Weekend Numbers [Aug 02 - Aug 04, 2024] | Actuals | 96.81M DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE | 22.80M TWISTERS | 15.45M TRAP

[Ryan C]

2 minutes ago, grey ghost said:

 

DPW shows that, despite The Marvels flopping, the MCU can still break records with a compelling premise.

 

Once again, there's no superhero movie fatigue, there's bad movie fatigue.

 

You're exactly right. 

 

Though It's not even just bad movie fatigue. I really do feel like people just took every single supehero movie that flopped last year as a sign of supehero fatigue while either completely disimissing the ones that actually succeeded or why specifically those movies flopped. 

 

All of the DCEU movies last year were leftovers from another era and all came out after it was announced that DC was moving into a completely different direction and that the DCEU was over. Complete with all of these movies (besides really Blue Beetle) getting mixed reception at best and weak audience reception (I knew The Flash was done when it got that B Cinemascore), there was almost no chance for movies like Shazam: Fury of the Gods, The Flash, or Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom to either succeed or reach the heights of its predecessors. I don't even think I need to mention the other issues that affected The Flash and the ridiculous amounts of money that Warner Bros. spent on marketing both that film and Aquaman 2. Oh, and to add insult to injury, Blue Beetle came out during the SAG-AFTRA strike when no actors could promote it? Literally nothing worked out for any of those DC movies last year. 

 

Marvel was a much more interesting case. At first, it was just a quality problem when Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania underperformed (bad audience reception did a lot of damage), but The Marvels showed what could happen if a MCU movie was released at the worst time possible. Not even just after Quantumania (Guardians 3 was an exception), but after Secret Invasion, right after the actors strike (there was no time to make it feel like an event), and being the first Marvel movie that had serious connections to shows that only hurt it. It wasn't just a Captain Marvel sequel, but a sequel to shows that not a whole lot of people watched and couple that with mixed reception and a terrible B Cinemascore (same grade as Quantumania) you get a flop that even to this day is still scary to look at. 

 

Apologies for writing this much, but it really is annoying how people used all of these movies flopping as an opportunity to say "superhero movies are dead" without realizing that the genre just is as execution-dependent as any other genre. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse and Guardians 3 were proof of that by becoming solid word-of-mouth hits. 

 

I don't know what the future is gonna hold for this genre, but it is far from dead and the only people who think it's dead are probably people who want the genre to fail because it's been ontop for so long.

[ZattMurdock]

12 minutes ago, Ryan C said:

 

You're exactly right. 

 

Though It's not even just bad movie fatigue. I really do feel like people just took every single supehero movie that flopped last year as a sign of supehero fatigue while either completely disimissing the ones that actually succeeded or why specifically those movies flopped. 

 

All of the DCEU movies last year were leftovers from another era and all came out after it was announced that DC was moving into a completely different direction and that the DCEU was over. Complete with all of these movies (besides really Blue Beetle) getting mixed reception at best and weak audience reception (I knew The Flash was done when it got that B Cinemascore), there was almost no chance for movies like Shazam: Fury of the Gods, The Flash, or Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom to either succeed or reach the heights of its predecessors. I don't even think I need to mention the other issues that affected The Flash and the ridiculous amounts of money that Warner Bros. spent on marketing both that film and Aquaman 2. Oh, and to add insult to injury, Blue Beetle came out during the SAG-AFTRA strike when no actors could promote it? Literally nothing worked out for any of those DC movies last year. 

 

Marvel was a much more interesting case. At first, it was just a quality problem when Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania underperformed (bad audience reception did a lot of damage), but The Marvels showed what could happen if a MCU movie was released at the worst time possible. Not even just after Quantumania (Guardians 3 was an exception), but after Secret Invasion, right after the actors strike (there was no time to make it feel like an event), and being the first Marvel movie that had serious connections to shows that only hurt it. It wasn't just a Captain Marvel sequel, but a sequel to shows that not a whole lot of people watched and couple that with mixed reception and a terrible B Cinemascore (same grade as Quantumania) you get a flop that even to this day is still scary to look at. 

 

Apologies for writing this much, but it really is annoying how people used all of these movies flopping as an opportunity to say "superhero movies are dead" without realizing that the genre just is as execution-dependent as any other genre. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse and Guardians 3 were proof of that by becoming solid word-of-mouth hits. 

 

I don't know what the future is gonna hold for this genre, but it is far from dead and the only people who think it's dead are probably people who want the genre to fail because it's been ontop for so long.

I don’t have much to add other than I’ve been saying for almost a decade that I like Ant-Man and that cast much more as supporting characters than running their own films and that I strongly believe that The Marvels issues at the box office are much more related to the lack of the actors being able to promote that film properly more than anything else. Secret Invasion was a travesty and a waste of those first few episodes that showed that the show kinda had potential. Ryan killed with this post and I agree with everything here.

 

The Marvels should be called Captain Marvel 2, it should also go harder on Carol as the actual threat to the Kree and play with the heavy themes that hinted there. It needed Iman to be able to hype the shit out of it and they not having a chance to do that hurt that film’s box office deeply. It seems that it has found its audience once it made to Disney+, and I’m glad it did because I do think there is potential for a Young Avengers film or series.

Edited August 5 by ZattMurdock

[Ryan C]

3 minutes ago, ZattMurdock said:

I don’t have much to add other than I’ve been saying for almost a decade that I like Ant-Man and that cast much more are supporting characters than running their own films and that I strongly believe that The Marvels issues at the box office are much more related to the lack of the actors being able to promote that film properly more than anything else. Secret Invasion was a travesty and a waste of those first few episodes that showed that the show kinda had potential. Ryan killed with this post and I agree with everything here.

 

The Marvels should be called Captain Marvel 2, it should also go harder on Carol as the actual threat to the Kree and play with the heavy themes that hinted there. It needed Iman to be able to hype the shit out of it and they not having a chance to do that hurt that film’s box office deeply. It seems that it has found its audience once it made to Disney+, and I’m glad it did because I do think there is potential for a Young Avengers film or series.

 

Honestly, even if The Marvels was properly promoted, it still most likely would've flopped. 

 

Reception to the film wasn't good and I firmly believe that the overabundance of mediocre-to-bad superhero movies before it finally exploded with Quantumania. After that film came out, I think it was the point where these movies had to genuinely be good to succeed and if not, they wouldn't. Even if The Marvels would've opened higher had the SAG-AFTRA strike didn't happen, it most likely would've dropped hard afterwards and become a flop. 

 

It's sad and that's not even mentioning the amount of unnecessary hate that film got online (a lot of people on social media should seriously be ashamed themselves for wishing for that film to fail), but I don't really see a reality where this film becomes a hit. Again, it came out at the worst possible time for the MCU and the supehero genre as a whole. 

[lorddemaxus]

The Marvels only made 50 mil more than Killers of the Flower Moon worldwide lol. No amount of marketing could’ve helped it

[ThomasNicole]

Idk if being bad is a problem for MCU audience tbh … half MCU movies are mediocre and they’re all successful

 

The Marvels isn’t really worse than Thor 2 and yet only one failed. I think the problem is lacking appeal, without a very clear vision of where this “smaller” movies are going like with Thanos in phases 1-3, people are probably more willing to skip the movies they’re not very interested.

[ZattMurdock]

4 minutes ago, Ryan C said:

 

Honestly, even if The Marvels was properly promoted, it still most likely would've flopped. 

 

Reception to the film wasn't good and I firmly believe that the overabundance of mediocre-to-bad superhero movies before it finally exploded with Quantumania. After that film came out, I think it was the point where these movies had to genuinely be good to succeed and if not, they wouldn't. Even if The Marvels would've opened higher had the SAG-AFTRA strike didn't happen, it most likely would've dropped hard afterwards and become a flop. 

 

It's sad and that's not even mentioning the amount of unnecessary hate that film got online (a lot of people on social media should seriously be ashamed themselves for wishing for that film to fail), but I don't really see a reality where this film becomes a hit. Again, it came out at the worst possible time for the MCU and the supehero genre as a whole. 

I’m not disagreeing with you. I think it would have flopped, but it wouldn’t flop as hard. What The Marvels needed is way more time on the oven, Secret Invasion not existing, a different title and more running time that actually told the story that they hint to try to tell but didn’t. 

[Darth Lehnsherr]

Before 2023 there would be no concerns about Cap 4 or Thunderbolts flopping. Poor reception has eroded the GA's interest in the MCU as a whole and like everything else will only show up to films there's already a pre-existing appeal. Which thanks to the multiverse means they can just bring back RDJ and immediately cause the next two Avengers films to be exciting to the GA. 

 

The MCU isn't dead it's just like everyone else plus a jail free card of the multiverse. The MCU fron 2012 to 2022 was all on a league of its own.

[Ryan C]

Just now, ThomasNicole said:

Idk if being bad is a problem for MCU audience tbh … half MCU movies are mediocre and they’re all successful

 

The Marvels isn’t really worse than Thor 2 and yet only one failed. I think the problem is lacking appeal, without a very clear vision of where this “smaller” movies are going like with Thanos in phases 1-3, people are probably more willing to skip the movies they’re not very interested.

 

Right now, I think being bad is a problem for MCU audiences. It probably wasn't before, but after a lot of mediocre to bad superhero movies between 2021-2023 (not to mention the D+ shows), now I think it will be a problem going forward with the films that aren't guaranteed to be hits. 

 

P.S. I actually think The Marvels is slightly better than Thor: The Dark World. Even if that movie is the worst MCU movie, it's still a servicable if very generic comic-book movie. 

[THUNDER BIRD]

Marvels needed to be Captain Marvel 2 for starters. Bringing down your main lead to levels of a lead of tv show who very few watched and other one who people couldn't tell the name off was a bad decision.

 

Iron Man 2 wasn't called The Metals and Captain America had Captain America before Civil War and Thor Ragnarok was Thor not The Revengers.

 

Should've made a proper Captain Marvel movie instead of this and then give those other two..... Supporting roles, not the main ones. 

Edited August 5 by THUNDER BIRD

[Ryan C]

3 minutes ago, Darth Lehnsherr said:

Before 2023 there would be no concerns about Cap 4 or Thunderbolts flopping. Poor reception has eroded the GA's interest in the MCU as a whole and like everything else will only show up to films there's already a pre-existing appeal. Which thanks to the multiverse means they can just bring back RDJ and immediately cause the next two Avengers films to be exciting to the GA. 

 

The MCU isn't dead it's just like everyone else plus a jail free card of the multiverse. The MCU fron 2012 to 2022 was all on a league of its own.

 

I'd honestly wait until Thunderbolts comes out to see if audiences will only show up to MCU films with pre-existing appeal, but I would not be surprised if that movie doesn't open much higher or lower than Eternals. 

[THUNDER BIRD]

1 minute ago, Ryan C said:

 

Right now, I think being bad is a problem for MCU audiences. It probably wasn't before, but after a lot of mediocre to bad superhero movies between 2021-2023 (not to mention the D+ shows), now I think it will be a problem going forward with the films that aren't guaranteed to be hits. 

 

P.S. I actually think The Marvels is slightly better than Thor: The Dark World. Even if that movie is the worst MCU movie, it's still a servicable if very generic comic-book movie. 

Funny, Thor Dark World got A- Cinemascore while most of Phase 4 hovered around B+ and B

 

I think Loki's antics got it a slightly favourable response which was missing in current MCU..... Characters that people actually like.

[ZattMurdock]

5 minutes ago, Ryan C said:

 

I'd honestly wait until Thunderbolts comes out to see if audiences will only show up to MCU films with pre-existing appeal, but I would not be surprised if that movie doesn't open much higher or lower than Eternals. 

The whole logo thing intrigues the fuck out of me. Knowing Thunderbolts comic book history I wonder what kind of move they could make to replicate what the Thunderbolts pulled it off with that first issue. There is something going on there, and I’m curious where they are going with it. Maybe it will take some time until we know that. New World Order comes out before the next Super Bowl, am I right?

[John Marston]

not even fans seem excited by Thunderbolts. Could be the MCU’s next sub 100m film. 

[Ryan C]

1 minute ago, John Marston said:

not even fans seem excited by Thunderbolts. Could be the MCU’s next sub 100m film. 

 

I don't think that's happening again. 

 

Marvel and Disney will have the chance to actually make people aware of this movie unlike with The Marvels. 

[John Marston]

24 minutes ago, ThomasNicole said:

Idk if being bad is a problem for MCU audience tbh … half MCU movies are mediocre and they’re all successful

 

The Marvels isn’t really worse than Thor 2 and yet only one failed. I think the problem is lacking appeal, without a very clear vision of where this “smaller” movies are going like with Thanos in phases 1-3, people are probably more willing to skip the movies they’re not very interested.

Thor was a popular character following Avengers and Thor 2’s trailers were fairly epic looking. The Marvels not only had to deal with the fact that the first Captain Marvel’s gross was heavily inflated by Infinity War/Endgame hype but the trailers looked absolutely awful and childish. It looked like a big budget Disney channel movie. And it seems that was the reaction to the  finished product As well. 

Edited August 5 by John Marston

[Darth Lehnsherr]

10 minutes ago, Ryan C said:

 

I'd honestly wait until Thunderbolts comes out to see if audiences will only show up to MCU films with pre-existing appeal, but I would not be surprised if that movie doesn't open much higher or lower than Eternals. 

I'm probably way more pessimistic on that film than you are. Really wish Fantastic Four was kicking off the summer but that can't happen. Obviously won't open to Fall Guy levels but I could see The Marvels numbers DOM tbh.

[Migs20242]

 

[John Marston]

1 minute ago, Ryan C said:

 

I don't think that's happening again. 

 

Marvel and Disney will have the chance to actually make people aware of this movie unlike with The Marvels. 

Brie Larson going on some shitty talk show was not going to save The Marvels . A film that nobody was interested in and looked bad 

 

 

Thunderbolts looks like another film nobody, not even fans, seem interested in. I mean one of the main characters is the villain from Ant Man 2. That says it all 

[ZattMurdock]

Second Edited August 5 by ZattMurdock

[grey ghost]

19 minutes ago, ThomasNicole said:

Idk if being bad is a problem for MCU audience tbh … half MCU movies are mediocre and they’re all successful

 

The Marvels isn’t really worse than Thor 2 and yet only one failed. I think the problem is lacking appeal, without a very clear vision of where this “smaller” movies are going like with Thanos in phases 1-3, people are probably more willing to skip the movies they’re not very interested.

 

 

Early MCU audiences were willing to sit through bad movies because the Infinity Saga was building to something. 

 

But the Multiverse Saga eventually felt like it was going no where.

 

That's the brilliance of the RDJ/Russos announcement.  The MCU feels like it's building towards something again. This has been proven essential by The Marvels floppage.