Did The Superhero Movie Bubble Finally Pop In 2022?
Plus, The Worrying Future of the Marvel Cinematic Universe
This past week, James Gunn and the new administration of Warner Brothers Discovery finally revealed the beginning of their plans to craft a new DC Cinematic Universe. This plan comprises releasing all the old vestiges like “The Flash” and “Aquaman 2” this year to see if anybody cares, and then finally starting on a new cinematic saga starting with a new, more traditional take on Superman in 2025. Along with this will be several interconnected shows on HBO, HBO Max, possible animated films, as well as video-game tie-ins, all played by the same actors that are in the movies.
No matter how you feel about the quality of their slate, from a Batman film that finally has a Robin again, to a Swamp Thing horror movie directed by James Mangold, aka the guy who did “Logan,” it seems unwise to bet on a long-term plan right now for any superhero universe, much less one as unproven as DC. It feels like making a long-term investment in China right now, or betting on economic prosperity in the United States for the next couple years. These are all things that could in theory pan out, but there’s no possible way to feel safe or secure in your prospects at the moment, for any of them.
Why is that? Well, because like any economic system, Hollywood is subject to bubbles. What is a bubble? A bubble is over-optimism due to continued success, leading to a flooding of the market, beyond what is sustainable for growth in the long-term. They are often “popped” when the market makes an unforeseen change, or when psychology around the product changes
For years, people have been wondering when the superhero bubble was going to burst ever since it started when “The Avengers” had the highest grossing opening weekend of all time, and subsequently became one of the highest grossing movies of all time. There were superhero movies before that, but after Avengers came DC wanting to make their own universe to eventually make a Justice League. Sony wanted their “Amazing Spider-Man” sequel to set-up an eventual Sinister Six film. Every studio and their mother also wanted an interconnected universe to compete, even if they didn’t have superheroes, which led to disasters like “The Dark Universe.”
But apart from the occasional disaster, the bubble continued to grow until it kind of enveloped all Hollywood blockbusters. Marvel kept sustaining itself beyond what was thought possible for some-23 films, DC and Sony Spider-Man movies still made lots of money, even if the product was often mediocre, or even outright bad. This all culminated in the “Infinity Saga” for Marvel, where “Avengers: Endgame” had by far the biggest box office weekend ever, and became the 3rd highest grossing film ever.
But then unthinkable happened as the pandemic shut down movie theaters, leading to no superhero movies being able to release for a while. But in the meantime, superheroes helped fuel another bubble, the streaming bubble, which thrived when people were at home, back when they cared about Coronavirus, but is itself now bursting because oops, people aren’t watching and paying for streaming services as much anymore.
In 2021 alone, Marvel saw the release of 4 streaming in-universe shows on Disney+, and 4 films, including the Spider-Man film they co-produced with Sony, which was by far the successful release of the pandemic era due to the fact it brought together characters from the 20 years previous in the film history of the character.
Now granted, there was a lot of build-up in product that was delayed due to the pandemic, but this is after the MCU had been releasing at least 3 films a year since 2017. With the Disney+ shows on top of all of that, of which 3 were released in 2022, not including 2 Holiday specials, and the 5 shows we know about that are scheduled in 2023. It’s impossible for fatigue not to set in at that point, and I believe that’s exactly what we saw in 2022.
For one, while there was no chance the MCU was ever going to end after “Avengers: Endgame,” because it was too successful, it was almost too perfect of a season finale to the entire universe. Now all the Captain America fans have to accept Falcon as the new Captain America. Black Widow fans have to accept Florence Pugh as Yelena. Robert Downey Jr. is no longer leader of the team, and Chadwick Boseman unfortunately passed so he can’t lead The Avengers, so now we have… Doctor Strange? Captain Marvel? Bueller?
It hasn’t helped any that since “Avengers: Endgame,” the MCU as a product just hasn’t been as good, or at least is more consistently disappointing. If they were the McDonald’s of the industry before, but like 90s McDonald’s, then now they’re the 2020s McDonald’s, which is just a much sadder institution that can occasionally still offer a satisfying enough Big Mac, but mostly just gives you diarrhea.
The MCU is just too diluted now in making several movies a year, but also several epic shows for Disney+ a year. Now the movies feel like they should be Disney+ shows, and Disney+ shows feel like they should be movies, or not really exist. Was anybody satisfied by She-Hulk? What about The Eternals? Did “Thor: Love and Thunder” feel like a shocking drop-off in quality from “Thor: Ragnarok” to anybody else? Was “Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness” actually good, or were a few of us nerds just happy to have Sam Raimi directing a movie again?
And sure, the MCU absolutely had weak films before, but never on this consistent a basis. The best MCU film since Endgame is probably “Shang-Chi,” but that film also has its fair share of problems, especially a third-act that is bad, even by MCU standards. With all the MCU product to consume on a yearly basis, as well as a noticeable dip in quality the past few years, it all might have finally made the MCU, and superhero films as a whole, vulnerable. I think you can already see it in their box office results the past couple of years.
In 2021, all three Disney-produced MCU films were all the lowest grossing of the films Disney has made. “Incredible Hulk” and “Captain America: The First Avenger” made less money, but those were produced and distributed by Universal and Paramount, respectively. Otherwise, “Black Widow,” “Eternals,” and “Shang-Chi,” are the three lowest grossing films of the Disney-made MCU films.
Now you could argue, as most have, that it’s because all of those films were released in the “Pandemic Era,” and people simply didn’t feel safe returning to theaters yet. But to that I counter with “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” which was co-produced by Disney & Sony, and made almost $2 billion worldwide. So clearly people were always willing to go back to theaters, but it had to be for a movie they cared about, which was definitely not “The Eternals,” a film released a month Spider-Man.
This is proven again the next year in 2022, when the Disney MCU movies performed better, but none of whom made over a $1 billion, which MCU films used to do regularly. ‘Doctor Strange 2’ did better than the first film, but only by heavily advertising, somewhat deceptively, that this was going to be a game-changer for the universe. ‘Thor 4’ made less than ‘Thor 3’ both internationally and worldwide. And as I stated in my ‘Black Panther 2’ review, that film made around $500 million less than the first film, which can not be understated as a massive disappointment.
Audiences can simply wait until these films come to Disney+ to watch them, if they ever watch them at all. After all, the MCU was so successful as theatrical releases before, because the tended to be events that make you watch as soon as possible. Now? They’re getting lost in the constant media shuffle, becoming just another item on your watchlist.
Once more, in 2022 the cultural conversation never centered around a superhero film for very long. There was the requisite week or two the fandom-industrial-complex is required to talk about the latest hype moments and failings of each film, but otherwise it always moved on. And what did it move onto?
Well, depending what time of the year you’re talking about, “Top Gun: Maverick” was by far the film of the summer, having an unprecedentedly long box office run, several horror movies were surprise box office successes, and at the end of the year there was ‘Avatar 2,’ which was Disney’s first solely-produced film to make more than a billion dollars since “Rise of Skywalker” in December of 2019.
What did all these more successful blockbusters all have in-common? They’re all old-fashioned blockbusters from a time before superhero films. ‘Top Gun’ was a legacy sequel whose sincerity, practical effects and stunts appealed to audiences of all ages and demographics. ‘Avatar 2’ was an effects-driven spectacle that currently isn’t an interconnected universe with ancillary material, which means anybody could go see it and have a fun time.
Audiences were willing to engage with everything the MCU had up until a point, but now when their quality has dropped, old beloved characters are being replaced with new characters, and there’s simply too much to keep up with across multiple platforms, audiences seem to be moving towards spectacles with broader-appeal and less homework.
By the way, all the other studios making superhero films in this pandemic era have faced similar, if not entirely worse issues. James Gunn’s “Suicide Squad” reboot was completely ignored by audiences, as was “Black Adam,” which put a nail in the coffin of the old DC Cinematic Universe.
“The Batman” did well enough for Warner Brothers Discovery to invest in it in addition to their new interconnected DC Cinematic Universe, but even that was divisive, being yet another dark and brooding Batman movie, as well as being 3 hours long.
As for Sony, well they were such fucking morons they released “Morbius,” not once, but twice in theaters, because trolls on the internet kept meming the film for how bad the film was. It was a Morbin’ failure, making $74 million with both releases, which is shy of the film’s $83 million budget.
Now, you could certainly argue against me in all the points I’ve presented, saying they were special situations in each case, the MCU will get better, DC is getting its act together, and 2023 seems to be a back to normal time at the box office.
Well, all I can say is keep an eye on “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania,” which Disney feels positively desperate in selling as a last grasp, pushing the 3D that helped make Avatar a success, as well as a universe-changing villain that would usually entice fans to watch the film in theaters. But my prediction is the film won’t make a billion dollars, and probably won’t even come close, coming in with $750 million best-case scenario, or $600 million in a truly eyebrow-raising, worst-case scenario.
It’s tracking to a $120 million opening, which would be an increase over Ant-Man 2’s $76 million dollar opening, but I don’t think this film will even have the legs that film had to make it to $216 million domestic, because all MCU films are extremely front-loaded now. The hardcore fans and anybody wanting to be a part of the discussion watches them in the first weekend, and there’s usually little to no rewatchable value in theaters.
Now I could be wrong, and maybe Disney pulling out all the stops will help this film. But then they have two more films to release this year, “Guardians 3,” which should do the best considering it’s Marvel’s first trilogy ending with finality, and then “The Marvels,” which will heavily rely on characters and plot-points from the Disney+ shows, providing a whole new set of challenges to sell audiences on.
As for ‘Shazam 2,’ ‘The Flash,’ with an extremely problematic piece of shit star in Ezra Miller, ‘Blue Beetle,’ ‘Kraven the Hunter,’ and ‘Aquaman 2?’ Good luck…
So, now that I’ve laid out my case for why the superhero movie bubble has either popped, or is popping, do you still feel safe about the future of the genre?
Put it this way, I was 17 years old when the MCU first launched in 2008, and “The Dark Knight” was released in theaters. When the proposed “Batman: The Brave and The Bold” and the Kang/Multiverse saga culminates for Marvel with “Secret Wars” in 2026, I will be 35 years old.
Coming Tomorrow:
A ranking of every superhero film and every major superhero show that came out in 2022.