Furiosa and Garfield have combined to produce one of the worst Memorial Day weekends at the movies in ages, at least in terms of ticket sales.
Those who have seen Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga may be wringing their hands that a movie that good is doing so poorly,Furiosa, meanwhile, had an even higher budget at $168 million, but it’s a big ask for not a sequel, but a prequel follow-up to out-earn its predecessor, particularly for one main reason: It’s hard to pitch a Mad Max movie without Mad Max actually in it. Absolutely Chris Hemsworth and Anya Taylor-Joy do a phenomenal job, but this is a prequel spin-off of a side character in Fury Road who is not even being played by the same actress this time . That’s a bit confusing for the public, or at the very least, not super appealing.
Finally, as much as I would like to say otherwise, critic reviews simply don’t matter that much in terms of overall box office. Or at least they can only move the needle so far. Furiosa has an exceptional 90% score from critics but in a lot of ways that’s only preaching to the already-converted. It did not seem likely George Miller was going to mess this up, and clearly he did not, but the movie needs more than just Miller die-hards.
Miller has said he’d like to keep making Mad Max movies forever, and I hope he’s able to. But Hollywood and general audiences are not really in a place to reward this kind of commitment at this point, and I’d fear that this kind of performance will hurt his chances of being able to do more. At least with the same studio. At least with the same budget.There’s really nothing else to be done except tell your friends to see the film if they haven’t.