During Christmas week, a prequel to the popular Kingsman series, The King’s Man, starring Ralph Fiennes, Djimon Hounsou, and Gemma Arterton, was released in the midst of a busy holiday week. Unfortunately, The King’s Man scored the worst rotten tomatoes score of the series thus far, a middle-of-the-road 43%. Of course, executives mostly care about box office numbers and with a production price tag of $100 million, The King’s Man needed to deliver big on its opening week, but sadly, it only saw a box office return of $16.80 million worldwide. It’s not the end of the road just yet as The King’s Man may have incredible legs, especially since nothing notable is set for theaters in the coming weeks; however, the prequel needs to make over $200 million to break even. So, what happened? The King’s Man is from a franchise that’s generally liked. The first two entries made over $400 million worldwide, so there isn’t much sign of fatigue just yet. Obviously, the coronavirus is still a strong factor when it comes to the box office, so it wasn’t expected to do huge global numbers, but this is a very disappointing opening. Let’s examine further why The King’s Man failed to generate much heat at the box office.
Spider-Man: No Way Home Killed Any Buzz That The King’s Man Had
Spider-Man: No Way Home made $1 billion worldwide in 11 days. This is an impressive feat especially since Omicron has hit hard in the last couple of weeks. The marketing behind Spider-Man: No Way Home was genius. The rumors surrounding the return of past names within the Spider-Man universe generated huge excitement; The trailers and excellent reviews only fueled that fire. Spider-Man: No Way Home felt big and must-see like Avengers Endgame. Unfortunately, the other movies of that week didn’t even come close to matching the hype of the Tom Holland flick. Sing 2 did the second-best numbers by making $41 million; however, The Matrix Resurrections and The King’s Man just couldn’t pull audiences in. Spider-Man: No Way Home stole the thunder from nearly every demographic. The King’s Man is a Rated-R action feature, but the marketing behind the prequel never garnered much interest from the beginning. It didn’t feel that the studios were all too confident in The King’s Man despite shelling out $100 million to make the feature. The lackluster reviews didn’t help. Even if The King’s Man had spectacular reviews, the buzz surrounding Spider-Man: No Way Home was too big to be taken down. Each of the Tom Holland Spider-Man films have made $1 billion worldwide. All three Kingsman movies equal close to $900 million worldwide. Not only was the fanbase stronger for the Marvel/Sony feature, but Kevin Feige and crew were wise to attract interest from fans of the Sam Raimi and Marc Webb films. The King’s Man simply had no chance, and it would’ve been wise of the studio to move the release date to sometime in 2022.
The Kingsman: The Golden Circle May Have Dismayed Some Fans
The Kingsman came around in 2014, it was a fresh and cool approach to the spy genre. The action was incredible and stylish, the characters were fun and compelling, and the jabs at various tropes made the experience engaging. The Golden Circle didn’t have that same impact. By no means is The Golden Circle a bad film, but it just didn’t have the spark that the original Kingsman had. One of the key issues is that The Golden Circle went with the “bigger equals better” notion by trying to overload the film with every thing that worked in the first movie. Usually, that would result in a great film but the movie goes so over-the-top and crazy that it actually suffers in the shadow of its predecessor. Another head scratching move is the return of Colin Firth. The actor was fantastic in the first film, but he was clearly shot in the head. Not only does the trailer give away what should’ve been a surprise in the sequel, but he ultimately feels pointless for a good majority of the film. That’s not knocking Firth himself as the actor is still pretty good. In fact, the acting is good across the board, but the overstuffed plot is what holds The Golden Circle back. Many fans weren’t pleased with the sequel. While The Golden Circle came close to the box office total of the original, it notably left a bad taste in the mouths of audience’s members. Granted, it wasn’t on the levels of Kick-Ass 2 reception, but most audiences had no issues choosing Spider-Man: No Way Home because the franchise itself is generally beloved. The King’s Man will likely do great on POV, but the disappointing box office numbers thus far doesn’t bold too well for its future.Avengers EndgameKevin Feige
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