alice's budget, at $350m total is a bit less than BvS's $420m total budget (production and marketing). But IMO, they both are in the same general category of "tentpole blockbuster". Disney certainly didn't expect it to flop, otherwise they wouldn't have invested all their time and money into it. And the stock market didn't think so, Variety reported that Disney stock took a hit after it opened poorly. 

 

And that brings me to why I've compared Alice 2 to BvS, which was to highlight what I believe is a flaw in JAndrews's ranking system: If BvS is a "loser", what do we call a movie that was in the same class in terms of its budget, marketing, studio support, sequel status, etc., and yet did almost  $600m less at the global box office? We'd need an extra category for that, something like a super-duper loser, and the OP doesn't have that. "Loser" is as bad as it gets in his rating system, and so long as that is the case, IMO it would have to be reserved for Alice 2 type films, not BvS films that, despite their terrible multipliers, still raked in almost $900m WW. 

 

2) About multipliers: I agree that BvS had a particularly bad one, and thanks for that chart showing it to be the worst among the top 40 openers. But even so, (a) it's not like BvS is an outlier, it's merely the worst on a continuum. E.g., all three "Twilight" movies come very close to BvS's multiplier. And even more importantly, I still don't know why so much stress is placed on multiplier to begin with. As i noted previously, what if a film did $750M DOM its opening week, and then "just" $250m DOM the rest of the way? That would be a horrendous multiplier of 1.33, but the film would still have grossed $1B DOM, a nominal record! So IMO it would be crazy to call it a loser based on its multiplier.

 

Conversely, what if BvS had opened at $145m DOM,  still a massive opening, and finished at the same $331m. That would be a multiplier of 2.28, which I guess would make you and JAndrew feel a lot better about it, but would that really take it off the hook for still doing 'just' $331m? I don't see the difference there, it's like the OP is worshipping multiplier for its own sake. Ultimately, what matters is gross, not how a film gets there. And BvS's gross, while disappointing, is not literally loserville, IMO. Again, see Alice 2 for that.

 

That's also why I asked about other impacts on revenue, such as sequels and home video. If a lousy multiplier leads to less $$$ in those domains, then yes, to an extent it does matter how a film gets to its gross, better to have a high multiplier than a small one. But nobody has shown that to be generally true (i asked for references to studies), and in this case, BvS has produced good home video sales, and its first DCU sequel, Suicide Squad, performed well at the box office too, indicating that the bad BvS multiplier didn't hurt in those areas.

 

3) As for gross compared to other batman films: First, it was also a Superman movie, so IMO it would be fair to add both "Man of Steel" and "Superman Returns" to your chart as well. And since BvS did better than both of those (adjusted for inflation), that would put BvS in 6th place out of 10 relevant films, not 6th place out of 8th. But even limited to your list, while 6th out of 8th isn't great, isn't even good, it's not bad, and IMO, bad is what is needed to call a film a loser. 

 

Finally, from the beginning, I have understood how the OP defined his terms. I get that he is looking at box office, reception, and expectations, not box office alone, or in a vacuum. Early on, he wrongly tried to chastise me and someone else for "looking at box office alone", when at least I have never done any such thing. If I had, I would have argued that BvS should be called a "winner", because at $875m WW, it surely made some profit for WB despite its massive costs (one analyst said it would ultimately make around $275m in profit for WB once all sources of revenue are tallied, such as home video). 

 

But I haven't called it a "winner". All along, I've said that the best word to describe it is a "disappointment", and for the reasons many have mentioned: Poor gross relative to expectations (like everyone else, I thought it was a near-lock for $1B WW), and poor critical reception. I've acknowledged both of those all along, and factored them into my evaluation. 

 

Was BvS a critical and commercial disappointment? Yes. But a loser? IMO, that is taking it too far, and that's all I've ever objected to. I don't mind that the OP has factored in other things, like reception and expectations, to arrive at his conclusion. I've done the same thing. But IMO, he simply weights box office too lightly. He allows expectations and reception to drag an $875m WW film into the loser category, and for the reasons I've given, that isn't tenable.

 

Just my 3 cents, hope I haven't mischaracterized any of your points, or overlooked any of them either. If so, I apologize.

 

 

Edited January 18, 2017 by SteveJaros

[RandomCat]

1.) Suicide Squad is not a sequel to Batman V Superman. It's like calling Winter Soldier a sequel to Thor the Dark World.

 

Course doing 750 in it's opening week is very impressive, but multipliers aren't done of opening week. (I'm being pedantic.)

 

Also, nice job not including all the Superman films in your chart, just to boost your point. Superman and Superman II made more than BvS adjusted. BVS sits at 8 out of 14 adjusted. But behold, it beat Quest for Peace and Superman III, that's something.

 

End of the day, it's how the OP wishes to declare it a loser, and you can argue that he's wrong all you want, but his definition is BVS didn't make as much as it should have based on clear interest in the film, which is shown by buzz and opening weekend, and how interest clearly dropped off after release by the one of the worst multipliers ever seen by a big budget movie. And comparing it to Twilight is pretty bad, when movies that only appeal to teen girls and Baumer has more GA interest after it's OW than BvS...well...

 

You can call it a Winner, but then again, that's your opinion. Mine is that it BvS did poorly relative to what it's potential was, and left a lot of sour tastes in a lot of people's mouths. It hurt the franchise more than it helped, and that's more a loser than it is a winner.