Solo: A Star Wars Story is shaping up to be one of the biggest box office flops of all time

The budget is estimated to be around 250-300 million (the movie was essentially shot twice), so it would require around 600-650 million to break even, but it's underperforming in the US and is an absolute disaster overseas.

Most people are expecting it to gross 400-500 million, which would make it one of the biggest box-office flops of all time, even bigger than JL.

Box Office: 'Solo: A Star Wars Story' Struggling to Hit $110M in U.S., Crashes Overseas

‘Solo’ Currently Flying Low For Disney ‘Star Wars’ Opening With $105M-$115M 4-Day

As expected, SOLO: A STAR WARS STORY was dead on arrival in China, debuting on Friday with est. ¥20.8M ($3.3M).

Even JL made a good amount of money in China, but Solo seems to be flopping almost everywhere. I was rooting for this movie since day one, but at the same time, there's always a lesson to be learned with a flop: Kathleen Kennedy has handled this franchise terribly so far, cashing in solely on brand recognition and nostalgia as opposed to quality. I wouldn't at all mind if Kathleen Kennedy gets fired. They should've stuck to Lord and Miller's original version instead of reshooting the movie all over again and almost doubling the budget.

All that money that isn't mine !!!

I feel so....apathetic

The Last Jedi killed Star Wars for me, sooooo....

https://forums.boxofficetheory.com/topic/26140-solo-weekend-thread-no-spoilers-memorial-day-weekend-sale-all-accounts-25-50-off-previews-141m-asgard-says-37-40/?do=findComment&comment=3522509

37-40m Friday now , recently been updated by a good source.

I saw this meme earlier lol

As someone who has been enjoying the new Stars Wars film, this movie did deserve to flop. Not only is it a movie nobody ask for, but is a movie that just felt very safe. Similar to JL it is entertaining enough, but forgettable and by the book.

So basically like DC another franchise(SW) is being ruined by studios trying to duplicate the Marvel formula/success without planning and putting in the proper work.

When will they learn.

@Asgaard what's your take on this?

Good. Maybe Disney will step in and make Lucasfilm shape up, get Kennedy out and put people like Favreau and Filoni (basically Lucas' Christopher Tolkien from what I can tell) in charge of everything creative. If she wants to stay as a penny-pincher fine but she doesn't know squat about story-telling and should kindly piss off.

They shot a film named Solo twice?

TLJ killed the excitement this movie and likely Star Wars movies after it for me and I'm sure this is the case across the board. Star Wars has been handled in the poorest fashion I've seen it handled in its history. I'm not surprised with the movie doing poorly, but this is just sad.

Ya know, this just proves what we've been saying all along. Marvel is so successful because they formed their own studio BEFORE a big company(Disney) got involved. SW is spiraling just like DC after WB got involved. That's the difference between the MCU and all these other failed franchises.

Once Feige and the OG Marvel fanboy crew leaves the MCU will go corporate. Ran by the suits, destined for mediocrity.

I didn't even realise it was out, that's how none existent its promotion was.

This seems to be the case.

Well, that's disappointing, but look on the bright side; maybe this will cause Disney to reevaluate the direction of their Star Wars movies, same way Justice League made Warner Bros. reevaluate the DCEU.

Star Wars is the new Halo.

They honestly should have never brought star wars back. These sequels all suck.

Nobody asked for a Han Solo movie.

People would sooner watch Ewan McGregor play Obi-Wan again, I'm sure of it.

If he's willing to come back for the Obi-Wan movie, we might be able to test your theory.

The theater I was in was filled with like 10 people, which is low for a big budget movie like this one on opening day. Well people did predicted that it will bomb, and it is looking like that is indeed what will happen.

I watched the movie. I actually thought it was surprisingly good.

I wasn't going to watch it anyway. The Last Jedi killed my interest in these new Star Wars movies, and that doesn't seem to be a sentiment unique to me. This movie might not even make the projected numbers due to all the die hard fans who got burned by the franchise's last installment.

That’s too bad, I know a lot of people probably wanted it to be good. I wasn’t interested but that’s me.

I forgot it was coming out this weekend, and I'm a starwars/movie fan

Man,this makes me sad.

This is true. Disney needs to do whatever it has to to keep these guys. If the suits take over the quality will plummet badly.

As a huge Star Wars fan I have absolutely no desire to see it at all and really hope it does flop so Disney can finally get their act together. I get the feeling this whole nostalgia and sjw mindset isn't working for the big Star Wars fans and most others.

I understand how complex it must be to make a Star Wars movie, but I feel like it’s almost a certainly that I could personally do better! I know that’s saying a lot, but after seeing how big of a flop The Last Jedi was I really truly believe I could! I would’ve at least made Mark Hamill look good!

I really think Disney should hire more true Star Wars fans to write new material.

Yeah its just shaping up to have the biggest Memorial Day opening weekend box office ever, but I guess that's bad lmao

@tonymartial said:

@theamazingspidey said:

This puts a smile on my face.

I wanted it to be good so bad. But it's just not very enjoyable. Please Disney let someone with some original ideas write these movies and not rely on the nostalgia and name.

Disney is hiring standard writers, casting agents and film makers that are competent at their jobs but are people that should be working on middle tier motion pictures, not major block busters or sequels to major classics like Star Wars. The God awful casting of Han Solo's son is a really blatant case of how bad things can go wrong when the film makers really are not that great at making motion pictures. The executives are of a mind set that the brand will sell the product to the same level that the best the brand ever had to offer did. It will work that way for a little while but then people wake up and then the brand fails. It will be interesting to see how poorly Star Wars IX does next year.

Wait, wait, wait... Is everyone in this thread operating under the assumption that this film actually cost 600 mil+++ to make???? Those numbers are beyond troll-level. That would mean Solo cost multitudes more than the most expensive films ever produced. I wont watch Solo until it's on HBO, but it'll still make hundreds of millions in profits before leaving the theatres. This thread is a joke.

Looks like Solo cost way more than the original estimates... all the way up to 250mil total. The reshoots cost a fortune, and blew the budget up, but at a third of what this thread presumes. Solo will make a lot of money for Disney, just not as much as the other Star Wars films.

It's a shame. I enjoyed the film on opening night. And when you know who showed up, everyone in the theater went crazy. All 15 of us...

I haven't even seen The Last Jedi yet and have no intention to unless it comes on Netflix

They should have turned it into one of those Disney Musicals.

The budget for the movie is estimated to be around $250 million. That does not mean if the movie makes $251 million worldwide that it makes $1 million in profit. Studios do not keep all of the worldwide gross, as more than half of it goes stays for theater profit. It is very confusing, so let me give you an example:

Ant-Man had a production budget of $130 million. Double that for the marketing (domestic and foreign included). That brings it to $260 million. Ant-Man made $519 million worldwide. Now, you subtract the total worldwide for the doubled production budget, which gives the movie $259 million earned. Not done yet. The studio does not keep all of this money. Studios keep around 50% in domestic gross, and 33% in foriegn gross, which can be simplified to a simple 40% for both included. Now, you take the $259 million, and multiply it by 0.40 which gives Ant-Man a profit of $103 million, which Deadline backs up: Source

It is never perfect though. There are other factors such as DVD, blu ray and digital sales taken into account which make the range go from 30%-50% that the studios end up with, instead of the average of 40%.

So because Solo had a $250 million budget, double that to include marketing to get $500 million to break even. But with a major blockbuster like Solo, breaking even is not good enough. It needs about $600 million at the box office to earn any profit at all. For major blockbusters, anything above $100 million in profit is healthy enough. For the film to reach that, it would need $750-$800 million worldwide.

When a movie like Justice League brings in $658 million globally, that is not the amount the studio pockets. The studio probably pockets a half of that domestically and less than 40% internationally, I do not know what the exact figure is). This web site does a great job breaking down the entire movie and showing that Justice League probably lost them around $28 million (actually they said $50 million but they were $22 million off on their projection of the world wide gross) after all profits and costs are factored in.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/robcain/2017/11/20/warner-bros-faces-a-possible-50m-to-100m-loss-on-justice-league/#39c403c55d8b

If Solo makes less than $686 million globally, it probably loses money if its costs were $300M. If its costs were $250M then it needs to only make $636M globally to break even (not a given). If Solo opens with below $90 million for the 3 day weekend it is probably looking at less than Justice League globally. This thread is a bit premature but it is not a joke by any means.

And then they go and announce a Boba Fett movie? Outside of og trilogy Star wars geeks, nobody's gonna care bout this. Universe building just ain't gonna work with this franchise I don't think. Stick to just the saga story and with a film every 3 years or so with directors who understand the lore. Too much of it isn't good for this franchise. Not all franchises have the depth and variety to be turned into the Mcu imo.

@theamazingspidey: Did you enjoyed more DP2 or Solo?

I loved Solo.

The two spin-off movies, Solo and Rogue One, have been my favorites. I do have love for Force Awakens, despite it being too much of a rip-off of A New Hope, because it did bring that Star Wars nostalgia back.

Solo just didn't get all the hype that other Star Wars movies get.

If anything I blame this all on The Last Jedi. Killed the Star Wars excitement and hype. There is a reason fans had a backlash against it. Then there was all the backlash against that from TLJ apologists and the internet got into the usual shouting matches.

The sad thing is that the critics and 'experts' will blame this all on Solo, saying it's not a good movie. Really, TLJ just made a lot of fans not excited for it.

If you still have love for Star Wars, forget about the disaster that was The Last Jedi and go watch Solo. It's much better than you would think.

This franchise is over. Just stop making movies.

@byrd42: I have no desire at all to see Star Wars Episode IX, which is pretty sad. I absolutely did at first but then I saw The Last Jedi and that completely took me out of the mood for seeing any more of the Disney Star Wars movies

This was an unnecessary movie. Hell I rather see a live action Ahsoka movie

@jujucrunk: Sad but true. WB has no idea what to do with DC better yet how to even use the characters and Disney is too focused on playing safe and boring. Poor DC and SW, I mean the SW franchise is doing way better than DCEU but expectations and not meeting them will uterly gut them. More so DC.

Pity, Solo was awesome.

Hope this doesn't happen with the obi wan and boba fett movie.

why would anyone think releasing solo just after infinity war and deadpool 2 was a good idea.

What is mind-boggling regarding Star Wars, is how Disney let LuscasFilm construct (or deconstruct) a franchise where the appeal is almost only based on the domestic market, and even regarding this market how come they didn't get that Wonder Woman and Black Panther worked because they didn't feel anything forced like the Ghostbusters reboot?

Sure that Disney Star Wars movies are nothing special and are more just like the typical blockbuster norm than above, and sometimes its hard to understand what audiences want (specially with political stuff) but its DISNEY, don't they know every single market and how to make money?

Its funny that new Star Wars movies have so much in common with the The New All Different Marvel, first they were awesome and successful but then they both sucked, they were basically the same thing all along, convince movie audiences and comic book fans that they were/are awesome was/is the difficulty.

Today you just can't say audiences what to like, at least for a long period of time... (lol)

Regarding the cinematic shared universes, the Dceu failed because WB wanted money from the superhero genre, and thought they just needed to make connected superhero movies period, they always saw this has a trend and never put too much effort and support and the mentioned project (not even their own movie studio), but Kathleen Kennedy has a subsidiary (LucasFilm) and her own movie studio for the Star Wars movies, plus the Disney machine for the release and its still failing?

In my view Feige also fails, even after only reporting to Alan F. Horn, (Captain Marvel will be the MCU strongest character because... she is a female) but i believe he (and team obviously) can learn with what did not work, Thor Ragnarok production was almost the contrary from its prequel Dark World and the results were very different.

But there is so much people in Hollywood that just don't learn with their mistakes (NOT Ryan Reynolds), maybe that is part of the Hollywood mythology, but for how much time will Hollywood movie studios and executives be able to keep their "arrogance" (or just incapacity to learn) with services like Netflix?

That’s pretty shit tbh. I loved TLJ and getting a SW movie every year was great.

I'll still go see it.