Furiosa
Furiosa and Garfield have combined to create one of the worst Memorial Day weekends at the movies in years, at least in terms of ticket sales.
Those who have seen Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga may be wringing their hands that such a good movie doesn’t do so well, just a $25 million opening, but unfortunately, it wasn’t exactly set up for success from the start. Why; A few reasons.
- At first, Mad Max: Fury Road isn’t a super-huge blockbuster hit. The movie grossed $380 million worldwide with a budget of $150 million and more in marketing. Solid, but nothing too crazy.
- Furiosa, meanwhile, had an even higher budget at $168 million, but it’s a big ask not for a sequel, but for a prequel sequel to out-earn its predecessor, especially for one main reason:
- It’s hard to present a Mad Max movie without actually Mad Max. Absolutely Chris Hemsworth and Anya Taylor-Joy do amazing work, but this is a prequel spin-off of a secondary character in Fury Road that isn’t even played by the same actress this time (Charlize Theron). This is a bit confusing for the audience, or at least not extremely appealing.
Furiosa
- You actually need to have a certain awareness of the events of the first film, even though this is a prequel, lest it end up as something of an anti-climax. This is actually So It is necessary for the film to give you a full reel of the first film at the end to reinforce the villains who all get their just desserts and Furiosa comes out victorious in this film.
- Finally, as much as I’d like to say otherwise, critics’ reviews simply don’t matter as much when it comes to overall box office. Or at least they can only move the needle so far. Furiosa has a great 90% rating from critics (as well as audiences), but in many ways that’s just preaching to the already converted. It didn’t seem likely that George Miller would mess this up, and apparently he didn’t, but the movie needs more than tough Millers.
Miller has said that he would like to continue making Mad Max movies forever, and I hope he does. But Hollywood and the general public aren’t really in a position to reward that kind of commitment at this point, and I’m afraid this kind of performance will hurt his chances of doing more. At least with the same studio. At least with the same budget.
There’s nothing else to do but tell your friends to watch the movie if they haven’t. Or convince your kids that they want to see Furiosa instead of Garfield (just kidding, mostly). Furiosa looked like it wouldn’t have a real shot to begin with, and unfortunately that seems to be proving correct as we speak.
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