*** SOLO: A STAR WARS STORY ***

251,906 Views | 1959 Replies | Last: 4 yr ago by Ol_Ag_02
AliasMan02
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Nicely done, Story Group. Dropped the name of the Galaxy's Edge (new Disney park) Outpost in Solo.



Zombie Jon Snow
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MBAR said:

It's making less money because of its release time. People only have so much to spend at the movies and the past month was full of things I'd see before Solo.
Seriously... i mean I don't think I'm rich or elitist but I've never not gone to a movie because of money or some budget for movies. I think moviegoers go to movies. Thats their entertainment. I used to see 45-50 per year in the theater which means every week basically. I've cut back to 25-30 per year not because of budget but just my interest in films. but I still see all the big releases.

I'm sure there are people with budgets but I don't think thats most of the movie watchers in theaters. those with budgets wait for everything to be on movie channels/streaming or at Red Box...imho.

I'd love to know the reason and have t be something unrelated to the subject really, I just don't think it's that... especially on a big holiday weekend.
SeattleAgJr
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Ridiculous. That would be the issue then any time of year for any given bug budget movie.

The movie is bombing for several reasons, many of which have been detailed above. And all are likely to have played into the performance to various extents.

At the end of the day it can probably be summed up as people really just did not want this movie. It is a mostly irrelevant story told about a popular character not played by the actor that made him popular, coming soon after a another Star Wars movie that was somewhat divisive, being released in a somewhat competitive market, and playing to an international audience that cares less about Star Wars than American audiences do. Add to that the circus sideshow of the behind-the-scenes activities, and a lot of audience Goodwill seems to have evaporated based on perceptions.

You can argue Rogue One, but that was only the second of the new Star Wars movies, it directly tied into episode 4, and it received pretty kick ass word mouth. Solo received soft reviews, has decent Word of Mouth and is more less stand alone.

It will be interesting to see what course corrections to its production release schedule Disney takes after this.
SeattleAgJr
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Could also be that the younger and newer audiences are only familiar with the newer trilogy characters, and don't have an attachment to Han Solo like older audiences do. So the younger audience may have stayed away, and some small part of the older audience may have also stayed away due to the Last Jedi blowback.

And LeBron James kicking ass in the playoffs.
Dr. Teeth
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MBAR said:

It's making less money because of its release time. People only have so much to spend at the movies and the past month was full of things I'd see before Solo.


It's bombing because TLJ was a full on and completely unnecessary character assassination of one of cinema's greatest heroes for the sake of "diversity"... followed by six months of Kathleen Kennedy, Rian Johnson, and J.J. Abrams calling the franchise's biggest lifelong fans sexists and bigots, and going on about how they didn't need or want us as fans.

Disney has effectively taken $4B and lit it on fire.
AliasMan02
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What a stretch. How was diversity at play in the "assassination" of Luke?
RebAg13
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You think Disney took 4 Billion and lit it on fire? They've already made that back in movie sales, not to take into account toy sales and another revenue.
SeattleAgJr
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RebAg13 said:

You think Disney took 4 Billion and lit it on fire? They've already made that back in movie sales, not to take into account toy sales and another revenue.
technically, they have not (movie sales)

at best they have made maybe 2.5B on box office and home video.

they make less than half of the box office per movie due to splits with distributors.
and they make less overseas than they do domestically.

with merchandising and whatnot... absolutely, and then some.
RebAg13
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Force awakens was 2b, Rogue one and Last Jedi were both about a billion. That's 4 plus whatever they make off solo. And they own the rights to future Star Wars movies.
SeattleAgJr
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RebAg13 said:

Force awakens was 2b, Rogue one and Last Jedi were both about a billion. That's 4 plus whatever they make off solo. And they own the rights to future Star Wars movies.
You are still wrong, and you did not read what I wrote.

Disney did not get all of that money. At best they get 50%.

Estimated profit:
TFA: $780.11M
RO: $319M
TLJ: $417.5M
Solo: TBD loss
Dr. Teeth
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AliasMan02 said:

What a stretch. How was diversity at play in the "assassination" of Luke?


It wasn't. That's why I also said it was completely unnecessary.
Zombie Jon Snow
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just had my second viewing.

we'll see but word of mouth might be helping.

This mid afternoon showing (on a holiday) had 2x the people in it as my Saturday night primetime 7pm showing. same exact theater.

And the reaction was noticeably positive including cheering at the end.

Bruce Almighty
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RebAg13 said:

Force awakens was 2b, Rogue one and Last Jedi were both about a billion. That's 4 plus whatever they make off solo. And they own the rights to future Star Wars movies.


Movie theaters get a large chunk of that
Zombie Jon Snow
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Toys and other promotional sales dwarf anything the movies do.

And the parks cannot be forgotten - they are gonna make a killing with the SW experience with lifelong fans dumping huge tons of money on that.

They'll make the $4B back in those two areas alone. The films just need to do well enough to make more and keep the franchise vibrant and current. With 7-9 more movies on tap they've got that going for them.
SeattleAgJr
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Zombie Jon Snow said:

Toys and other promotional sales dwarf anything the movies do.

And the parks cannot be forgotten - they are gonna make a killing with the SW experience with lifelong fans dumping huge tons of money on that.

They'll make the $4B back in those two areas alone. The films just need to do well enough to make more and keep the franchise vibrant and current. With 7-9 more movies on tap they've got that going for them.

We are talking just movies, since that is what he started with. he added the merchandising as a second completely separate category.

We all acknowledge other merchandising and affiliations blow that away.
SeattleAgJr
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Some of the weekend wrap-ups are starting to float the idea this may not break $400MM worldwide.

They are pointing to domestic at best getting to $250MM, and WW getting to $150MM since it cratered in China and is extremely soft in Europe.

That would be a $150MM+ loss.
Ulrich
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I think it'll have a decent run on word of mouth because Solo really is the best Star Wars movie since ROTJ. It'll be a shame if it doesn't.
SeattleAgJr
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Ulrich said:

I think it'll have a decent run on word of mouth because Solo really is the best Star Wars movie since ROTJ. It'll be a shame if it doesn't.
it could happen but:
1. It has only two weeks to improve
2. Even then it would struggle to make $200MM more at this point even under the best of circumstances.
TCTTS
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Congrats. This is one of the dumbest things posted in a thread full of ill informed people speaking with clueless authority.
Brian Earl Spilner
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Man, these threads are a beating after each new movie.
SeattleAgJr
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Belton Ag
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We've reached a point where the The Last Jedi haters are posting DOOM on every Star Wars thread now. I especially love the guys who say they won't go see Solo because of Johnson's treatment of Luke, yet this Solo movie is about as true to the source material as you can get, right down to the score.
Dr. Teeth
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TCTTS said:

Congrats. This is one of the dumbest things posted in a thread full of ill informed people speaking with clueless authority.


Which part do you dispute?

The remarks from Kennedy, Johnson, and Abrams disparaging the fans critical of TLJ are public.

Brian Earl Spilner
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I'm assuming the part about calling fans sexists or bigots. Any examples?
TCTTS
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I'm not disputing anything you said in terms of facts and figures (though I'd like to see quotes/examples as well). I was referring to other posts/posters in that regard. What comes across as laughable, ridiculous, and "dumb" is your vitriol. Using the term "character assassination" and speaking about TLJ with such absurd disdain is so incredibly cliched at this point (they lit $4B on fire?... come on). I didn't particularly like TLJ either, but surely you have to be aware of how laughably lame you sound at this point, yes?
fig96
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Didn't get to see Solo till this morning and had a blast. Well paced, great action sequences, some interesting new characters, and really funny in spots. And the twists at the end were pitch perfect.

Need to see it again, but it's way up there for me on first viewing.
fig96
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One minor complaint, felt like Han was a bit smarmy (for lack of a better word) in places, but the chemistry between he and Chewie as well as Glover absolutely crushing the part of Lando more than made up for it.
lunchbox
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fig96 said:

One minor complaint, felt like Han was a bit smarmy (for lack of a better word) in places, but the chemistry between he and Chewie as well as Glover absolutely crushing the part of Lando more than made up for it.
I swear...if you closed your eyes during Glover's first lines as Lando, you would swear it was Billy Dee Williams. Perfect tone, cadence, everything. After that, it didn't matter if he sounded perfect, he had sold me as Lando.

Also, I think the Solo name backstory would have been less cringe-worthy if Han came up with it rather than the Imperial recruiter. Han could have said the same exact line and ended with..."call me Solo". Not perfect but acceptable.
TCTTS
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Malachi Constant
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From reddit:

| Rank | Title | Domestic Gross (Weekend) | Worldwide Gross (Cume) | Week # | Percentage Change | Budget
| 1 | Solo: A Star Wars Story | $83,325,000 | $148,325,000 | 1 | N/A | $250M - $300M
| 2 | Deadpool 2 | $42,700,000 | $487,145,548 | 2 | -66.0% | $110M
| 3 | Avengers: Infinity War | $16,494,000 | $1,904,688,638 | 5 | -44.0% | $315M $400M
| 4 | Book Club | $9,450,000 | $31,834,516 | 2 | -30.4% | $10M
| 5 | Life of the Party | $5,115,000 | $45,002,348 | 3 | -32.7% | $30M

Notable Box Office Stories:
Solo: A Star Wars Story - Normally on a holiday weekend I wait until Tuesday so I can discuss the full scope of how the extra day off affected the major releases. But the results for Solo were so shocking I frankly couldn't wait and wanted to get at that juicy analysis asap. tracking to open at the worst over $100M for the three-day weekend may now not even crack $100M after a four day holiday as Solo: A Star Wars Story opened to #1 with $83.3M. It's been strange because I've seen a lot of couching for this number, that it's soft or underwhelming. Let me be more blunt then, this number right here is bad. Really, really, really bad. How bad? Well first off remember Justice League, the megaflop from last year? That film carried a similar budget of around $300M (Solo's estimates are all over the map with Disney reporting $250M while Deadline reports $300M+) and was also a film that was basically shot twice under two different sets of directors. Well that film, for all its woes, opened at $93.8M, a full $10M higher than Solo. Then there's the comparisons to other Disney era Star Wars films. No one expected the spin-offs to do as well as the episodic ones but compared with Rogue One, Solo is just pitiful. Rogue One opened 46% higher than Solo with $155M and that was in December when films are supposed to be flipped from the usual summer release strategy of opening really big to cushion big drops in the coming weekends. Not to mention that Star Wars has always been much more of a domestic pull then other more lucrative international properties like the MCU and the Fast & Furious films, which brings us to the even worse news.
Solo: A Star Wars Story (cont.) - International was probably never going to save this film but the results are far far worse than everyone predicted as the film opened to a miserable $65M overseas, making the worldwide opening a miserable $148.8M. The film couldn't even crack the best international numbers of the weekend, as Deadpool 2 out grossed it by earning $67M on its second weekend. To put that in context Rogue One opened to $134.9M overseas and Justice League opened to $185M. In fact you can just look at the list of overseas openings (thanks u/Greede for showing me that list) and see the many box office disappointments that opened better, including: The Mummy ($140.7M), Pacific Rim Uprising ($122.4M), Thor: The Dark World ($109.4M), 300: Rise of An Empire ($88.8M), Wrath of the Titans ($76.1M), and fellow Disney megabomb alum John Carter ($70.6M). Every Star Wars film seems to set a new low in China and this one took the cake opening there to just $10.1M (Rogue One opened to $30M). Guess disguising the film under the title "Ranger Solo" in China didn't really help with the country's continued disinterest in the franchise. As it stands not only will Solo be the only Disney era Star Wars film to not crack $1B, it could very well earn less worldwide than Rogue One made domestically (and note it has already opened lower worldwide than Rogue One opened domestically). That is terrible no matter what way you slice it.
Solo: A Star Wars Story (cont.) - So what the hell happened here? While the film got worse reviews then Last Jedi the fan vibe seems to be more generally positive including a solid A- score on Cinemascore. Of course there was the very public firings of original directors, Chris Miller and Phil Lord, and the complete reshooting of the film which ballooned the budget to such catastrophic proportions. That change also meant marketing took a while to finally roll out, all while trying to compete against bigger and splashier ad campaigns like Avengers and Deadpool. Star Wars fatigue could certainly be a thing with less than six months in between the last two films and following up a very divisive film at that. The main takeaway for me though is there is no damn reason that a spin-off movie should cost more than a main movie. Solo potentially being one of the most expensive films of all time is insane because by its very nature the work is disposable, an ad on, DLC. It should be a fun addendum, not must see material that demands the kind of massive crowd size reserved for the splashiest of releases.
Solo: A Star Wars Story (cont.) - Where Lucasfilm goes from here is going to be very interesting. There's blessedly more space between Solo and Episode IX with a full year and change. The episodes also don't feel as directly threatened. The more curious ones will be the Obi Wan movie by Stephen Daldry and the recently announced Boba Fett movie by James Mangold. The latter director in particular is well known for delivering good earning and audience beloved hit films like Logan on time and under budget which is exactly what Star Wars needs right now. Solo is arguably the biggest single character draw of the franchise and the fact the general public reacted so incredibly ambiguously to Solo should be extremely worrisome for Disney. It shows name alone will not drive sales and it already feels like the other spin-off movies that are coming are horribly out of date before they even begin principal photography. Disney/Lucasfilm needs to take a real hard look at the future of this Star Wars cinematic universe because I don't think they ever expected to have potentially one of the biggest box office bombs of all time by just their fourth release.

oragator
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Just saw it and liked it.
I thought the first half had some overly fast pacing (Han and chewy were buddies in about 10 seconds for example), but many great nuggets for the cannon, excellent cast, good story,

Not sure why it's taking a flogging, other than Star Wars fatigue, 7 and 8 alienating different groups of people, and comparisons to completely different movies.
Brian Earl Spilner
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Ron is all class.
SeattleAgJr
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I would say well done with the troll attempt, but it really wasn't really well done.
lunchbox
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oragator said:

Just saw it and liked it.
I thought the first half had some overly fast pacing (Han and chewy were buddies in about 10 seconds for example), but many great nuggets for the cannon, excellent cast, good story,

Not sure why it's taking a flogging, other than Star Wars fatigue, 7 and 8 alienating different groups of people, and comparisons to completely different movies.
Is it still canon that Chewie owes Han a life debt? If so, was it from the rescue from the pit? The rescue on the train? When???
Brian Earl Spilner
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