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Eric is Quiet

The Marvels | November 10, 2023 | Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter

By Eric is Quiet, in Box Office Discussion

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Posted by Porthos,

To be fair, an equal number of people have made hating the MCU their entire personality.
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JustLurking Box Office Gold

JustLurking

Posted
Posted (edited)
3 hours ago, Porthos said:

 

 

But that's kinda Deep Wang's point here.  When someone is saying "biggest box office bomb of all time" what they really mean is "Biggest disappointing box office run from an anticipated film".  They're not actually talking about the financial losses.  I mean, not really. 

 

People like to trot out John Carter, but at least it made back its alleged production budget which a whole hell of a lot of films have failed to do. 

 

Meanwhile films like Mortal Engines couldn't even crack its "Sure, Jan" budget of "at least 100m".

 

Now did John Carter "actually" cost a hell of a lot more than $250m?  Of course.  Did John Carter "actually" take in a hell of a lot less than $250m since theaters and middlemen and whatnot getting their cuts?  Again, of course.  But a shit ton of attention has been given to the John Carters and Lone Rangers of the world and not quite as much as the Mortal Engines for various reasons that probably aren't all that important in the grand scheme of things.

 

Hell, only reason *I* remember Mortal Engines is because of the Peter Jackson connection and that it spectacularly imploded.

 

===

 

Now will The Marvels be "worse" than the others?  None of us will ever know, thanks to the magic of Hollywood Accounting.  And I'm not even being snide here because Hollywood Accounting is such an infamous joke that, famously enough, Fox/Lucasfilm tried to claim that Return of the Jedi was never profitable.  And I bring this up because it shows that the whole definition of profitable/unprofitable is... fucking impossible to define even in the best of situations.

 

And that's not even getting into "loss leader" territory like KOTFM. 

 

It is entirely possible for  KOTFM to "lose" more money than Apple/Paramount expected, "lose" more money on whatever fictional balance sheet actually exists deeeep within the bowels of Cupertino versus the similar balance sheet that exists somewhere in Burbank *AND* not be as big of a financial disappointment to the parent studios of Apple and Paramount as The Marvels might be to Disney.

 

In the end, I think that's what folks really might mean here.  They're trying to gauge the relative disappointment/expectations of the studios themselves and the entertainment industry at large. Which is another reason why people remember things like John Carter and Lone Ranger and not films like Mortal Engines and Mars Needs Moms (or The 13th Warrior or 47 Ronin or...). 

 

And since that is, by definiton, a subjective viewpoint, good luck getting an actual objective answer to the question of "what is the biggest box office bomb of all time".

 

...

 

Plus, you know, the whole idea of Recency Bias. 

 

(not to mention inflation, ticket and budget — but loooong post is long)

All great points, and I totally agree basing "biggest bomb" on suspect hollywood accounting is...wonky, at best. Though if we have to go into "what underperformed studio expectations" territory, a film claiming the record for biggest decline ever for a sequel (both nominal and %) sure is a compelling argument, IMO.

 

But in the end, all speculation. There can't really be a consensus on this one.

Edited by JustLurking
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Porthos Global Phenomenon

Porthos

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18 minutes ago, JustLurking said:

All great points, and I totally agree basing "biggest bomb" on suspect hollywood accounting is...wonky, at best. Though if we have to go into "what underperformed studio expectations" territory, a film claiming the record for biggest decline ever for a sequel (both nominal and %) sure is a compelling argument, IMO.

 

But in the end, all speculation. There can't really be a consensus on this one.

 

Sure.  At the same time I'm personally a fan of a film that can be said to have literally — LIT-ER-AL-LY — killed an entire slate of movies all by its lonesome.  So again it's not like there isn't competition here when it comes to the dreaded "studio expectations".

 

(yes I have been making a very slight subtextual argument in a different direction when I mention "studio expectations" earlier)

 

But even there I wouldn't really try to claim Solo was in the biggest bomb of all time discussion. And, in fact, isn't on this list or this list or even this list of films which had nearly 50 of them!.  So, as you say, not really possible for a consensus here. 

 

(mind I'm sure it's on others, but those were the first few Google hits I had for "biggest box office bombs of all time")

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Sophia Jane Box Office Gold

Sophia Jane

Posted
Posted (edited)
9 hours ago, Zakiyyah6 said:

Because 99.99% of people forget that Mars Needs Moms exists.

That’s the point,when talk about box office bomb we talk about a movie which target customer are general audience ,not a movie which 99.99% people don’t even know wtf is that.

There must be great number of $100,000 budget movies ,and their box office are like $500-10,000,that’s must be an insane failure but most people just don’t know its exists,even for movie fans

Edited by Sophia Jane
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jimisawesome Sleeper Hit

jimisawesome

Posted
Posted
13 hours ago, Deep Wang said:

I guess I’m confused why everyone goes to John Carter and not something like Mars Needs Moms when talking about biggest bombs of all time?

 

The reason is simple the production and marketing of John Carter is a textbook example on how to produce a bomb from giving a first-time live-action director full control over production with no oversight at all to giving him control of marketing.  There was no one there to tell him how to schedule production.  Off the top of my head it was something like 3 days in and they where already a week behind.  Shots that needed longer lead time for FX and where needed for marketing where not shot early.  There was also the endless reshoots. 

 

A lot of the lessons that should have been learned with JC are still standard practice across the Disney IP family.

 

On the marketing side, they acted like this was an established IP when it was original IP as far as the GA was concerned.  Again, they let Staton have approval over marketing decisions why? 

 

 

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fabiopazzo2 Summer Tentpole

fabiopazzo2

Posted
Posted (edited)
10 hours ago, HummingLemon496 said:

One and a half years ago Doctor Strange 2 did a mind-boggling $90M in it's opening DAY. Now The Marvels will probably barely cross that in its ENTIRE total. It is absolutely insane how much shit can change so quickly. Wtf happened bruh.

 

Hell even one year ago Wakanda Forever did $181M in its opening weekend alone, which will probably be higher than any live action CBM domestic total this year except for GOTG 3 and Quantumania. Speaking of which we all shat on how trash Quantumania did but it'll be the second highest grossing live action CBM of the year in domestic. . .compare that to Marvels which is the most dead on arrival box office bomb ever that nobody wants to watch.

 

BadOlCatSylvester is up there with BobTrain and Relevation as some of the most correct users in this entire forum. He said "a year ago Marvel was a force to be reckoned with. Now they're a laughingstock." What he said was 100% accurate. Just compare how absolutely insane a B-list solo movie like MoM did to how horrible Marvels is doing

Easy.

 

none care about this type of movie anymore

who care about "The Marvels"? 
 

people want quality and want to be excited.

 

give me Deadpool x Wolverine not this booring woke movie

Edited by fabiopazzo2
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Barnack Global Phenomenon

Barnack

Posted
Posted (edited)
On 11/18/2023 at 3:19 AM, Porthos said:

Now will The Marvels be "worse" than the others?  None of us will ever know, thanks to the magic of Hollywood Accounting.  And I'm not even being snide here because Hollywood Accounting is such an infamous joke that, famously enough, Fox/Lucasfilm tried to claim that Return of the Jedi was never profitable.  And I bring this up because it shows that the whole definition of profitable/unprofitable is... fucking impossible to define even in the best of situations.

 

Those are often not exactly true Hollywood legend and it tend to be more ruthless than this, they made creative contract with talents and do not need to even claim they were not profitable and usually never share their contract details.

 

That not how people that signed their contract will tend to tell the story, the Forest Gump one has been honest about it, studio never claimed Forest Gump did not made a fortune (Hanks and other veteran on that movie bank account will be clear about that), he signed a contract that explicitly give him points on the producers large slate of movies points, not on Forest Gump.

 

Bref, people without strong representation and no previous success usually sign stuff that make it possible to not pay them without having to make stories about the movies not being profitable up, contract never gave point on profits to start with always a net gross as defined in its term, which become in interview simplified as anyone saying that a movie made no profit, which they never do.

 

if you access only 20% on home video on your contract and that Will Smith-Spielberg gross participation count in the cost of the movie, that there is a 30% distribution fees even if all the distribution expense are counted, the studio is not telling you the movie was not profitable when it is telling you the agreed formula to calculate net proceed amount to 0.

 

Sometime small movie sell most market in advance, when they turn huge a lot of people wonder why the profit are so low. 

 

Edited by Barnack
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BadOlCatSylvester Box Office Gold

BadOlCatSylvester

Posted
Posted
Just now, Blaze Heatnix said:

Wow, this is dropping higher than freaking Fant4stic ( 2015 ) ?

 

 

Fans were clearly not ready for the mighty vision of Josh Trank back then. Now his work looks like a Renessaince painting compared to the drivel of today. Now they'll happily get in the Trank.

GIF by HBO

#G3t1nTh3Tr4nk #R3l34s3Th3Tr4nkC0t

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BadOlCatSylvester Box Office Gold

BadOlCatSylvester

Posted
Posted
1 minute ago, SpiderByte said:

The six plus months of "Marvel is dead heil cinema" articles are gonna make Deadpool blowing up all the sweeter imo

Deadpool is a powerhouse on his own, and can thrive independent of the Marvel brand. There's a reason why Marvel's betting it all on that third movie next year.

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