YM!

Joining @YachtyLogs in some Milwaukee tracking today, but I will be using the North area, primarily North Shore Cinema and Menomonee Falls Cinema Wish (as of 2:31 pm, 29 minutes before showtime) 247/1977 seats (898 PLF, 247 3D, 832 2D) - 44% PLF, 2.6% 3D, 53.4% regular of those sold - 12.5% of sales Napoleon (as of 2:40 pm, 20 minutes before showtime) 272/987 seats (538 2D, 449 PLF) - 22.4% PLF, 77.6% regular - 27.6 % of sales I am pretty impressed with Napoleon's growth, the 3:00 at one theater is almost sold out and think feel confident in 2M previews. Wish is kind of soft so far, will check again in like 10 minutes but I believe the main districts are still in school today, but the evening shows are where the real driving of tickets is. Thinking around 1.5M

Encanto did 40m five day.

Elemental MTC1 Previews(T-1) - 21913/340828 329714.67 2519 shows +5062 Decent-ish rebound but about 7% behind Elemental at the same point in time. Take 30% for ATP but more PLFs and that puts us at 1.56M for previews, so ~1.5M previews/~2M with EA. DHD says presales are 60% ahead of Elemental as it all comes down to walkups. As you said Encanto did about 32k (is that T-2 or final total?) for previews and Wish should (borderline) get there. Guessing around 40-50m five day then but sub 40m could happen if bad walkups.

If this was a Disney film, you’d have the right wing grifters demanding Disney’s execution

Honestly. Mainly a creative shakeup but as it stands right now, Disney probably will deal with a Peltz take over

Guessing 40m five day might be touch and go.

Think Vector being the lead villain for DM4 might help a Gentleminions moment not just for nostalgia but because of the various Vector memes. Out of curiosity, what do you think about Garfield?

I do agree that there’s an overall negativity problem on the forums in general, not just for the blockbusters but the overall nature of the theatrical future in general. I do know quite a bit of fans who have felt uncomfortable being in the forum because there is increased hostility. I do also agree that streaming in general and overall corporate greed is the overall biggest fish to fry for theatrical future. There’s obvious dudes you can tell just by posting habit who has artistic issues with tentpoles and who’s against “wokeness”. The latter shown their true colors over the past few weeks, some better or worse than others and are pretty much a small but heavily annoying minority. We should try in general to be kinder to each other and that we do get too aggressive on flops. I do think the pandemic and overall problems with our world has made it harder to focus on the positivity. However, I do think that the issue at large isn’t Scorsese and film bros killing cinema which I feel is laughable. Especially when you’ve partaken in similar behavior numerous times in the past and the present of trolling and stirring the pot. Thats like saying Marvel fans memeing DC woes killed the franchise. Whats happening to Marvel, is similar to any other franchise, they’ve reached diminishing returns primarily because of oversaturation. It annoys me people will blame women and POC before the fact we had 23 MCU projects within the past two years, which not only overworked Marvel but did contribute to why somethings came out more half-baked than usual. It can be remedied and while I’m not optimistic on the future, the brands won’t die outright. Secret Wars can be the end of the MCU but the heroes won’t die out. The problem with the film industry is that audiences have gotten way more accustomed to streaming than the theatrical experience primarily due to cheaper prices and short windows. Scorsese saying there should be equal room for films that aren’t tentpoles as well. For fuck sake’s, dude wrote an impassioned soliloquy about his time and has said many times he only used Marvel as an example of the leaders of tentpoles and said there’s room for tentpoles, yes including superhero films can be considered cinema. The problem is that studios have focused on just tentpoles and brands and have pushed been focus primarily so on taking little risks and now the general audiences are starting to get tired of them. The way events are prioritized is not healthy and doesn’t help when studios are unwilling to take risks because of it by sending those films to streamers or like Disney, choose not to make them at all. There’s plenty of low and mid budget films that could do well with the right marketing campaign and effort, and it’s important that not just tentpole survives but all films do, because film shapes how we see the world and allows new voices to thrive. It should not be just event films dominating all or being the only thing tried, and it’s not fair to dismiss artists and crew members who don’t want to be part of that process, especially when there’s an amount you have to sacrifice for the average tentpole. Tentpoles shouldn’t be the only option for POC or women directors to make films and it’s ridiculous we gotten to this point. Scorsese has done great works in making sure filmmakers of color has gotten their works shown through his World Heritage Foundation but to chalk it up to the old white man is out of touch because he said something mean about something you love annoys me. Scorsese earned his right to offer his opinion. Especially calling him for sleeping with the streaming devil when Feige unleashed a boatload of streaming shows just because he thought he could, with the same budget. Especially when, most of these tentpole studios that have been making noticeable and great strides in representation (my god, it’s so great for kids now - kid me could only have dreamed about the amount of black heroes on the screen), primarily care less so about giving power to those voices but can turn on a dime based on profitability. There’s a huge reason why I don’t trust Iger or Feige with proper onscreen LGBTQ representation especially after using Alonso as the scapegoat. I’m also disappointed with how Falcon and the Winter Soldier took a heavily centrist view versus the Black Panther movies which still standout as dynamite films. I really disliked this anti-intellectual attack on critics these past few years in not just film but in music and games. It not alone makes fans look bad, but it makes one ignore criticism. It hurts when someone who’s of great name and prestige doesn’t like the stuff you do, and you feel clowned because sometimes it feels like an attack on you, when it’s not the case. However at the end of the day, love what you love. The best you can do is just ignore and move on if you feel it’s contributing to your enjoyment though it should never get to that point. Despite my hangups with the franchise, I still love Marvel. However, I’m not going to stick my head in the sand when there’s obvious problems nor am I going to let the voices of others effect my enjoyment.

It’ll do a bit better relatively as more people watched Mandalorian and Ashoka and Boba Fett over Ms Marvel and WandaVision but still a huge money loser as no one cares about that team up. Think that Rey sequel is better off because you don’t have to watch the films. Tbh think Star Wars needs to fundamentally move on from the Skywalker legacy.

Both can happen especially with the multiverse stuff of Deadpool, but I’m keeping expectations in check.

I think Cap 4 has a much better set of circumstances than Marvels and can have the potential to break well, because the concept was directly stated at the end of Endgame so you don’t need the show to watch it or know Sam is the new Cap. It also helps the only new character is the new Falcon who never really had a presence on the show and Eli Bradley, who people liked. They’ll easily sell ads with it’s been “It’s been X amount of time since I’ve been Cap”. There also isn’t as much of a targeted campaign against it as The Marvels. I do think making it incorporated with Hulk stuff is a good pitch to sell as there’s going to be the pitch of impossible odds of fighting a Hulk and the president unlike Marvels were the marketing sort of struggled to sell it. Methinks that an Avenger or two will likely be a key part of the cast to help as well. I got the most faith of it vs Thunderbolts and Blade. If it works, like really works, I think it could do Winter Soldier numbers but right now, I’m thinking Shang-Chi numbers.

I mean we never waited for other superhero projects or even other blockbusters, why is Marvel a special exception. Sometimes a turkey is a turkey.

What does Thunderbolts have to offer? The villainous/anti heroes team up has been done before with the Suicide Squad films, it has mainly a bunch of side characters no one outside the fandom really cares about, said characters barring Ghost and Sentry all share the same powers fundamentally, and the MCU is floundering right now. It needs to be exceptionally great and look one of a kind in order to stand out and as of right now, that’s very unfair to hope for and a high standard. As it stands right now, I have as much faith in it as I do Madame Web but Thunderbolts by nature should be bigger. I got far more faith in Cap 4 to do well enough because for better or worse, Falcon has more history and the concept was introduced in Endgame and I think Hulk stuff is more popular than anything Thunderbolts has to offer and I still think it’s likely to be a psuedo Avengers.

I don’t trust any mainstream studio doing active LGBTQ representation in a blockbuster, even an R-rated one. They made Moondragon a kid in Guardians 3 to shy around it.

Gonna guess this is for Cap 4. Got a gut feeling they’ll try to squeeze in another key figure or two to some scenes to make a psuedo Avengers.

I’m aware of Beef’s strong critical reception and they seem to have faith in Thunderbolts being good, but you are aware of the very long and hard uphill battle it has to fight right. And just because reception is great for one project, means it’s necessarily a lock for the other. Chloe Zhao came off an Oscar and well look at Eternals.

Honestly even if this is great and blows up, don’t think it’ll be enough to fix the problems the MCU is currently in. Guardians 3 nor Wakanda Forever helped, if anything those felt like jump off points or something moreso the GA was really into. That stretch of Fantastic Four/Cap/Thunderbolts/Blade needs to be great and honestly I don’t think Marvel can pull it off. Do think if they could, if F4 and SM4 (assuming it opens in 2025 like hinted) should release before Cap 4/Thunderbolts/Blade. What they need is a solid streak of well performing hits.

Moana clears Pocohantas in its fucking sleep. The only redeeming thing about Pocohantas is quite literally two songs.

It’s real

My dumbass forgot the power of summer lol.

They should do this but the studios won’t allow this due to their own greed.

I think Wish is probably going to do higher than Encanto still. I don’t know much about numbers but that Wednesday seems to hint at around 8-9m, which adding previews should be around 10-11m OD. That should be enough to get it over 50m. Napoleon also seems like it could do 30m for the five day.