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Everyone wanted Sin City 2, but nobody turned up for it.
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00:00If the history of Hollywood has proven anything, it's that audiences have shown themselves
00:04to be incredibly fickle. They beg and plead for a movie to get made, but then never even
00:09bother supporting it when it hits cinemas. Now, of course, the reality is a little more
00:14nuanced than that, but there are a number of long-requested films that a lot of people
00:19wanted to see, only for everyone to categorically turn their backs when they finally came out.
00:24The reasons for this are myriad. Perhaps the film was poorly marketed, or the reviews were
00:28terribly, or the studio simply waited too damn long to make it. But in each case, fans
00:34failed to turn up for a movie they insisted had to be made.
00:38To make it sting worse, most of the films on this list are also pretty good, such that they
00:42actually deserve to enjoy some well-earned box office success, rather than tanking catastrophically
00:48and having to settle for, at best, selling some DVDs or being rediscovered on streaming.
00:54Everyone was enthusiastic about these films out of the gate, but by the time they finally
00:58hit cinemas, that excitement had long since faded. For shame.
01:02So with that in mind, Ben, I'm Ellie with WhatCulture, here with 10 Movies Everybody Wanted
01:08But Nobody Watched.
01:0910. The Lego Movie 2 – The Second Part
01:14The Lego Movie was one of the biggest cinematic surprises of the last decade. A shockingly clever
01:19and creative tribute to those teeny plastic blocks we all love, rather than the crass, cynical,
01:24commercial exercise it could so easily have been. The film was, consequently, a stonking
01:29box office success, and a sequel was soon enough announced with The Lego Movie 2 – The Second
01:34Part, finally releasing five years later in February 2019.
01:39Though there was considerable initial excitement about the sequel announcement, The Lego Movie
01:442 crated at the box office despite solid reviews, grossing just $192.4 million worldwide, a mere
01:5341.1% of its predecessor's $468.1 million haul.
01:58The reason for its failure has been dissected by box office analysts ever since, some blaming
02:04samey marketing which failed to distinguish it from the first film, others citing the five-year
02:08gap between movies, and perhaps most persuasively, the ever-troubling notion of franchise fatigue.
02:14The Lego Movie 2 was actually the fourth entry into the Lego Movie franchise, with Lego Batman
02:20and Lego Ninjago films being released during the aforementioned five-year gap. Though Lego
02:25Batman was a solid success, Lego Ninjago bombed at the box office less than 18 months before
02:31The Lego Movie 2's release, seemingly ensuring that all the initial excitement around a second
02:36mainline Lego movie dried up, killing the franchise.
02:40It's a damn shame, really, as while failing to meet the highs of its predecessor, The Lego Movie
02:442 is a respectably enjoyable animated sequel.
02:479. Blade Runner 2049
02:51Though Ridley Scott's original Blade Runner was famously a box office bust upon its original 1982
02:57release, its esteem grew exponentially in the years and decades that followed, as large swarms
03:02of sci-fi fans discovered it on home video. Blade Runner is basically a mandatory inclusion
03:08on any list of all-timer sci-fi films, enough that Warner Bros. greenlit a sequel, Blade Runner
03:132049, which finally came to fruition under director Denis Villeneuve in 2017. With a first-rate director
03:21and Avengers-worthy $185 million budget, fan excitement was through the roof that they were
03:28getting another mega-budget glimpse into this world some 35 years after Scott's original.
03:35Despite the anticipation, though, Blade Runner 2049 was a box office failure, grossing just
03:40$259.3 million worldwide. A slow-paced 163-minute sequel to an artsy philosophical sci-fi film was
03:50never going to make a billion dollars, but Warner Bros. clearly hoped it would pull at least
03:55$500 million and prove a solid success. Despite all that passionate clamouring for a Blade
04:01Runner sequel, evidently a lot of people decided to stay home when it mattered most. Though
04:05it has since performed well on home video, that's not nearly enough to make Blade Runner 2049
04:11profitable when you factor in Warner Bros. massive marketing spend.
04:158. Dread
04:17It can't really be understated just how much people loathe 1995's Sylvester Stallone starring
04:24Judge Dread film, primarily due to Stallone's ego-driven decision to commit the cardinal sin
04:29of removing Dread's helmet, as was never done in the comics. But when a Dread reboot was announced,
04:35comic book fans were giddy that Hollywood had a golden opportunity to get it right this time and
04:39redeem the property. And yet, while 2012's Dread received warmly positive reviews from critics,
04:46it bombed horridly at the box office, grossing just $41.5 million against a $45 million budget.
04:54That's barely one-third of what the Stallone film made 17 years earlier.
04:58The blame was largely levelled at the movie's marketing, which placed a heavy emphasis on the
05:033D aspect, enough that it was actually titled Dread 3D. Though Dread has been a strong performer on home
05:09video and streaming, it's a damn shame that more comic book fans didn't support it theatrically,
05:14as would have actually made a sequel possible. Given that there was a considerable uptick in the
05:19popularity of R-rated superhero films in the years following Dread's release, things could have gone
05:24so differently with a few years' difference and a more confident, imaginative marketing campaign.
05:307. Serenity
05:32Joss Whedon's cult sci-fi TV series Firefly wasn't given much of a chance by Fox,
05:37who aired the original run of episodes out of order and then unceremoniously cancelled the series in
05:42December 2002, after just 11 of its 14 episodes had aired. Both fans and the show's cast, led by
05:49Nathan Fillion, were devastated, and despite a concerted effort to get the series picked up by
05:55another network, it went nowhere. Yet due to strong DVD sales, Whedon was able to get a follow-up film
06:01greenlit at Universal, with Serenity being released in 2005. Firefly fans, who typically refer to
06:08themselves as browncoats, helped spread word about the film online in an attempt to accentuate its
06:13modest marketing budget. But alas, when Firefly hit cinemas, it failed to break out into the wider
06:19mainstream, just barely recouping its $39 million budget. Given Firefly's mighty home video sales,
06:25it was no doubt a disappointing result for Universal, who quite understandably figured they'd at least
06:30turn a decent profit off the lower-budget sci-fi production. You can blame the lacklustre marketing,
06:36which fans, bless them, tried to bolster, or the fact that it was the glorified series finale to a
06:40cancelled TV show, but Serenity deserved to do so, so much better than this.
06:466. Watchmen
06:48An adaptation of Alan Moore's legendary comic book series Watchmen had been in the works for roughly
06:5320 years before the Zack Snyder version finally stuck and actually got made. One of the most iconic
06:59and acclaimed comics of all time, a Watchmen movie seemed like an absolute slam dunk on paper,
07:05yet the complexity and ambition of the material also made studio executives wary.
07:10But Warner Bros. nevertheless gave Snyder $138 million to make an R-rated, 163-minute adaptation of
07:19Moore's novel, and one which stirred up much excitement when its first trailer was put in
07:24front of The Dark Knight in the summer of 2008. Reviews ultimately skewed mixed positive, but in an
07:31era where R-rated superhero movies had yet to find their place with audiences, Watchmen's pre-release
07:36hype failed to translate into commercial success. Watchmen was an atrocious box office failure,
07:42grossing just $185.3 million worldwide, with analysts citing both its long runtime and grim
07:49tones as turning mainstream audiences off. It did, however, perform phenomenally well on home video,
07:56enough that it's estimated to have actually turned a modest profit. Even so, that a film whose original
08:01trailer stirred up so much buzz online tanked so hard when it mattered most was genuinely dispiriting.
08:08Watchmen is generally accepted to be one of Snyder's better films today, and it's easy to see how its
08:13more challenging content probably would have gone down better with today's more enlightened,
08:18comic-literate audiences. As such, it's little surprise that HBO's recent Watchmen series,
08:24a fair improvement over Snyder's film, admittedly, was both a massive critical and ratings hit.
08:305. Snakes on a Plane
08:33Remember Snakes on a Plane? A classic example of
08:36it does what it says on the tin marketing. All this B-movie homage needed to sell itself was
08:41that ridiculous title and a trailer clip of Samuel L. Jackson complaining about the
08:45mother-effing snakes on this mother-effing plane. Snakes on a Plane was one of the world's first
08:50movies to be virally marketed online through internet memes, before the world at large even used the word
08:56meme. The excitement was palpable enough that New Line Cinema even commissioned a small round of
09:02reshoots to change the movie's rating from PG-13 to R, including the addition of Jackson's
09:07aforementioned one-liner. To the layperson, it seemed like Snakes on a Plane couldn't fail. The
09:13internet couldn't get enough of how hilarious it all was, and with a $33 million budget, the path to
09:18profitability seemed fairly straightforward. Yet, while not a catastrophic dud, it ended up underwhelming,
09:25and grossing a mere $62 million, failing to even double its budget in the process.
09:30The consensus was that internet lols didn't translate one-to-one to box office success,
09:36with some suggesting that many online fans, especially those younger enthusiasts who couldn't
09:40see the R-rated movie in cinemas, simply pirated it instead.
09:444. Gremlins 2 The New Batch
09:481984's Gremlins was a massive box office hit, grossing an incredible $212.9 million
09:55against a mere $11 million budget, and clearly suggesting a new Hollywood franchise had been
10:01born. Yet, it was an entire six years before the sequel Gremlins 2 The New Batch arrived,
10:06and while there was plenty of initial demand for a second Gremlins, by 1990,
10:11interest had seemingly waned considerably. The kids who found Gizmo adorable in 1984 were now older and
10:17seemingly less interested, while the sequel's heavily satirical, tongue-in-cheek tone caught many
10:23remaining fans of the original by surprise, as the first film was more of a darkly comedic horror
10:28film. As such, while saddled with a heftier $50 million budget, Gremlins 2 ended up grossing a
10:34poor $41.5 million worldwide. This was ultimately a textbook example of both what happens when you
10:41leave audiences waiting too long for a sequel, and when you deviate from the expected sequel formula.
10:47Gremlins 2 later found itself cult fandom on home video, though the fact that it grossed less than
10:5220% of the first film while being produced at over four-fold the cost is nothing if not an abject failure.
10:593. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World
11:03It's easy to see why everyone was excited about Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, an adaptation of Brian
11:08Leo O'Malley's beloved comic book, directed by rising cult fave filmmaker Edgar Wright, with a
11:13crackerjack cast of likeable young actors including Michael Cera, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Chris Evans,
11:19Anna Kendrick, Brandon Routh, and Jason Swartzman. If you were in geek nerd circles in 2010, it was
11:25easy to believe that Scott Pilgrim was going to be a huge hit. The hype train was chugging along,
11:30and backed by strong reviews out of the gate, it seemed like a forward-thinking comic book movie that
11:35couldn't miss. But Scott Pilgrim was ultimately a commercial dud, grossing just $49.3 million
11:42against an $85 million budget, no matter the rabid online enthusiasm for it. Much like Snakes on a
11:49Plane, this seemed to be a case of internet fandom failing to translate into box office stubs. Given
11:54that nerd culture became considerably more mainstream in the years that followed, it's easier to see how
11:59Scott Pilgrim would have performed much better had it released in, say, 2015, arriving as it did before
12:05superhero movies ruled Hollywood and video game adaptations were taken seriously, Scott Pilgrim
12:10failed to make general audiences bite, even though the mainstream has come round to it more in recent
12:16years on streaming. 2. Sin City – A Dame to Kill For
12:21Robert Rodriguez's adaptation of Miller's legendary graphic novel Sin City was a massive critical and
12:27commercial success back in 2005, enough that a sequel seemed inevitable. And though Rodriguez quickly got to
12:34work putting Sin City 2 together, the project was repeatedly delayed enough that it wasn't finally
12:39released until the summer of 2014, a whole nine years later. Against a $65 million budget,
12:47Sin City – A Dame to Kill For made just $39.4 million, not even 25% of the original's $160 million haul.
12:56It was a catastrophic result for a film that frequently landed on lists of most anticipated movie sequels,
13:02but that ultimately took too damn long to get made. Sin City's stylistic innovations no longer
13:07seemed cutting edge in 2014, which in conjunction with the sequels' inferior script and reshuffled cast
13:14seemingly turned audiences off. Had Sin City 2 been made within, say, three years of the original's
13:19release, things might have turned out quite differently. 1. The Matrix Resurrections
13:26Though The Matrix Revolutions brought the original trilogy to an underwhelming end back in 2003,
13:32there was still a lot of general audience goodwill for the series, and especially lead Keanu Reeves,
13:37enough that a two decades later follow-up certainly caught people's attention.
13:42The first trailer for The Matrix Resurrections stoked intense discussion online about the potential
13:47for it to revive the long-dormant franchise, whereby it could both satisfy long-time fans,
13:52and earn itself a whole new generation of supporters. Yet even with the film releasing
13:57simultaneously on HBO Max, Resurrections' box office figures were, to be kind, atrocious.
14:03On a $190 million budget, Resurrections grossed just $156.6 million globally,
14:11serving as a concrete vote of no confidence for Lana Wachowski's bold new vision.
14:16There were many factors to consider, from the pandemic, to the script's aggressively meta-nature,
14:21the mediocre action sequences, and the absences of cast members Laurence Fishburne and Hugo Weaving.
14:27Releasing mere days after Spider- No Way Home as it did, the choice for casual audiences was a
14:32no-brainer, and the only folks who actually stepped out of their homes to see The Matrix
14:36Resurrections were the most devout faithful. Despite promising mainstream engagement in its marketing,
14:42Resurrections couldn't hold their attention, and once the polarizing word of mouth got out,
14:46it was dead on arrival. And that concludes our list. If you can think of any that we missed,
14:51then do let us know in the comments below, and while you're there, don't forget to like and
14:54subscribe, and tap that notification bell. Also, head over to Twitter and follow us there,
14:59at WhatCulture, and I can be found across various social medias just by searching Ellie Littlechild.
15:04I've been Ellie with WhatCulture, I hope you have a magical day, and I'll see you real soon!
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