Han and Eric's (Not-So) Controversial Predictions of 2023

[filmlover]

With how empty this holiday season looks overall, I checked to see if the majors had any projects already made that will be ready for this year and as it turns out, they do. Guessing all of these end up in the fourth quarter:

 

The Bikeriders (Disney/20th Century ensemble drama from Jeff Nichols starring Jodie Comer, Austin Butler, and Tom Hardy)

Downtown Owl (Sony drama from Lily Rabe and Hamish Linklater starring Rabe, Henry Golding, Jack Dylan Grazer, Vanessa Hudgens, Finn Wittrock, and Ed Harris)

Dumb Money (Sony ensemble dramedy about the GameStop saga starring Paul Dano, Sebastian Stan, Seth Rogen, Pete Davidson, and many more)

Killers of the Flower Moon (receiving a theatrical deal with Apple that will keep it off its streaming service for a few months)

Edited January 10, 2023 by filmlover

[YM!]

I think the jump from Dune 1 to 2 is a huge reach and think both Wish and Trolls 3 should do much more but it ain’t controversial predictions for nothing.

[Maggie]

Killers of the Flower Moon, i thought it was rumored to go at Cannes. However, i believe it makes more sense for December 2023

[BadOlCatSylvester]

I'm honestly baffled Disney still hasn't slotted anything for December. After Strange World bombed they're utterly nuts to bet both their Thanksgiving and Christmas revenue streams on a dead genre. I've been saying for a while that The Marvels needs to get away from the carnage of the summer schedule and move to December. That move would give them a safety net, as even a franchise fatigued Marvel is still stronger than most other IPs.

[filmlover]

14 minutes ago, BadOlCatSylvester said:

I'm honestly baffled Disney still hasn't slotted anything for December. After Strange World bombed they're utterly nuts to bet both their Thanksgiving and Christmas revenue streams on a dead genre. I've been saying for a while that The Marvels needs to get away from the carnage of the summer schedule and move to December. That move would give them a safety net, as even a franchise fatigued Marvel is still stronger than most other IPs.

I fully expect Disney to give The Bikeriders a December release both for awards prospects and also in hopes of capitalizing on Butler's popularity (he already has Dune 2 in the fourth quarter), since he's clearly (a) lead in a big ensemble piece.

[TwoMisfits]

Who on Earth put Trolls 3 opening 4 days before Wish?  No way that schedule sticks b/c both movies torch each other for the already limited audience...

[filmlover]

9 minutes ago, TwoMisfits said:

Who on Earth put Trolls 3 opening 4 days before Wish?  No way that schedule sticks b/c both movies torch each other for the already limited audience...

It's also weirdly set to open a month before Universal releases Illumination's Migration for that Christmas break money, meaning two movies from them a month apart. Pretty sure it's stating the obvious that the entire fourth quarter schedule as it currently is seems unlikely to stick once they realize how overcrowded the summer is on the opposite end.

[Verrows]

2 hours ago, TwoMisfits said:

Who on Earth put Trolls 3 opening 4 days before Wish?  No way that schedule sticks b/c both movies torch each other for the already limited audience...

Agreed. I wouldn't be surprised to see it go up against Dune on the 3rd though. DW Animation films often do just fine going up against other tentpoles on the first weekend of November (Peanuts Movie against Spectre, Trolls against Doctor Strange etc). DW in the past has really liked that first weekend of November slot anyway, whether there is another big opener or not.

 

Yeah, I'm pretty confident it moves to November 3.

[Grebacio]

2 minutes ago, Verrows said:

Agreed. I wouldn't be surprised to see it go up against Dune on the 3rd though. DW Animation films often do just fine going up against other tentpoles on the first weekend of November (Peanuts Movie against Spectre, Trolls against Doctor Strange etc). DW in the past has really liked that first weekend of November slot anyway, whether there is another big opener or not.

 

Yeah, I'm pretty confident it moves to November 3.

Peanuts isn't DreamWorks 

[Verrows]

28 minutes ago, Grebacio said:

Peanuts isn't DreamWorks 

Woops, thank you for the correction. Don't know why I thought DW got the rights to Peanuts.

 

The point still stands, though, that these early November animations can coexist with another tentpole.

[DAJK]

2 hours ago, TwoMisfits said:

Who on Earth put Trolls 3 opening 4 days before Wish?  No way that schedule sticks b/c both movies torch each other for the already limited audience...

Release Trolls the first week of November. The first film went up against Dr. Strange on the same weekend and did well.

[Eric Duncan]

December 15

Wonka: Am I blinded by love? Maybe. But the cast is good, the music should be good, and there's still plenty of nostalgic love and memories for both the Wilder and even the Depp film (yes, there are people who like the Depp movie). Plus there’s likely enough fantasy spectacle to make it stand out compared to other musicals that it will make this a legit event, even with the intense family competition. 30/165 (5.5x)

[Eric Duncan]

December 22

The Color Purple: I’m still not convinced this is getting a wide release. There’s just no way Warner will have three major wide tentpoles all out in the same month like this. But assuming it does, this is going to draw the shortest straw. Aquaman is Aquaman, while Wonka has bigger starpower and the property is more popular with the 18-34 crowd. West Side Story numbers are probably what we’re dealing with, and that’s assuming this also gets critical acclaim and becomes an Oscar darling. And who knows if that will happen? 5/7/35 (7x)

 

Ghostbusters: Afterlife 2: While it didn’t “save the franchise” per se, Afterlife was still a fairly leggy hit that both general audiences and manbabies alike had a good time with, whether we want to admit it or not. Even with Christmas, this probably won’t have a big increase, especially since the nostalgia hook won’t hit as hard. But at worst, it will only do slightly less than its predecessor, and we’ll likely get a third and final movie out of this. 30/40/135 (4.5x)

 

Migration: The power of Illumination and the Christmas season should get this ahead of most original animated features these days, but probably not enough compared to Sing 2 or Puss in Boots 2. Which I know is bad compared to the mad stacks the first SLOP and Sing made, but...we’re in a new era. Take what you can get. 20/135 (6.75x)

[Eric Duncan]

December 25

Aquaman and the Last Kingdom: At last, we are finally done. I’ve been down on almost every superhero movie this year, but even though this has the same issue of “Gunn/Safran are rebooting everything, so who fucking cares”, this one...will be fine. There’s already excitement for this judging by The Quorum, the first Aquaman was a solid crowdpleaser, this likely has a lot of the same fun and thrills, and...well, there’s nothing else for the normies to watch this holiday season. It should still see a decline, but not as bad as some of the more gloomy prognosticators have it at. 25 (OD)/305

[Eric Duncan]

And...that’s it. You can probably guess that I’m not expecting much from 2023 barring one or two major hits. And even then, this is probably going to be the first time in a while that a film hasn't hit 500M+ domestically. Sadly, there’s no reason for me not to feel this way. I know there’s a lot of optimism that people want to go back to the theaters and that everybody hates watching movies at home now and the studios will ditch their streaming services forever and we’ll all sing kumbaya at our local AMC multiplexes...but that’s not gonna happen.

 

It’s more than obvious that a good chunk of people want to stay home, even for the big theatrical events, and we are never going back to the good old days. This is a new era for this silly little hobby of ours, and it’s one that I doubt many of us will be happy with. The big stories are losing their impact and the little stories don’t exist anymore. But hey, at least we have our community to vent out our frustrations with. So let’s enjoy this brotherhood of man and complain about everything together.

 

Thank you so much to @WrathOfHanfor saying yes and doing this again with me for the first time in three years. I was planning on doing this no matter what, but it’s always fun to have a second opinion, especially for films that we are totally split on. Hoping that your 2023 is a great one in your personal life and I wish you nothing but prosperity and good luck. And of course, a tremendous super-duper extra huge thank you to everybody who reacted to our posts and responded in our thread, whether it be yelling about how wrong we are or giving your own predictions for what the year has in store. I love talking with you guys about the box office and it was really fun hearing your guys' input on all the upcoming tentpoles.

 

Can’t wait to do this all over again next Christmas, and I hope everybody else here is excited too. And hopefully my negativity bites me in the butt this year. For all our sakes really.

[Brainbug]

25 minutes ago, Eric the Plane said:

And...that’s it. You can probably guess that I’m not expecting much from 2023 barring one or two major hits. And even then, this is probably going to be the first time in a while that a film hasn't hit 500M+ domestically. Sadly, there’s no reason for me not to feel this way. I know there’s a lot of optimism that people want to go back to the theaters and that everybody hates watching movies at home now and the studios will ditch their streaming services forever and we’ll all sing kumbaya at our local AMC multiplexes...but that’s not gonna happen.

 

It’s more than obvious that a good chunk of people want to stay home, even for the big theatrical events, and we are never going back to the good old days. This is a new era for this silly little hobby of ours, and it’s one that I doubt many of us will be happy with. The big stories are losing their impact and the little stories don’t exist anymore. But hey, at least we have our community to vent out our frustrations with. So let’s enjoy this brotherhood of man and complain about everything together.

 

Thank you so much to @WrathOfHanfor saying yes and doing this again with me for the first time in three years. I was planning on doing this no matter what, but it’s always fun to have a second opinion, especially for films that we are totally split on. Hoping that your 2023 is a great one in your personal life and I wish you nothing but prosperity and good luck. And of course, a tremendous super-duper extra huge thank you to everybody who reacted to our posts and responded in our thread, whether it be yelling about how wrong we are or giving your own predictions for what the year has in store. I love talking with you guys about the box office and it was really fun hearing your guys' input on all the upcoming tentpoles.

 

Can’t wait to do this all over again next Christmas, and I hope everybody else here is excited too. And hopefully my negativity bites me in the butt this year. For all our sakes really.

 

Personally, im hoping for a Top Gun-like surprise this year, a movie that doesnt have the highest of expectations but completely blows up.

 

And i totally get your pessimism (i actually dont disagree with any of your points here) but at the same time, i just hope as well that 2023 will prove to be better for movies and the box office than we expect.

[JWR]

Hope for the best, prepare for the worst.

[Blankments]

@WrathOfHan you ever finishing these?

[BadOlCatSylvester]

On 12/28/2022 at 12:57 PM, CJohn said:

When Creed does like 70M DOM total people are gonna be really sad.

[JWR]

On 12/28/2022 at 4:57 AM, CJohn said:

When Creed does like 70M DOM total people are gonna be really sad.

 

So, about that.....