4 out of the 5 video game movie adaptations in 2016 were outright box office blunders, so why are companies still pursuing these dead-end terrible movie ideas?
The answer lies within the tired Hollywood franchises, such as Transformers and Ice Age. The franchises are being used until they die, and along with reboots are still making nostalgia money. As Bo Burnham put it, “We’ll stop beating this dead horse when it stops spitting out money”
Of course, no one in Hollywood would admit to this- that would be asinine. What we can do is observe.
Using the first of the two examples, Transformers: The Last Knight only grossed $125 million domestically, far below their budget of $217 million. They were only saved by their massive grossing of $392.4 million in other territories, with global gross of $517.4 million.
The second example, Ice Age: Collision Course had a similar fate. With a budget of $105 million, the $64 million domestic box office is a complete flop, and they are only saved by their international box office which grossed at nearly $340 million, making their global gross $403 million.
There is a common theme with both of these franchises: they are doing better internationally than domestically. This is likely because in America and Canada, the people are downright tired of seeing these films. We want something new, something exciting, something adventurous, we want something we know about but that will be fresh on the big screen.
Something like video games.
With video games rising in popularity, many companies want to take advantage of what they perceive to be a hidden, untapped market- when in reality, most video games were never meant to be adapted for the big screen. This cash cow is a safe endeavor for someone seeking to invest in a movie- if millions of people play a game, and a movie is made, there millions of potential viewers just waiting to be reeled in by an enticing trailer, a creative plot, and a good story line.
Unfortunately, these movies rarely fulfill the promise made in their trailer, and often end up with flat plots and plain, run-of-the-mill story lines. All that’s left now is to cross our fingers and hope these upcoming video game movies aren’t as 2-dimensional as they have been.
