2019 Box Office Busts

[Username taken]

There has been 1 movie the last 2 decades that died domestically here quick but was saved by international box office. It would have been box office bombs had the international gross not saved it.

That film was 2012 with John Cusack. Sony had a $200 million budget into it. The film only did $166 million here. But the international box office did $600+ million for it. Not saying this will happen in either case. But films like Pacific Rim got sequels for this reason.

I understand your point but the movies you're referencing did far, far better than Dark Phoenix.

Dark Phoenix fell 70% domestic and is only at $204 million globally. It's opened in China (the market that usually saves movies) and the United States.

Dark Phoenix is probably one of the (if not the) biggest flop of the year and might conservatively lose the studio millions of dollars. It might end up being a F4 level disaster.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottme.../#4832237450b9

[numberthirty]

I understand your point but the movies you're referencing did far, far better than Dark Phoenix.

Dark Phoenix fell 70% domestic and is only at $204 million globally. It's opened in China (the market that usually saves movies) and the United States.

Dark Phoenix is probably one of the (if not the) biggest flop of the year and might conservatively lose the studio millions of dollars. It might end up being a F4 level disaster.

Jeez, yeah.

It doesn't really feel like kicking that film while it's down to just realistically point out that it is going to take some sort of a miraculous turn for things to work out for it.

Never mind that it is in a spot where franchise fans have exactly zero reason to be invested in it.

[Divine Spark]

Never mind that it is in a spot where franchise fans have exactly zero reason to be invested in it.

Based on what Deadline has reported many franchise fans don’t even know it exists.

https://deadline.com/2019/06/dark-ph...hy-1202629749/

This leads us to the mishap of Fox marketing. With the Disney-Fox merger looming, we understand they’ve been a mess, distracted, with a revolving door of execs. We heard this around the time that Alita came out, that the filmmakers were dealing with different people in different marketing meetings.

I understand in meetings, some marketing execs didn’t even realize the release date changes on Dark Phoenix, and weren’t cognizant of the fact that the film was opening up against another franchise this weekend (i.e. Secret Life of Pets 2).

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/he...-plans-1216859

At the time, preparations for the Disney-Fox acquisition were in full swing. Marketing and publicity and distribution execs were either being forced out or had one eye on the door. "The campaign was muddled," says a former Fox executive. "Was this the final X-Men movie? Was it about a character going back? This movie just got lost."

An NRG tracking poll taken in May showed that Avengers: Endgame, Marvel Studios' rival superhero franchise, was rated higher than Dark Phoenix as a choice for moviegoers — and that's after Endgame had been playing in theaters for five weeks already. "Definite awareness never got a score over 75 on tracking," says one insider. "An X-Men movie had never been below 90."

"When definite awareness of Rocketman is higher than an X-Men movie, you know you're in strange territory," says another insider.

I literally I have seen some people say they didn’t know it came out.

https://mobile.twitter.com/search?q=...d_query&f=live

[jetengine]

Why I said wait a couple weeks is Dark Phoenix has 2 more markets left to open in , MIB : International has 6 markets and Shaft has 3 more markets. The rest are Netflix related (3 markets). Whether they help or not who knows. But I usually wait to see. This gives times for more totals to come in.

Shaft is lucky for the fact it had a $30 million budget. But well...WB was expecting $15 million opening weekend so that failed. So we will see how it does.

I thought Phoenix had a worldwide release ?

I never expected Shaft to do anything tbh.

[Username taken]

Based on what Deadline has reported many franchise fans don’t even know it exists.

https://deadline.com/2019/06/dark-ph...hy-1202629749/



https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/he...-plans-1216859



I literally I have seen some people say they didn’t know it came out.

https://mobile.twitter.com/search?q=...d_query&f=live

Wow.

That's just..crazy.

Granted things have changed significantly since Dark Phoenix finished production, the movie should have still been handled better.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

I understand your point but the movies you're referencing did far, far better than Dark Phoenix.

Dark Phoenix fell 70% domestic and is only at $204 million globally. It's opened in China (the market that usually saves movies) and the United States.

Dark Phoenix is probably one of the (if not the) biggest flop of the year and might conservatively lose the studio millions of dollars. It might end up being a F4 level disaster.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottme.../#4832237450b9

Jeez, yeah.

It doesn't really feel like kicking that film while it's down to just realistically point out that it is going to take some sort of a miraculous turn for things to work out for it.

Never mind that it is in a spot where franchise fans have exactly zero reason to be invested in it.

I doubt anything can save Dark Phoenix honestly at this point either. I usually wait til a film drops out of top 10 domestically knowing its fully over as well as every international market. I was wrong about a film last year I nearly listed. When Hugh Jackman's "The Greatest Showman" debuted it came in 4th opening weekend with $19+ million debut.

I was like this movie is a bomb and said it in a thread , that it would be lucky to recoup the $84+ million budget. I didn't list it here , because I waited of course but I said as much that Jackman should relook at doing Wolverine again due to this in a Fox thread. But where as there is always a drop the 2nd weekend , well...there wasn't with this one. In fact the film stayed in the top #10 for 13 weekends ! It stunned me as the movie would go on to earn $174+ million domestically. (Over $430+ million worldwide).

I don't see this happening with Dark Phoenix. Its why I wait really before i throw the dirt on a film. Because well I nearly listed that one before it was done. I wanna be exact before i place it.

I thought Phoenix had a worldwide release ?

I never expected Shaft to do anything tbh.

It opened everywhere except 2 markets (Belgium on June 13th/14th and Japan in late June)

Shaft was a film I thought well if it makes its domestic budget back I'm sure Warners will be happy. The weak opening seems to kill that one. I did like seeing Richard Roundtree back.

[jetengine]

I totally get why you wait and agree with you (I mean greatest showman was certainly an outlier) and officially we should wait....but unofficially we can all admit its a bomb. Belfium isnt exactly a giant market afaik and whilst Japan CAN be.....I dont think the X-men will do it there.

[Divine Spark]

Wow.

That's just..crazy.

Granted things have changed significantly since Dark Phoenix finished production, the movie should have still been handled better.

They should have delayed the movie beyond June and that would have given Disney enough time to properly market it.

[Jokerz79]

They should have delayed the movie beyond June and that would have given Disney enough time to properly market it.

Why? Why waste more good money that they would probably not recover.

This film had a awful production this was like Solo and Justice League level mess not surprising it suffered their fate. Also the merger hurt it many people have moved on now seeing Logan as the proper ending to the Fox X-Men and waiting until they enter the MCU.

[Vakanai]

I think another problem with Dark Phoenix is it doesn't have X-Men in the name. I had to explain to my mom when she asked that it was an X-Men film. I think to a lot of casual fans it might not have been obvious, and that might have hurt it. Not saying a name like X-Men: Dark Phoenix would have saved it, just that it might have done a smidge better.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

Disney seems ready to be working something for New Mutants given they pretty much ok'd reshoots of it for 2020.

[Immortal Weapon]

It's safe to call Dark Phoenix a flop. That movie wouldn't be saved.

[Theleviathan]

Why? Why waste more good money that they would probably not recover.

This film had a awful production this was like Solo and Justice League level mess not surprising it suffered their fate. Also the merger hurt it many people have moved on now seeing Logan as the proper ending to the Fox X-Men and waiting until they enter the MCU.

People are going to see movies they want to see. Especially for studios that have earned their trust. Spiderman will do well. Toy Story probably will as well. John Wick is still rolling along. Aladdin is raking in money despite a lot of chatter before it's release about Will Smith's Genie. Still making money.

Fox burned their audience bridge with their lackluster series of X-men movies and when juxtaposed to the raucously good time people have with Avengers, it only makes them look worse generally. It didn't matter when you put Phoenix on the screen, if you put X-men in front of it, marketed the **** out of it, made it two and a half hours....all of that is people grasping for something they want. This movie was the culmination of failures and, befittingly, was a failure itself.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

People are going to see movies they want to see. Especially for studios that have earned their trust. Spiderman will do well. Toy Story probably will as well. John Wick is still rolling along. Aladdin is raking in money despite a lot of chatter before it's release about Will Smith's Genie. Still making money.

Fox burned their audience bridge with their lackluster series of X-men movies and when juxtaposed to the raucously good time people have with Avengers, it only makes them look worse generally. It didn't matter when you put Phoenix on the screen, if you put X-men in front of it, marketed the **** out of it, made it two and a half hours....all of that is people grasping for something they want. This movie was the culmination of failures and, befittingly, was a failure itself.

We have to examine this , if we look back almost every X-Men film (including the 1st 2 Wolverine films) did between $350-550+ million worldwide. Which isn't Marvel Universe film money as we saw right now. But enough to be successful films to keep making them. Its only Days of Future Past , Deadpool's 2 films and Logan that really tipped that average to be high as we saw.

As one friend posted on FB , the failure of X-Men Origins : Wolverine killed them doing spin-off films outside the main X-Men line. They had plans for Magneto as a solo film and Deadpool. But they got spooked by what happened and pulled back. In the case of Deadpool they only moved once the test footage leaked out and made them do that 1st film.

Fox was too scared to do a wide universe of films spread out til it was too late . FF bombed and then it was too late.

[Zero Hunter]

People are going to see movies they want to see. Especially for studios that have earned their trust. Spiderman will do well. Toy Story probably will as well. John Wick is still rolling along. Aladdin is raking in money despite a lot of chatter before it's release about Will Smith's Genie. Still making money.

Fox burned their audience bridge with their lackluster series of X-men movies and when juxtaposed to the raucously good time people have with Avengers, it only makes them look worse generally. It didn't matter when you put Phoenix on the screen, if you put X-men in front of it, marketed the **** out of it, made it two and a half hours....all of that is people grasping for something they want. This movie was the culmination of failures and, befittingly, was a failure itself.

Very true. Just look at the box office for the last 2 Spider-Man movies under Sony solo compared to the Marvel/Sony team. Homecoming made over 150 more even though it was the 3rd reboot of the character in 15 years, and the biggest factor in the is people trust the Marvel name. I really think Far From Home could be the first Spider-Man movie to cross that billion dollar mark at the box office because of the good will Marvel has built up with Spider-Man. I think they can and will do the same with the X-Men.