Why is Wonka considered a box office success compared to The Marvels?
Wonka opened to $39 million this weekend, while The Marvels had a $47 million opening last month
Aux Features The Marvels
It doesn’t take a lot of pure imagination to notice that the language surrounding Wonka’s $39 million opening this past weekend was a whole lot more sugary than what was used to describe The Marvels’ $47 million debut last month. We’re not exempt; The A.V. Club, for example, called Wonka’s haul “a sweet debut” while The Marvels got “Marvel’s The Marvels opens at the top of the weekend box office, and let’s leave it at that.” As headlines praising the Timothée Chalamet-led reboot rolled in, MCU fans on Twitter/X were quick to point out the disparity in coverage, which was pretty hard to ignore. The real question is why this disparity happened in the first place.
Yes, The Marvels technically made more money in its opening weekend than Wonka, but these amounts don’t exist in a vacuum. At $275 million, The Marvels’ budget was over double Wonka’s ($125 million), which obviously makes a huge difference in what should have been its overall earning potential. The Marvels also experienced a drastic 77 percent drop in ticket sales during its second week, while Wonka, as a family-friendly nostalgia bomb, will likely see continued success into the holiday weekend.
As the lowest domestic opening of the entire 33-film series, The Marvels was also a flop for Marvel specifically, while Wonka—despite its candy-coated franchise connections—had less to live up to. Wonka also pulled in its dollars despite the fact movie musicals are on the outs nowadays (regardless of the fact that the film was barely marketed as a musical in the first place), which is also an interesting piece of data to add to the picture as a whole.
Still, despite the odds stacked against it, The Marvels didn’t deserve what it got. As many have pointed out, a lot of the criticism leveled against the Iman Vellani, Brie Larson, and Teyonah Parris-led superhero film feels particularly pointed against Nia DaCosta, a Black, female director. Even though the film likely underperformed due to marketing and, more importantly, growing fatigue with the MCU, Disney CEO Bob Iger was quick to throw DaCosta under the bus when asked to explain his hand in the numbers. DaCosta’s poor treatment in general has lent a particularly nasty taste to a lot of this criticism.
In general, though, these numbers tell the same story that films like Barbie, Five Nights At Freddy’s, and even The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes have been illustrating all year. A little IP is okay, as long as it’s handled in a fresh, creative, and genuinely artful way. Another repeat of the same old thing simply isn’t going to cut it anymore.
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Because the budget for The Marvels was more than double that of Wonka and, more importantly, The Marvels’ domestic box office total was less than double the first weekend. Oh, also? Globally? The Marvels didn’t make its budget back. On the other hand, Wonka has already made its budget back globally, three days into its run.
If Wonka ends its theatrical run making less than $75M domestically, it too will be considered a bomb.
But yes, wHaT maKEs tHe MOvIes DiFFerEnt?!?!?!
The question is why are KotFM and Napoleon considered successes versus the Marvels. Similar budgets et al.Riddle me that, AC Club.
It’s pretty simple. Because The Marvels is a failure on the level of what theatrical Marvel movies are supposed to be. And is troubling from the point of view of the health of their entire market segment.Those other two? Sure. You’re not wrong in that they’re ultimately loss leaders theatrically. But Apple signed up for that. They wanted marquee content, with name brand directors and actors, that would be in the press/Academy race and then locked on their service forever. i.e. they’re pursuing the the track Netflix took for years (over spending to create content for their library) without much of a hope for direct profit. That said, they’ve decided (smartly, I’d argue) that putting these films out theatrically brings in a bit of money to help offset that cost, and the theatrical window also adds a patina of presitge/hype that helps the shelf life of the product once it arrives on their service.
Except that I’m not interested in seeing the movies in the theater or on any streaming media outlet so there’s that.
Killers of the Flower Moon is available to rent digitally on iTunes and platform-agnostic services like Vudu and Amazon. It will more than likely receive a physical release at some point (probably from Criterion), but between movie theaters and their own streaming service, I think that covers the majority of the market Apple is interested in appealing to.
Well then, hear me out here because I’m spitballing, this isn’t about you.
Because The Marvels is a failure on the level of what theatrical Marvel movies are supposed to be. That part.
Well done, spot on.
I suspect apple is a bit different in that there aim is to put some of those hundreds of billions to use rather than letting waste. TV an film production can be very tax efficient.
good answer.
Are those even considered successes? Neither has made its budget back.
I’m unaware of anyone claiming either movie is a financial success (Flower Moon appears to be a solid critical success), but both of those movies were made for AppleTV+. The theatrical run is for awards consideration and whatever $$ they get is a bonus.
It’s not a “bonus” because there’s literally zero chance Apple TV Plus is financially successful as a streamer, but Apple can easily take the loss.
It’s accounting fiction, but the film industry has been doing that for decades.
I don’t think anyone has called them financial successes, but they were both distributed by Apple TV+, which is flush with cash, and it was pretty obvious they just put them in theaters for awards eligibility.
First of all, I’m not sure they are considered successes. But both Killers of the Flower Moon and Napoleon were greenlit with the primary goal of driving people to subscribe to Apple TV. Unlike Disney+, Apple doesn’t have a clear “brand” of what kind of TV it is offering, and both movies seem designed to establish a brand — Apple TV is for prestige-y stuff dads like to watch, like historical epics, Martin Scorsese movies, and Ridley Scott movies. (It’s no coincidence that Masters of the Air, the follow-up to two of the most dad series of all time, is coming to Apple TV in January.) If Apple succeeds in that strategy, it will be well worth whatever bath they take on these movies.The Marvels is in a different boat. Disney doesn’t need help to establish a brand for its streaming service. And if you really like watching Marvel movies, you’re already probably subscribing. No one’s going to subscribe to the service because The Marvels will stream there.
Because, to people with absolutely no skin in the game, overspending on passion projects is okay, but overspending on four-quadrant entertainment isn’t.
Its not rocket science…..Its actually quite obvious to anyone with even a smidgen of common sense…THE COMIC BOOK MOVIE CRAZE IS OVER!!! The bubble has burst, the GENERAL AUDIENCE who are more important than the Marvel fanboys do not care about the constant flow of endless comic book movies and streaming shows that all require you do homework. Its kinda hilarious at this point just how much copium the comic book movie fanboys need to smoke to ignore that comic book movies are over…The important audience does not care. Its exactly why each comic movie has done worse than the one before it. Loki season 2 was great, annnnnd ZERO people talked about it. As if it wasn’t obvious comic book movies were dead before Loki season 2, but its quite pathetic when ZERO people are talking about Tom Hiddleston possibly ending his run in the MCU at the end of the season. People actually want to see Wonka because its not based on a comic book.
Neither is a success from a theatrical box office standpoint – people have just conceded that some of their value may come from drawing viewers / subscribers to streaming eventually.
So there is a palpable sense that folks are trying to frame those movies as a success, even though the aren’t. Why doesn’t The Marvels get that consideration?
For the reasons already explained in the responses.
My comment before was only referring to the theatrical returns. I don’t know how the movies are doing / will do on streaming or how Apple calculates their value there. I also don’t know how much Apple values winning awards or prestige. Netflix was making similarly high-price movies that barely got theatrical releases at all to win awards and garner subscriber attention. So I don’t agree you can say for sure they are or are not successes.What I do know is Disney and Iger were not happy with how The Marvels did because he’s publicly commented on it. So it’s pretty easy to deem that movie an unequivocal failure while it isn’t as much for the other two you mentioned.
Because the one and only goal of the MCU – especially under Disney ownership – is to print money. By that measure, The Marvels is a failure relative to most of the previous feature films in the series.Apple’s goal with financing prestige projects like Killers of the Flower Moon and Napoleon is driving subscriptions to Apple TV+ and trying to accomplish that goal by putting them in theaters to qualify them for award consideration. It will be a while before we can know if that goal is successful. Obviously Apple would be thrilled if either made $5o million on opening weekend, but it’s not the primary goal for them.
You said “similar budgets” and so I googled that to check. First result for “Napoleon budget” is describing it as a “box office bomb”.
First result for me was the Wikipedia page detailing the budget as $200 million.
I think you are confusing bomb with another explosive, dynamite.
Critical success and financial success aren’t the same thing, and might not even be the goal in at least one of those cases (Apple is making KotFM with what amounts to pocket change, so they could care less if this particular film makes money, as long as it grants them some prestige via an Oscar nod or win).
You understand that “Apple doesn’t care about making money” (which is an insane claim, to say the least) doesn’t explain the disparity described in my original post, yeah?
I didn’t say “Apple doesn’t care about making money” (as in: they never care about making money- as you say, that’s patently insane to suggest of one of the biggest, most ruthless companies on Earth). I said “they could care less if this particular film makes money” because they’re looking for some prestige out of it.
And the disparity you talk about is explained by my actual statement and a moment’s thought… but since you seem to be having a hard time with it, I’ll elaborate.
Apple and Disney have different goals with their respective films. Apple is aiming to get some prestige added to their studio, so they are treating their films as loss leaders— something to get more people interested in Apple films in general. If these films manage to get nominations or awards, the theory is that they will drive traffic to future films. (And again, considering Apple has $65B in cash, very little debt, and an overall value of 3 trillion dollars, a few hundred million bucks barely ticks a needle for them, investment-wise).The Marvels is something like the 30th film for Disney’s MCU. Oscar campaigns were never going to be a thing for this film— it’s purely a money making engine. So when it doesn’t make money, it’s a much bigger problem, because that’s all it was supposed to do. Disney, with a lot more debt, a lot less cash, and a generally poor showing recently with investors, is going to be a lot less able to shrug off a poor performing film.There’s also the matter of the overall purpose for each company’s existence, and the expectations they respectively create: Apple makes phones and computers. They dabble in movies- any success in that field is essentially a surprise. Whereas Disney has been making movies for 100 years. Spending $300M and not even smelling profit on it reflects much worse on them.
Yikes, does something this self-evident really need to be explained to people? If so, let me add that Wonka has already made $150 mil globally, and is on pace to make more globally than The Marvels by, likely, a hefty amount. It will be more successful irrespective of budgets.Fandom is really anti-critical thinking these days, moreso than it even used to be.
Not everyone enjoys the smell of your farts as much as you, friend.
Not yet but once we bottle them they’re gonna sell like hot cakes.
Talk about smelling it and dealing it!
This made me actually laugh, thanks.
People with self-esteem issues are really trying to stand out by combining archaic words and nonstandard spellings in an attempt to affect wit.
I had a different thing written here but I’m just gonna say bye, this is dumb.
It sure was. Being more clever than a likely AI-created clickbait article impresses no one, no matter how foppishly you declare yourself.
He said, with no self awareness
He said, incorrectly.
Seriously, why didn’t the person also ask why was Flash a bomb at 50+ Million!? Fans have their head up their own asses.
Because it doesn’t fit the narrative that The Marvels failed because of misogyny, the patriarchy, etc. Which is this articles sole purpose.
If that’s the “sole purpose” of this article, then the final paragraph of this article blatantly contradicts that:In general, though, [The Marvels’] numbers tell the same story that films like Barbie, Five Nights At Freddy’s, and even The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes have been illustrating all year. A little IP is okay, as long as it’s handled in a fresh, creative, and genuinely artful way. Another repeat of the same old thing simply isn’t going to cut it anymore.
I don’t think you actually read the article. That take is a (probably intentional) way to read the headline, but its only vaguely touched on in the article itself.
No i read the articles, the quite obvious answer, the net proceeds is the answer. Total Ticket Sales (Foreign + Domestic) – Total Budget (Production + Marketing) = ??? The one with the larger number is the winner. Its so obvious financially, yes they touch upon that in the article, they also say sequel exhaustion isn’t the answer either, as they provide successful sequels. So it makes you wonder what’s the point of the article? What is it trying to have us question? Again, it all leads back to trope that The Marvels failed because its a strong female lead with ethnically diverse, female cast. Because if you wont admit the bottom line to success is Net Profit, than you are an activist.
I feel like you’re ignoring the embedded tweet in the middle of the article that is asking the question with the very obvious answer. I’m down to criticize a G/O site for spinning an entire post out of a sole tweet (sometimes a handful) and presenting it as “People online are wondering…” but in this case, it probably has to do with criticism aimed at AV Club themselves:
Permalink (though Kinja only knows if it actually works): https://www.avclub.com/1851106851This isn’t the first time that’s happened either. The Monday after the new Hunger Games premiered, a couple commenters demanded to know why it wasn’t being called a flop or a failure with the same strong language The Marvels was (the answer of course was because it didn’t cost over $200 million to make).Again, completely fair to criticize whether one mad comment justifies a follow-up piece explaining how math works, but the insinuation that this article is prompting a question in readers who understand context and scale is silly.
When DC movies suck it’s because the woke left mob forced the studio to ruin them by committee. All we need is a 4 hour version where everyone is horrible, and it’ll be great.
Because Marvel = progressive, which = good; therefore DC must = conservative = bad.*But in all seriousness, I think everyone saw the Ezra Miller of it all and didn’t question it.*not all fans blah blah blah, but the ones with their heads stuck furthest up on their own asses do seem to draw political and ideological lines around their fandoms.
Man my Brown liberal ass being a DC fan, means I’m on the wrong side! 😉
To be fair, that description was kinda accurate given how Snyder seemed treat the early DCEU like it was in Watchmen’s setting.
It’s really more strange that you feel the need to take a side at all?
To be honest…
The Marvels was just okay. I can’t really call it a bad movie so much as a movie that only exists to further the Phase’s multiverse plot and push Ms. Marvel and Photon to theatrical status. Marvel could’ve delivered the war against the Kree that the prior film implied but they just skipped it.
Flash though… it had serious issues. Not just because of Miller either, though it didn’t help that it gave us two Miller Flashes (though one was often a fully CG double rather than a properly used lookalike or ‘deepfake’. The story was pretty bad, the set pieces were also bad, and the best acting and overall portrayals were from the characters who weren’t Flash. I think even the director knew it wouldn’t be good since it hit a point where the iffy CG cameos were more memorable than what was causing them.
For some reason the character seems entirely defined by the Flashpoint storyline so he was even introduced using time travel back in BvS. Nothing in Flash seemed like a good idea and the visuals were hard to watch at times. I would easily go out and see a movie focused on that Superwoman, or one focused on Keaton’s Batman. I just honestly… don’t care for the theatrical Flash. CW Flash honestly did everything better.
As for The Marvels.. it probably would’ve been better as a D+ show given its story. Captain Marvel’s second film should’ve been her wrecking entire Kree armies before running into someone like Black Swan, Supergiant, Angela, or one of the lesser known Heralds of Galactus.
Strongly disagree. I thought The Flash was a lot of fun, and a huge part of the reason it worked so well for me was Ezra Miller’s performance. I know that a lot of people have disliked their performance going all the way back to Batman v Superman, and I know that I’m never going to change anyone who dislikes their performance’s mind. But I think Ezra does a good job capturing the nervous energy that I imagine a speedster would have. Plus, I grew up with Wally West, specifically Michael Rosenbaum’s Flash, so I’m used to Flash being light-hearted and covering up his insecurities with jokes. Outside of the crossovers, Grant Gustin’s Flash doesn’t do that, and that’s why his Flash has never worked for me. I also think that the movie handled the Savitar storyline way, way, way better than the TV show did.Having said all of that, I don’t think The Flash is perfect (Stephen King’s tweet still comes off as sponcon). The bad CGI is distracting, the movie sags in the middle, the cameos draw way too much attention to themselves, and after a decade of Flashpoint riffs and adaptations I’m read to move the fuck on too. But I had fun, and to be honest, I think some people went into the movie primed to dislike it. I think some people look at Ezra and if their mind doesn’t immediately jump to the video of them choking a woman or the disturbing allegations against them, then they associate them with the Snyderverse and the #ReleaseTheSnyderCut campaign. I also give a massive side-eye to people who blame The Marvels’ failure on sexism and bigotry, but misgender Ezra. I don’t think The Flash was ever going to get a fair shot, and it’s surprising to me that WB’s executives (yes, including Zaslav, but he’s hardly the only one) couldn’t foresee that happening.The reason I bring that up is that regardless of how you or I feel about the quality of The Flash and The Marvels (which I didn’t see, so I have no opinion on), I am never going to be convinced that quality had much to do with their box office failures. Both films underperformed opening weekend and quickly petered out, which suggests to me that the majority of people who were going to see those movies at all (probably fans) saw them the first weekend. Worse movies with much worse critical scores have made more money at the box office. I have always refused the narrative that the box office numbers that get reported every week are some kind of referendum on the quality of movies themselves. People just didn’t want to see these movies.
Oh I definitely agree on Box Office vs Quality. We’re at a point now where it is far more convenient to wait for streaming and external factors (Media coverage, both good and bad) have a large influence on whether people will take the time to go to the theater.
I mean, Pacific Rim got destroyed by Grown Ups in the Box Office. One was a film that was a labor of love to the giant robot genre from a visionary director. The other was Adam Sandler doing his typical SNL Alumni gatherings featuring a father who outright lies to his family in order to spend time with his friends and does it long enough for them to forgive him because things just happened to work out.
I wouldn’t say The Flash was a bomb, but last week the KKK did try strapping a DVD copy of it to the rear bumper of Al Sharpton’s car.
That particular Tweet was pretty embarrassing. Their main reason “I just still fully believe that the box office post Covid doesn’t really mean anything and the way trades discussed the marvels was…weird to say the least.”The comparison to Wonka just didn’t make much sense…math is hard for some I guess?
Fandoms are all about forming your identity around a piece of consumable pop-culture, so any attack on or failure on that piece of IP that is your whole self feels personal.
I think they hit the nail on the head with the line “growing fatigue with the MCU”. It’s time to give it a rest.
Yeah, I saw the title and assumed the answer was something other than the huge budget disparity, because that’s the second question you ask to determine how successful a movie was. It’s like asking why a Ferrari is considered a car for rich people and then writing a whole article to explain that the reason is because a new one costs a quarter million dollars. That was literally my first thought?
Does it really need explaining?I don’t know, does AV Club need to churn out 500 word posts in order to explain to the dumbest of fan reactions on twitter that definitely have other people already explaining it in 10 words or less?
“Still, despite the odds stacked against it, The Marvels didn’t deserve what it got….A little IP is okay, as long as it’s handled in a fresh, creative, and genuinely artful way. Another repeat of the same old thing simply isn’t going to cut it anymore.”
So, which is it? Did The Marvels not deserve its fate or did it?
Give me Gene Wilder, or give me death by Oompa-Loompa doggypile!(No, that wasn’t really a challenge!)
Like you said, it’s the budget. Wonka will be a success in theaters alone if they make it to $250 million world-wide – and it’s nearly two-thirds of the way there. Although I wonder if it will get there with Aquaman 2 coming out. That one’s not tracking super-well, but it could still cut hard into Wonka’s box office on Christmas.
I’m sure the added competition from Aquaman 2 will have some effect, but I don’t know how much the audiences for the movies will overlap. Wonka seems well positioned to take advantage of Christmas, where for many viewers it becomes less important what you are dying to see, and more important what grandma, your teenage cousin, your younger sister, and your parents can all be OK seeing. Wonka seems like a very good “Yeah, I guess that will be fine” movie.
No marvel movie is worth dying for and no one is dying to see them.
Really? If the choice is to take the kids to Wonka or Aquaman 2 Aquaman 2 is getting a hard pass and Wonka will be selling more tickets. Plus Wonka was never tainted by the presence of an overbearing manipulative bed pooping which.
Had no idea Depp was in Aquaman 2.
If your going to call someone a name learn how to spell the name. Witch or bitch? What were you planning on calling her? I really wish she hadn’t have pooped on that bed though. They world needed less Depp shit in it.
Why is this even an article? The Marvels’ budget: $275 millionThe Marvels’ box office: $200 million and will probably end up not much higher. Since the studio gets roughly half, that means a loss of about $175m.Wonka’s budget: $125 millionWonka’s box office: Likely will end up over $300 million possibly even over $400m, meaning the studio will probably make money.
One reason this is an article is because a significant group is very invested in the idea that The Marvels has been treated unfairly.
But yeah, it’s no mystery why a movie that costs half as much has an easier path to financial success. And now that Marvel’s seeing a little softness in demand for its movies, one obvious option is to cut costs. It’s not like Wonka is a small, intimate drama with no need for costumes, sets, or special effects. And it’s not like like Marvel’s recent outings have looks so good that you can really see the money on the screen.
Wonka also pulled in its dollars despite the fact movie musicals are on the outs nowadaysAre movie musicals really on their way out, or have there just been some really bad movie musicals lately?I mean, Cats didn’t fail because it happened to be a musical.
They’ve been heading out for like 60 years.See also West Side Story, In the Heights, etc.
West Side Story and In the Heights were bad. Remaking a perfect classic is hubris. In the Heights just was not good.
Increasingly, audiences think the entire genre isn’t good. On screen, anyway. Also, some might say that painting white actors brown and calling them Puerto Rican is a far bigger sin than remaking a brownface musical, but do you.
They seem to be super unpopular; there are a LOT of musicals (Mean Girls, Color Purple, Wonka) where the trailer almost completely elides the inclusion of musical numbers. Pretty grim if you can’t sell a musical on…being a musical.
If people don’t know it’s a musical, then it being a musical isn’t the reason they’re staying away.The Mama Mias and the Pitch Perfects do fine. La La Land, Greatest Showman, A Star is Born. I’d guess the ratio of success/bomb is better for musicals than most other genres.
If people don’t know it’s a musical, then it being a musical isn’t the reason they’re staying away.
right; that means the people advertising these movies think people will stay away if it is a musical. as you point out they can be crowd-pleasers; one comes around every 3 or so years which is a critical or commercial success, but there I can also point out the West Side Stories, Dear Evan Hansons, Les Mis’es, Catses, Rocks of Ages, Jersey Boyses, Nines, Cyranos, Into the Woodses, and Annies. especially on the context of movie musicals being Hollywood’s bread and butter through the 30s and 50s, they’re made infrequently, and succeed even less so.
the good ones haven’t really been making money either, but yeah i’m not shocked ‘dear evan hansen’ didn’t set the world on fire.
La La Land and two Mamma Mia! movies would like a word with you….
I’m wondering what mental gymnastics AV Club will use to explain The Color Purple – The Film based on the Musical later this month? Racism? Rampant Misogyny? *Fan of the original film and will just wait until it hits whatever streaming service. Which might also be the reasons things just don’t perform fiscal miracles for studios anymore!
The decision to make The Color Purple a holiday release just baffles me. It’s a great story but one filled with child abuse, spousal abuse, racial injustice, etc. and, while the characters who face those challenges rise above them, they don’t shy away from their depiction.
To me, a holiday movie is either “feel good” or pure fantasy escapism along the lines of Lord of the Rings or Star Wars and, in both cases, it’s something the entire family can enjoy. The Color Purple is neither feel good or escapism and I’m not the story is really going to resonate with most viewers under the age of 13.
It seems like January or February would have been the better release date.
The most simple and cynical reason is to get awards. Just the idea of a film about a musical version of the book-based film is nauseating. Having been 13 in 1985 I found the material made me ask my parents a few things. Growing up in MA you only were taught the material in bits and pieces based on age. It was a school sponsored event, but that’s also what you get from private schooling that gave a much broader picture of life.*I feel the same way about re-imagined or revival version of other mainstream theater. Changes for a more updated society, like they’ve done with Hamlet set in WWII, have no real bearing on the material as the dialog doesn’t change from Shakespeare’s original text. Guess being 51 now puts me firmly in the “I like my old stuff” category.
Have you seen only the original movie? If so I see why you think that but the musical version isn’t as depressing. It ends up being more of a feel-good experience.
I like waiting for streaming. As a Barbie collector if a movie about her couldn’t get me to see it in a theater I don’t think anything can. I do have a $15 gift card have no idea what I’m going to see with it.
Honestly the musical is what clicked it for me. I couldn’t get into the book or the film (I blame the latter on being unable to accept Danny Glover as a bad guy) but I dug the musical.A lot of that is that it does file down some of the really jagged edges. Like, The Color Purple is objectively a novel about people being victimized by personal violence that is itself a reflection of systemic violence, to the point that the only option they really have is to abandon their societal roles as much as possible. But it becomes so bleak that it can be kind of hard to see how any of the characters even manage to relate to one another. The musical sort of reframes the story around the friendships and social relationships that the book takes for granted, and benefits from that IMO.That said, I imagine it was very cheap to film, and people LOVE The Color Purple, so I don’t see it tanking personally. Even if it’s a bad performance, it will probably make its budget just on name.
Getting those harder societal topics into the public and in a way that is thought provoking and entertaining is the benefit of musicals done correctly. You’re right that the original movie is hard to take and everyone brings their personal feelings and experiences to what they see. I’m glad you found the musical your entry. I don’t want it to fail, but I know the success just isn’t going to be what some hope and others will tie it to some social ill (like The Marvels?).Spam-A-Lot was my way of getting my wife into Monty Python. I also cringe at the idea someday someone will convince people to do the money-grab of turning that into a film.
I found the movie so, so grim that I never tried the book. I was probably 10 or 11 when I first saw the movie and it was just so sad and depressing to me. I didn’t revisit it again for a long time until I saw the musical several years ago and it was much easier to absorb. It wasn’t as harsh throughout as the movie (and presumably the book) was. I think that’s why it does make some sense as a holiday release. It’s not as depressing as the movie and you leave feeling pretty good rather than feeling beat down (which is, at least, how I felt after the movie).
I think the problem is that the book is basically just the author asking “what is every way being a black woman in depression era rural America sucked?” and going down a checklist, so then at the end when she kind of just pulls out a clutch win in the form of a not totally miserable old age, you’re so drained you can’t really empathize. I understand that all the stuff that happens to Celie, and worse, probably happened to lots of people and may still happen, and that Walker is in no way obligated to sand off the edges, but doing so JUST A BIT makes the less horrible stuff, like her burgeoning friendship with Shug, a lot easier to accept emotionally.I should say that, so far as I remember, all the events of the book ARE PRESENT in the musical. Like, it hasn’t been warped into the story of a happy woman living in a society that provides her recourse for her problems by any means, it’s just a little less of A Serbian Film in Alabama. And if that’s not what you want, again, I get that.
Yeah it’s definitely worthwhile storytelling that I think people should experience. But once is enough. I know people who rewatch the original all the time and I don’t know how they do it. But in my old age I’ve become less interested in Black trauma entertainment. I value the telling of the stories, but I’ve seen so much of it over the years (and, of course, experienced a good amount), that at this time in my life I want my entertainment to entertain more and traumatize less. And in addition I wish there was more Black joy storytelling. There’s some, but the majority of Black films historically have been struggle films, and I think we can start exploring the joy of our lives a little more, where possible.
No, ‘Cats’ failed because they were too cowardly to release the Butthole Cut.
There was at least one visible arsehole in it, come on.
Finally a truther movement I can get behind. All hail Butthole Truther
There is a very small percentage of people who love them, not nearly enough for them to be as common as they are. But they are beloved by people who work in hollywood so they get greenlit anyways.
It’s definitely a niche market although it seems Apple found some success with Schmigadoon. It feels like there’s room in the market for this style but similar to the point of this article, rebooting Oklahoma probably isn’t going to work.
The last good musical film was South Park.
I think it’s safe to say they’re in a valley.
While the reasons The Marvels underperformed are worth digging into, the constant dragging the conversation out, even when discussing the success of unrelated projects, feels like a part of the phenomenon, not some impartial outsider’s observation. Like, you’re not examining the hole; you’re digging it deeper.
You don’t know just need editors for spelling and grammar; you need editors to say “Look, you’re goin’ nowhere with this piece – develop angle and figure it out before you type it out and hand it in to me.”
It’s still in theaters?
Another factor to consider for comparison’s sake is that Wakanda Forever had premiered on essentially the exact same weekend one year before The Marvels. Both are sequels to films that opened around comparable times (Black Panther in February; Captain Marvel in March) and grossed over $150 million in their opening weekend alone. The former opened to $181 million; the latter to $47 million. When you have a comparison that direct, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out a $47 million opening was abnormally low.
But hey, FWIW, I don’t think Wonka’s domestic box office is very impressive either. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory opened in 2005 to $56 million (albeit during the summer), and the same weekend last year, movies collectively grossed $152 million, in huge part thanks to Avatar 2. This year (which has already outgrossed last year’s total box office), that number was $73 million. Not to suggest that I was expecting Wonka to do Avatar numbers, but it clearly wasn’t a historically bad weekend for the movies like the doldrums of August and September.Then again, Hunger Games 5 opened only $5 million higher and is creeping up on $150 million domestic, so if Wonka’s word of mouth is good, it could have staying power. And as others have pointed out, it’s doing pretty well internationally.
This article answers the question it asked —why is Wonka considered a box office success compared to The Marvels — really easily. Wonka is considered a box office success because it’s likely to make a lot of money, whereas The Marvels costs a lot more, so it will lose a lot of money. Then it bends over backwards to try to to convince us that it’s really unfair that we consider The Marvels a failure, just because it lost a ton of money and audiences and critics didn’t like it.
The Marvels will also sink into oblivion relatively quickly, finding its place among the least popular of a 22-film franchise. I can see the Wonka refresh staying relevant for much longer, as something people would like to revisit.
the least popular of a 22-film franchisePeople still question whether Incredible Hulk is even *in* the MCU, and they were openly hostile to both Love & Thunder and Quantumania. No way is The Marvels taking the “least popular” crown.
Yeah, I said “among” for a reason. Financially it’s certainly down there, but from that point it’s subjective.
Yup. That horrid “Dark Thor” (or whatever it was called) will always be the worst.
I’ll fight that. It sucked but it didn’t wipe its ass with one of the best modern Thor stories. Love and Thunder took a shit on Jason Aaron’s run.
I never read that comic run, I had already long stopped reading any of them before that happened – so will have to take your opinion that it didn’t do it justice at face value … but Love & Thunder was a better movie than Dark Thor.
Also, it was entertaining.
the least popular of a 22-film franchise. I think you’re forgetting about The Eternals , to be fair most people who watched it have too I guess.
“. . . finding its place among the least popular of a 22-film franchise.”
I forgot it about 30 seconds after I watched it.
Yeah, it isn’t all that complicated: this family-friendly movie derived from a children’s story, which cost half as much as The Marvels, is also leading into a weekend where that exact kind of thing tends to do well. The context and standard for what “success” looks like is very different.The “woke M-She-U” people are trash, but there are plenty of non-culture-war reasons to disengage with recent Marvel. The Marvels is not different from Ant-Man: Quantumania or Thor: Love & Thunder in this regard; the storytelling feels arbitrary, the conflicts impersonal, and the rushed CG comes off as a flat and inert. Iman Vellani is the only part of the movie that conveyed any real sense of joy or life and I wish she had a more fun project to work within.
Being confused about why Wonka is being considered a success is like saying, “Everyone said it was great when I sold my old car for $20,000, but now I’ve sold my house for $22,000, and everyone is appalled. What the hell?!?!”
It felt like the only point of The Marvels was to put Ms. Marvel on the big screen.
The film had all the interesting stuff we could’ve seen from a Captain Marvel sequel happen sometime in the years between Captain Marvel and Endgame.
Photon was just kinda… there. Like they didn’t know what to do with her at all.
I dunno, it just kinda feels like both Captain Marvel films were half-assed in terms of writing. The first one at least had Larson, Jackson, Mendolson, and even Jude Law kinda vibing off each other in an often fun way in terms of dialogue and character interaction. The Marvels just kinda… went by the numbers and used the typical Marvel formula. It was also the first Marvel film where the villain’s death didn’t seem like it mattered. It was more impactful when the laser head guy in Quantumania died.
I’m sure The Marvels is a decent movie but I’m just so tired of the MCU. I’ll probably come back once they finally get around to that X-Men because I have a lot of nostalgia tied to that series.
It wasn’t a decent movie. In fact it was a mess. I love Marvel movies, but there was no magic in this movie. The chemistry between the Marvels was awful. The back story was almost non existent, and what was provided, was confusingly laid out. Lastly, the main villain was forgettable and not worthy of being battled by 3 superheroes. Just my two cents.
“Just my two cents.”
I’ve got two cents that says you haven’t seen the movie.
It’s Marvel Universe fatigue—duh. No one goes to see a Marvel flick about third-tier heroes that no one except ultra-Marvel weenies care about. Who could’ve predicted this outcome? (Everybody.)
I don’t know to what extent MCU fatigue is or is not a widespread thing, but it sure feels like it’s affecting me. Perhaps it’s because Endgame felt like a natural stopping (well, pausing or at least slowing down) point, but they more or less rolled right into the next phase full steam ahead.I haven’t been particularly interested in watching any Marvel movie or TV content since Endgame that doesn’t involve Spider-Man. And I’m someone who enjoyed Captain Marvel.
it would have been so easy to let it sit a few years, hit reboot and watch people get excited all over again, but every penny must be squeezed out
Likewise. I saw Guardians of the Galaxy 3 in the theater with the family (mainly because my wife wanted to), but I have watched everything else since Endgame on DVD (from Netflix DVD – so I won’t be doing that anymore). Don’t have Disney+ so I haven’t watched the TV shows. It all feels like so much work anymore. Both Spidermans (Miles Morales and the Tom Holland version), Venom, and Deadpool are about the only superheroes that I’ll get worked up to go see anymore.
with you on that one, the smart call would have been to pause for a few years and really let Endgame sink in before returning. This said, Spiderman and Guardians 3 are both excellent films in a field of otherwise garbage.
“No one goes to see a Marvel flick about third-tier heroes that no one except ultra-Marvel weenies care about.”
Except for, you know, that decade-long streak in which people did?
Because Marvels licked the taint of every minority group on earth, while Wonka had “fatohobic” jokes.
The big issue with The Marvels is the worldwide box office performance, not just Domestic. In addition to only making $84 Million YTD domestically, it also has only made $119.3 Million internationally. Meanwhile, Wonka has already almost made that amount ($112.4 Million) in the two weeks that it has been out in International territories.
Still, despite the odds stacked against it, The Marvels didn’t deserve what it got. As many have pointed out, a lot of the criticism leveled against the Iman Vellani, Brie Larson, and Teyonah Parris-led superhero film feels particularly pointed against Nia DaCosta, a Black, female director. Even though the film likely underperformed due to marketing and, more importantly, growing fatigue with the MCU, Disney CEO Bob Iger was quick to throw DaCosta under the bus when asked to explain his hand in the numbers. DaCosta’s poor treatment in general has lent a particularly nasty taste to a lot of this criticism.
It would make no sense if the director wasn’t blamed at least a little for her film performing this badly, especially since even most people who liked The Marvels agree that this wasn’t a particularly memorable film. Every other factor for its failure – especially the MCU fatigue – has been covered to death also. DaCosta doesn’t deserve all of the blame but she deserves her share.
Where have you been the last 20 years, you can’t criticize the persons work, if they are a certain protected class.
You’re not a victim, JB226. Stop crying like one.
hmmm…re-read what i wrote, nothing there says anything about me being a victim. Must have me mixed up with somebody else.
This is definitely a strange article. The author answers their own question almost immediately (budget and expectation differences. yes they’re both existing IP, but one has had a firehose of content to gauge likelihood of success). There also seems to be some 3rd person trumpian logic of “if it does well it’s all because of this person. if it doesn’t do well they had no role in its failure and it’s everyone else’s fault” going on.
The odds stacked against it like being part of the biggest cinematic franchise in history, starring a character whose last film topped $1 billion at the box office. How could any film be expected to make money with those odds working against it?
As a CM fan, it’s because it wasn’t as big as the standard for Marvel movies as a whole. Yes it broke records, specifically for the director, but most people aren’t going to highlight let alone care about that because of their hate boner for Brie Larson. Marvel/Disney is actually very aware of the hate for Brie/CM which is why they set her up to be hated even more. Hence instead of ‘Captain Marvel 2,’ we got ‘The Marvels.’ Because they thought that they could bring in more fans with that title even though the original made a billion. That movie could’ve been a lot better, but I won’t get into that.
Is this “the marvels” or the “wonka” of blog posts? Guess it depends on whether you think this much internet ink needed to be spilled on a question that is self evident.
“Another repeat of the same old thing simply isn’t going to cut it anymore.”What a load of shit. As if originality was ever the path to box office success. Ultimately, Goldman had it right: nobody knows anything. Who the fuck knows what works and what doesn’t.
that was the piece of advice a family member working in music gave me that scared me from ever wanting to work in the entertainment industry: there is mostly no rhyme or reason for why something is successful and something else is not (plus working the same job in non-entertainment fields like accounting pays more, but you don’t get to impress strangers at dinner parties)
“At $275 million, The Marvels’ budget was over double Wonka’s ($125 million), which obviously makes a huge difference in what should have been its overall earning potential.”
Seems like this could have been a much shorter article.
It’s barely an article in the first place. There is virtually no insight in this whatsoever. I know it’s fashionable to accuse this place of having ChatGPT write its articles, but… sometimes it really does seem that way.
It’s not just an accusation:
https://futurism.com/the-av-club-imdb
That is absolutely gross. I think I keep coming here out of sheer inertia.
Right? This is like the super simple answer to why people couldn’t understand how that Hunger Games prequel was being considered such a huge success. They kept the budget low, presold a shitload of its budget overseas, and didn’t need it to actually bring that much in.
Okay, but if you want to start having objective conversations about box office numbers in isolation, then the whole box office commentary system breaks down. Get Out with a $255 million box office was covered as a smash hit sensation that swept the nation, but it had about the same domestic box office as Black Adam, a flop that everyone hated, and Black Adam made $393 million at the box office.Batman v Superman was “divisive and rejected by audiences,” making $330 million domestic and $544 million international for $874 million total. If we can’t judge movies by their budgets and the expectations had for them, there’s not really any point to any of this. Yeah, if The Marvels were a $2 million French language period drama, it’d be the surprise hit of the decade. An interesting and pointless observation.
I want to live in a world where we collectively look at that tweet whining about coverage of “The Marvels” and say “OH MY GOD, WHO FUCKING CARES? GROW UP ALREADY!”
Why is a lower rated, less profitable movie considered a failure while the higher rated, more profitable movie is not? It’s a mystery.
1. Wonka will in the end make much more than the Marvels.2. It cost much less and will turn a profit.So yes it is a box office success in comparison to The Marvels (that totally deserved its failure, it’s a horrible movie).
I don’t quite get why the discussion often in failing shows or movies get stuck to rather irrelevant things,. Like Rings of Power or Marvels get both accusations about woke this and that, but in reality they are just bad. Especially the RoP was so badly written (and looked a bit shitty, but that’s just minor thing) that I think most 90’s fantasy series had better scrips. And Marvel in general has just detoriarated (since Raimi’s Spidermen) into irrelevant crap. I mean I could not care less about the characters, the action has no concequence and is just lots of flashing lights and CGI stuff exploding.I think good counterpoints are things like House of Dragon which has well written and acted script with very little visual stuff. Or the Boys which excels on concequence of violence and also has great script. Or even Peacemaker which is silly on intention and has put lot of heart into othervise simple script.
One movie makes back almost 1/3 of it’s budget opening weekend, the other makes back less than 1/5. How is it a question why one is a bomb and the other isn’t?
You’re also ignoring international box office, where Wonka is already looking profitable after one weekend, and The Marvels never even make back the original production budget during the entire run.
Haven’t watched the Marvels, and not planning to. Nothing against the stars or director, but Marvel movies feel like a Christmas tree in January. They were really relevant for a while, but the moment is gone.
The real question, is why do we care how much movies make? Unless you’re an executive of one of these companies, the question should be, was the movie good?
It’s all about expectations. For a MCU making at least a billion at the BO is practically a requirement for the movie to be a “success” the main issues is studios, and the press for that matter, seemingly requiring a 100% return on investment for a movie to be a success.
Context and Expectations.Wonka hasn’t had a release in literally 20 years. Nobody cares about Wonka, but they tried to make people care about Wonka again. Marvel movies come often and have had setup strong expectations. What was also setup was the big push of this women-lead film over the last few years. So with both of those expectationsBudget-wise, The Marvels cost close to twice what Wonka did – $275M to $150M. So the ratio of cost-to-revenue is much different.Regardless of your particular thoughts on either movie, “flop” only relates to revenue not the performance itself. I love watching Out Cold. That was technically a box office flop.
So is this whole article just to respond to one disingenuous tweet from someone who wanted to gin up some sexist controversy?
The Marvels didn’t have the luxury of full promotion due to the strike. The box office 100% did not reflect how good the movie actually was. It was a lot of fun and totally worth watching. Fandom really is just weird and dumb at times.
It seems pretty obvious that when you can spend less than 50% of the money and make more than 80% of the profit of another film that your film is more successful than that one that you’re comparing it to.I have no doubt that if they made a longer feel every year or twice a year or three times a year with the box office for it would fade away quickly too they killed the marvel universe by making too much marvel universe. One film every three or four years or five or six years is more than enough.
Iger’s reaction is telling.“Wish” is a failure. It debuted UNDER “The Marvels” and has stayed in the lower half of the top ten since.Disney had based an amazing amount of advertising etc. on that movie and it’s little Super Mario Star character. The effects of the movie underperforming are already showing up – the new short form “Disney 100″ commercial that used to feature various Disney fans getting Invincibility from the star (or whatever they were supposed to be getting) has stripped the star from the commercial. I’d guess more is to come.Disney Feature Animation IS the 800 Lb Gorilla in the Disney discussion. They’re the heart of the company, and have been since Walt was in charge. Iger’s got to be counting his blessings he had something he could throw to the wolves to get them talking about ANYTHING other than “Why did WDFA release something so cheap looking that failed to engage?”
Again, questions that are phenomenally easy to answer.
When you spend a decade undercutting and minimizing what you’ve been famous for for an entire century (ie, animated films, especially traditionally animated ones), in favor of bloated, money-grab live action remakes of said films, why would anyone be surprised the results weren’t good?
Jurassic Park in 1993 had a 63 million dollar budget, which today would be roughly 131 million dollars. It’s first box office weekend made 50 million almost it’s full budget, and grossed over 900 million during it’s theatrical run. Jaws had an even lower budget at 7 million dollars in 1975 or 40 million in todays money, made it’s entire budget back opening weekend, and made 260 million during it’s original run. Star wars a new hope was the same way as well, lower budget/massive return. Is it a question of the budgets just being too high? Were those movies just creatively vastly superior? (yes). Director inexperience? maybe. 275 million is alot of budget money for something that isn’t an Avengers film. The Avengers infinity wars cost over 300 million to make, but everyone was anticipating it for many years and it made sense for it to be that high, grossing over 2 billion in the end…However, the first guardians of the Galaxy movie had a 200 million dollar budget, and made about 700 million world wide which was fairly good so I don’t even know. seems like a combination of alot of things.
Sorry but it wouldn’t have mattered what gender or skin color Nia Dacosta was.. if the movie tanks, the director always takes the heat. Unless maybe you’re Spielberg. You think Bob Iger would take responsibility for that? You see how much he shat on Chapek?
I dunno, choosing between the 3rd best Willy Wonka and the 33rd best MCU film feels like South Park’s Turd v Douche episode.
At $275 million, The Marvels’ budget was over double Wonka’s ($125 million), which obviously makes a huge difference in what should have been its overall earning potential.This really could have been the only sentence after that title.
Are people really this dense that this needs explanation?
Also, really classy to just barely imply that people don’t like The Marvels because of racism. Never change, AVC.
Without even reading the story, the answer is “Because Wonka is not a Marvel movie with all the baggage of expectations.”
OK full disclosure, I’m not young and keep seeing the acronym IP thrown around a lot on stories “internet protocol?” that doesnt seem right in this context. someone help an old fart out.
Intellectual Property
damn you kids and all your silly acronyms! Also i love your handle. The answer is 42
How many roads must a man walk down?
“deserve”I really wish pop culture writers would stop trotting out this idea.
One of the things that could reset the public’s mindset is to start publicizing not just the highest grossing films but the MOST PROFITABLE films — both by $ amount and %. That would favor some blockbusters, but also quite a few horror films and surprise hits that punched way above their weight.
To everyone jumping straight to “budget, end of story”: Wonka hasn’t broken even yet either, & depending on its 2nd-week drop, it still might not.
Two reasons:1. Basic Math – Wonka will make more than the Marvels2. The Marvels is being judged against other Marvel moviesIt’s embarrassing that you even had to write this. Stop trying to defend a shitty movie.
“The Marvels also experienced a drastic 77 percent drop in ticket sales during its second week, while Wonka, as a family-friendly nostalgia bomb, will likely see continued success into the holiday weekend.”Wow. Even in an article about how lopsided the coverage is, you can’t resist giving a “likely” boost to Wonka, based on…absolutely nothing.Yes, The Marvels had a drop off after opening weekend. That happens when the media reports your movie is disappointing. Which is an odd concept, since media was predicting it to underperform before it even opened; so it was disappointing even compared to the advance bad press y’all gave it?Here’s a thought…wait until a movie opens before trashing it. Or at least wait until box office numbers are in before you predict that a movie will underperform. In other words, either STFU or do better.
Movies are business endeavors so cost versus earnings count. The Marvels needed 600 million to break even . The movie has very little future earning potential. The director’s race is not an issue as references to that are just excuses for the director. The issue is she directed a 300 million dollar loss. Wonka is a family movie with potential to earn ongoing including future re-release . Napoleon was made for Apple TV who only put out a theater release in hopes of Academy Awards season publicity. Those are 3 very different economies.
I’m not sure what I’m more annoyed by. The clickbait headline which anyone who pays the least attention to the industry can give an instant logical answer to: (Wonka’s budget was a third of The Marvels, and it didn’t have the weight of being part of a billion-dollar-each-film franchise on it)… or the fact that this is 500 words that barely qualifies as a point of view.
I swear, I do not know what keeps me coming here, outside of Dawn of the Dead-like zombie inertia.
Do better.
“…the film likely underperformed due to marketing and, more importantly, growing fatigue with the MCU..” Boy, that’s rich. It was poor marketing that kept folks away after the first weekend. It was superhero fatigue that kept folks away from Guardians. Yeah, pull the other one…it’s got bells on it.
Every movie deserves what it gets. The audience decides if a movie is worth the price of admission, not you, and certainly not the directors or writers.
I loved the Marvels especially the end credit sequence..
The MASTER move Disney should have done was finish Infinity War and its part two but separate them by about 3 years. This would have gotten fans in a fizzy and helped reduce a 33 film and sub series fatigue. It’s proof that a rare bird is sought after because its rare, not because its pretty. Keep a set plan of sub series and AU stuff rolling to keep the main line interesting. Then slow the rollout of movies and media afterwards.
Think more Star Wars less Star Trek with amount of content.
The MASTER move Disney should have done was finish Infinity War and its part two but separate them by about 3 years. This would have gotten fans in a fizzy and helped reduce a 33 film and sub series fatigue. It’s proof that a rare bird is sought after because its rare, not because its pretty. Keep a set plan of sub series and AU stuff rolling to keep the main line interesting. Then slow the rollout of movies and media afterwards.
Think more Star Wars less Star Trek with amount of content.
Why? Budget and expectations.
Since all the naysayers will avoid the obvious answers, by shouting “because franchise!” ; we should also point out that the latest entry in The Hunger Games series had the weakest opening weekend of any in that series. So where were the two or three weeks of articles pointing that out and asking “Is The Hunger Games OVER?! Are audiences DONE WITH them?!” or “Did the Hunger Games go TOO WOKE!?” *gasp!*It’s all nonsense and ridiculous sensationalism that is being used to drive negative-feedback-loops for clickbait.
??? This is a site that covers movies and likes and understands the business, right? How is this even an article?
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Gossip rags like The AVClub threw DaCosta under the bus. Disney sucks, but their and Iger’s comments about The Marvels performance were bland and general. Sites like this took those bland and general quotes about quality control, which don’t mention DaCosta, and drew a dubious conclusion that those quotes were about DaCosta, based off an anonymous source from months earlier said she was absent during post production.This whole narrative has been a disgusting example of the intermingling of the shallow social justice politics of these bloggers with the deep stupidity of private equity media. These bloggers have all but manufactured a narrative that the first black woman who directed a Marvel abandoned her project, just so they can defend her by pushing back against that invented narrative, while implying Disney threw her under the bus.Blogs like this are actively smearing DaCosta under the guise of defense. Just remember that the appearances of social justice here are illusionary, and only in service to Spanfeller’s bottom line.
How many times can you re-make Willie Fucking Wonka?
I’m sure it’s been going on more heavily than I’ll ever realize, but it seems like people are comparing things like this a lot more lately without considering anything beyond “they’re both movies.” Different budgets, different genres, different expectations. Is that too hard to comprehend?
Obviously because the patriarchy.
simple answer-bigotry and misogyny plain and simple, not hard to figure out.
The answer is the same every time this question comes up (i.e. Flower Moon, Napoleon, etc): it’s entirely about expectations. Not many people expected Wonka to be a hit. Flower Moon makes half it’s budget back and is considered a surprise success…same with Napoleon. Nobody expected those films to be huge, just Oscar bait. Marvels was following up to huge movies that came before and if it didn’t do gangbusters right out of the gate then it’s a bomb (much like Ant-Man, Thor 4, Dr STrange 2 etc.)—even though it made more than those other films. Plus, of course, you have the anti-MCU people that seem to be very happy to trumpet the demise of Marvel at every opportunity.