Puck’s Scott Mendelson is sounding the alarm on the $170M budgeted “Furiosa,” which I’ve been doing since last week. Its box-office numbers are a catastrophe.
A 4-day total of $30M was the absolute worst-case scenario and it might come to fruition. What happened? Reviews have been solid, and audience scores are good, it’s definitely not that. Maybe it’s the fact that there’s no Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron in this film?
Mendelson is comparing it to Disney’s ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ debacle — a prequel origin story starring a less famous actor than the one who defined the character in the first place. I wouldn’t go that far. There’s more to this story than just that. This year, we’re seeing plenty of films underperform— people just aren’t going to theaters as much anymore.
2015’s “Fury Road” earned $46 million in its Fri-Sun debut. “Furiosa” might not crack $30 million in four days. Now, Miller will most likely not be able to get any more ‘Mad Max’ movies made. It might very well end with “Furiosa,” unless he gets his budgets under the control, which I don’t believe you can do with this franchise.