Posted in: Box Office, Movies | Tagged: disney, Inside Out 2, Summer Box Office 2024

Disney Flexes Muscles: Your Summer Box Office Wrap-Up For 2024

Summer Box Office Wrap-Up: Disney flexes its muscles while Warner Bros. licks its wounds. How did the rest of our predictions go?

Disney has taken it on the chin for a couple of years now in the press, on social media, and at the box office. It seemed for every hit they had, two more would underperform. Of course, the articles started: Is Disney in trouble? If 2024 has taught us anything at the box office, that would be an emphatic "No." Disney ruled this summer, owning the top-grossing film in May, June, and August. They owned three of the top ten-grossing films of the summer, including the top two spots. They had the two biggest openings, and Inside Out 2 became a global phenomenon on its way to becoming the top-grossing animated film ever. The overall box office was down 10% from last summer, which nobody would have believed at the end of May. Total box office take was $3.64 billion. Let's take a look at the winners and losers this year and see how I did in my predictions. Spoiler: you win some, you lose some.

Disney Is The Big Winner, But Is It Really Fox?

Disney has been criticized as well, mainly Bob Iger, for the Fox purchase a few years ago. However, three of their big-grossing films, Deadpool & Wolverine, Alien: Romulus, and Kingdom of the Planet of The Apes, were released by 20th Century Studios, and all are former Fox properties. Alien: Romulus also became the rare American film to score big overseas this year, especially in China. As a studio, though, no matter how you look at it, Disney grossed $1.4 billion over four films domestically. That should quiet people down for a bit.

Loser: Warner Bros.

Ouch. The studio failed to have a single movie crack the top ten grossing films of the summer, and their major releases, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, Trap, Horizon: An American Saga- Chapter 1, and The Watchers all failed to catch on with audiences. Trap at least made its budget back, but Furiosa was a major disappointment. Horizon did so poorly that the completed Part 2 was pulled from its release date in theaters, and right now, nobody knows when it will see the light of day. They even handled the overseas release of Twisters and somehow only managed to get that one to less than half of what it made in the States. It was not a great summer for Warner Bros. It's good that their luck turns around this weekend.

Winner: Sony

Sony had three major releases this summer, and while A Garfield Movie didn't pack em in, Bad Boys: Ride or Die sure did. That film single-handedly changed the entire narrative of the summer when it opened in June, along with Disney releasing Inside Out 2, and proved that the last film's gross was not a fluke. It also proved that the general public doesn't really care that Will Smith slapped someone at the Oscars, but they still want to see him in the right film. But, they became a big winner in August with the release of It Ends With Us. The Blake Lively adaptation of the mega-popular novel by Colleen Hoover surprised most (not me) with a huge opening weekend and held up through the month to head over the $100 million mark. It is also a hit overseas and will end up over the $300 million mark worldwide. It's a huge hit and proof that Hollywood has been overlooking certain genres where there is obvious money to be made. Memo to Hollywood: Women want to go to the movies too.

Loser: Lionsgate

Let's be fair. They started the summer with The Strangers—Chapter 1 did pretty well, but then August happened. In two weeks, Borderlands opened to ridicule, low grosses, and a shoulder shrug from audiences. Then, they had The Crow remake open to ridicule, even lower grosses, and a shoulder shrug from audiences. Combined, those two films won't make half of what The Strangers made in May. If there was a complete opposite of Disney this summer, Lionsgate was it.

My predictions:

First, here was how I saw the top ten finishing back at the start of summer:

1. Despicable Me 4
2. Deadpool & Wolverine
3. Inside Out 2
4. Twisters
5. Borderlands
6. Horizon: An American Saga- Part One
7. Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes
8. It Ends With Us
9. Alien: Romulus
10. The Watchers

Here is how the actual list played out:

1. Inside Out 2
2. Deadpool & Wolverine
3. Despicable Me 4
4. Twisters
5. Bad Boys: Ride or Die
6. Kingdom of The Planet of The Apes
7. A Quiet Place: Day One
8. It Ends With Us
9. IF
10. The Fall Guy

Hey, I nailed a couple of those! I was WAY off three of the predictions, and I take the L on Borderlands. I knew nothing about that game except that it's hugely popular. Ditto on Horizon; I thought more of the target demo who watches Yellowstone would head out to the theater. You win some, you lose some.

Here were my fearless predictions as well:

• No May opening film will open to more than $75 million.
• Furiosa will reach $500 million worldwide but gross less than $200 million domestically.
• No horror film will gross more than $75 million.
• Horizon- Part One will do well, but Part Two will bomb.
• No film will cross $1 billion worldwide this summer.

I nailed that first one. I was half right on Furiosa, but nobody cared overseas, either, so that's a loss. I came close to the horror prediction, but A Quiet Place: Day One made $138 million and held all summer long. Horizon…oof. Two films crossed $1 billion this year, and I am happy to have been wrong there. Thanks, Disney.

If this summer proves anything, it is that audiences are there and want to go to the movies. The rush to see things in week one is still there, but movies this summer had legs and made money for months. We need a fuller schedule, like 2019-style, to invade theaters. 2025 has one such loaded schedule for most of the year, especially summer. We now turn our attention to fall and winter, with eyes towards the screens as we get our first looks at next year's big summer tentpoles from Disney, Universal, WB, etc. My first bold prediction for the summer 2025 box office? It will be the most successful since 2019.

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