The Summer 2023 Box Office: Just How Did the Predictions Fare?

This summer I discussed a good many predictions about how various films would fare at the box office--and made a few predictions of my own. These included eight predictions I offered in advance of the film's release, in which I also explained my reasoning at some length. Some of the movies I made predictions about have already all but disappeared from theaters, their runs over, while the others discussed here (the last of which was mid-July's Mission: Impossible 7) do not have much further to go, the matter of their performance almost as settled. The result is that it is not too soon to consider how those predictions fared--and to that end this post revisits the predictions I made about those eight films.

Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 3
On the basis of the grosses of the prior two Guardians of the Galaxy films one would have expected the third film to also be a billion-dollar hit--but the trend of the grosses of the films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)'s various series has been downward, with new sequels making between three-quarters and half what the preceding films in their series' did. Adjusting that billion dollar hit expectation for that reality I projected a $700 million global gross for Guardians--and in the wake of the disappointing opening weekend wondered if the film would not do worse than that. The second weekend, however, hinted at strong enough legs that the film could go a little higher--perhaps as high as $875 million. In the end the movie made $846 million--not too far outside the range I predicted pre-release, and certainly not so much so as to really defy the trend from which Marvel's releases had been suffering through the prior year (the movie's take in the end a rough fifth down from what Guardians of the Galaxy 2 scored in real terms).

Fast X
Working in the same manner as before (the inflation-adjusted grosses of prior series films, the downward trend in those grosses) I estimated that Fast X would pull in $750-$850 million. The movie made $705 million--performing a little below the bottom end of the range here.

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
Considering Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse I was, I think, more optimistic than I was about any of the summer's other movies, partly because of the evidences of audience anticipation. I in fact suggested that the movie, which Boxoffice Pro early on estimated would break the $300 million barrier in North America alone, could be the biggest superhero film of the year. I was less bullish on the movie's overseas performance, excitement elsewhere not quite as easy to detect. Still, I saw the plausible range of its global gross as $500-$750 million (with the low end mainly defined by the sequel's doing no better than the original).

As it happened, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-verse grossed a sensational $380 million in North America (close to twice the gross of the original Into the Spider-Verse), and a respectable $688 million worldwide. In the process it beat Guardians of the Galaxy 3 (and The Flash) to at least be the #1 superhero movie of 2023 in the North American market, while if doing less well than Star-Lord overseas, still posting a higher real-terms gross than the film that began the series (hence, the extra $300 million+ from the international market).

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts
My expectation regarding the latest Transformers film was a gross in the $300-$450 million range (with this so much consistent with the downward trend of the series that the decision to make an additional $200 million Transformers film seemed to me incomprehensible). The film, which in North America had the benefit of an opening weekend a bit stronger than the very low expectations held for it, has at least avoided the worst, but not done much better than approach the upper end of the range--with some $439 million collected globally.

The Flash
Initially considering the performance of The Flash I mostly went by whether others' guesses seemed plausible. Originally seeming to tend toward the $700 million range this seemed a safe enough anticipation for a big DCEU movie getting a big summer release. Still, as the hype for the movie as "the greatest superhero movie ever made" built I gave the matter a little thought--comparing the guess with how other DCEU films had done. I was simply unable to see this one breaking the billion-dollar barrier, with $750-$850 million seeming the plausible range at my most optimistic. Of course, the expectations for the film collapsed quickly, in part because of what the box office tracking showed, and my estimate just before the opening weekend was down to $300-$550 million. As it happened, the low end of the range was only slightly optimistic (the movie having $269 million grossed to date) in the weakest performance of any of the movies discussed here, and what has proven a debacle for the DCEU.

Elemental
In contrast with the high expectations surrounding many of the films that were badly disappointed this year (epitomized by The Flash) Elemental arrived with expectations that were none too impressive, with the high end of Boxoffice Pro's projection not seeing the movie break $100 million domestically. Still, extrapolating from prior Disney films' performance I speculated that the film might, with decent legs and a stronger reception overseas than in the domestic market (more "concept-heavy" movies tend to do better internationally than in North America) it might do better than that. The result was a plausible range of $250-$450 million, give or take. As it happened, Elemental has had very good legs indeed (in North America thus far taking in over five times its opening weekend gross, such that here the gross stands at $152 million), while indeed having that robust international performance (making twice as much money overseas as it did in North America). The result is that the film has slightly bettered the upper end of the range I predicted (with $469 million collected so far)--which is not quite enough to have Disney crowing, but should put the extreme pessimism about it into perspective (especially given how well Disney tends to do in home entertainment, which may let it even turn a profit).

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny
On the basis of the prior four films performance I suggested $1 billion as the likely gross of Indiana Jones 5, with a quarter-billion dollar margin of error ($750 million-$1.25 billion), but already in April I declared the possibility of a Solo-like collapse (instead of the narrative that it would play like Top Gun 2 that some of the claqueurs were pushing). The Solo scenario seemed to me much more plausible after the bungled premiere of the film at Cannes, and the way the promotional effort ran out of steam afterwards, such that by opening weekend Solo was what I had come to expect. And indeed the film played like Solo in current dollar terms, falling short of the $400 million mark ($381 million taken in after almost two months in the theaters)--and adjusted for inflation, actually did worse. The result is that, to go by the available data, only Indiana Jones 5 compares with The Flash as a disaster for the studios this year.

Mission: Impossible--Dead Reckoning, Part One
Working on the basis of prior films' performance and tracking--with it seeming possible that the Tom Cruise film would get a bump from the good will toward last summer's Top Gun 2 (compensating for a likely weaker performance in the important Chinese market this time around) I estimated that the global gross for Mission: Impossible 7 would be in the $850-$950 million range. As things stand the film has, after seven weeks in release with not much further to go, taken in just $174 million domestically and $552 million worldwide. This is not just a much weaker showing than I earlier anticipated, but when adjusted for inflation a new low for the series, both the domestic and the global revenue lower than the gross for the movie that was the previous low, 2006's Mission: Impossible III. (The result is that it seems to me that this was the one time this summer when, even just before release, I was so wide off the mark.)

Of course, big a part of this summer's box office as these eight films were they were not the whole of it--or even the totality of the films I discussed. Still, I only discussed The Little Mermaid after its rather dismaying opening weekend. (My expectation then was that it would make $300-$350 million domestically, $500-$700 million worldwide. The movie's performance has been in line with the low end of that prediction--just $298 million grossed in North America, $569 million worldwide--which is more than Elemental made, but an undeniable letdown in comparison with the prior live-action adaptations of Disney's animated classics.) I discussed Barbie and Oppenheimer, but attempted no number-crunching in regard to these films, which lack convenient points of comparison. (Certainly, though, I did not expect Barbie to break the billion-dollar barrier--I had thought this likely beyond any live-action movie this year, and the expectation of that only grew as one likely candidate after another flopped. I did express some skepticism about Oppenheimer's legs given its "arty" filmmaking style--indeed, suggested there might be a collapse in attendance after the first weekend--but it has held up pretty well, with the movie now on the way to quadrupling its opening weekend gross, giving it $299 million in North America and $778 million globally.) And I did give some thought to how Blue Beetle might do (suggesting it might do a bit better than it was credited with, a prediction that now seems validated, even as the film still looks like it will lose money).

The result is that, while I do not think I did too badly with the estimates, this summer has certainly had its share of surprises for onlookers--those movies that should have been the most reliable performers consistently letting down their backers, while a few of those less conventional releases (the animated Spider-Man, Barbie, Oppenheimer) often performed spectacularly. Indeed, when in a few days we are in a position to consider the summer season as a whole we are likely to conclude that, amid a generally disappointing season, those riskier picks rescued the summer from disaster.