EGN NEWS DESK
“Moviegoers don’t want prequel origin tales,” the place important franchise characters are “portrayed not by the actor who originated and outlined them, however by a youthful, less-famous performer,” Scott Mendelson, a field workplace analyst who publishes a subscription publication, wrote on Saturday.
“Furiosa,” directed by George Miller and co-starring Chris Hemsworth, might have been launched too quickly after the similar-looking “Dune: Part Two,” which delivered large ticket gross sales in March, some movie executives mentioned. At the identical time, they added, “Furiosa” might have been launched too lengthy after “Fury Road,” permitting the “Mad Max” fan base to chill.
There has additionally been an absence of momentum on the field workplace, famous Paul Dergarabedian, a senior Comscore media analyst. Hollywood’s summer time season began with “The Fall Guy,” which arrived to $28 million in ticket gross sales earlier this month — the bottom summer time kickoff since 1995. The April field workplace suffered from a scarcity of films, which studios blamed on lingering fallout from union strikes in 2023.
“The present malaise reveals the significance of the well being of the general market within the months main as much as this all-important moviegoing season,” Mr. Dergarabedian mentioned in an e mail.
Theaters within the United States and Canada have been anticipated to promote about $125 million in tickets over the weekend, down roughly 40 % from final yr, in line with Comscore. For the yr to this point, ticket gross sales within the two international locations complete $2.6 billion, down 22 % from the identical interval a yr in the past, Comscore mentioned.
Mr. Dergarabedian is an optimist, nonetheless.
“It’s not recreation over for theaters this summer time as many have asserted,” he mentioned, noting that sequels like “Inside Out 2,” “Despicable Me 4” and “Deadpool & Wolverine” might arrive as main hits in June and July. If these movies ship, he mentioned, Hollywood can salvage “the notion of the movie show enterprise as a viable and related a part of the leisure ecosystem.”
