D&D Movie/TV D&D Movie Hit or Flop?

[Myrdin Potter]

Now at $157,070,213 worldwide, so it has at least cleared its production budget.

Not really. That is what the theaters collect, not what goes to the studio (50% is the usual rough estimate)

Does mean that I don’t see it being an absolute flop.

 

[Burnside]

Not really. That is what the theaters collect, not what goes to the studio (50% is the usual rough estimate)

Does mean that I don’t see it being an absolute flop.

Yes, sorry - I mean that the gross was higher than the production budget, not the net.

 

[payn]

It's unfortunately more complicated than that.

Everyone is used to using the pre-COVID metrics and the rules of thumb that were used in the industry. And those are helpful, to some limited extent, still.

But the economics in the post-COVID environment, combined with the streaming services, make it different right now. Take Air, for example. Air had a budget of $90 million (or so) and another $40 million (or so) to market. So, on the one hand, with a current worldwide gross of $54 million, it's kind of a flop.

Except it isn't. Air was never supposed to even release in theaters- Amazon chose to give it a theatrical release! We don't know what the relationship with MGM is in terms of distribution, but any amount over marketing is gravy. Why did Amazon do this? Because streamers are beginning to realize two things-

1. Any box office profit over marketing is ... profit; and
2. A movie released in theaters may actually be a bigger draw to streaming services than a movie just released on the streamer!

Now that doesn't mean everything everyone knows is wrong- we can still say, for example, that John Wick 4 was a hit and that Mario Bros. monstrosity is an unexpected juggernaut. But because the box office itself has changed (and a lot of what is going on in the backend), it's much harder to speak with confidence about the performance of movies that aren't clear-cut.

TLDR; without knowing what arrangements were made, it's really hard to tell very much at this stage about the finances of DADHAT. For that reason, perception (the quality of the movie, the impact on the brand, the performance vis-a-vis expectations, and the collateral effect (if any) on merchandise and other products) will matter.

Im still comfortable calling it a flop just on box office. That's no slight against this film they released it into a quagmire of popular franchises during a heavier than ever release year. It was a critique success, it was a fan success, it might be a stream and toy success, but box office is flop. Plenty of flops have climbed out the red and into the black. Guess we will see here D&D franchise has some legs or not.

 

[OB1]

So the trades instantly called Renfield a flop after this weekend ($7M opening against $65M budget). That is a fair assessment. Renfield is not part of a larger brand, it's a movie that has to stand on what it does at the theatre to eventually make a profit. Someone made a mistake greenlighting that movie for that amount.

Not a single trade has called D&D a flop (and several still see it hitting $100M domestic and over $230M worldwide). Now, those totals will mean the film will be in the red at the end of it's theatrical run, but much of that loss will likely be on Hasbro, which put money into the film to ensure quality, regardless of the BO results of the film, because it's part of a larger strategy.

Over the next year, we'll see a AAA video game released, a Paramount+ TV show, and of course the 5e Anniversary Edition. As a high quality, well received movie, DaDHAT will continue to attract eyeballs from non-D&D fans over the next year on streaming services, helping to grow the brand across those other pieces.

Now, maybe none of those things will catch on and D&D will remain at the same level of popularity that it's been at for the last 7 years or so, but Hasbro is betting that they can take it to the next level and it will be years before we know the final word on that.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

I don't care if it's a flop or not, although of course that's the title of this thread

But for me, the subtext behind "flop or not" is... "Will it get a sequel?"
That's what I'm hoping for, and I feel like the indicators are quite mixed (mediocre box, anecdotal strong merch sales, evidence of surge in PHB sales, high SEO numbers).

Either way, if there's a sequel, I'm there for it, especially if Pine, Rodriguez et al are involved (Hugh Grant I can take or leave although his performance was great, but his character doesn't say BBEG to me). But I don't want to wait 22 years!!!!

 

[Zardnaar]

It's unfortunately more complicated than that.

Everyone is used to using the pre-COVID metrics and the rules of thumb that were used in the industry. And those are helpful, to some limited extent, still.

But the economics in the post-COVID environment, combined with the streaming services, make it different right now. Take Air, for example. Air had a budget of $90 million (or so) and another $40 million (or so) to market. So, on the one hand, with a current worldwide gross of $54 million, it's kind of a flop.

Except it isn't. Air was never supposed to even release in theaters- Amazon chose to give it a theatrical release! We don't know what the relationship with MGM is in terms of distribution, but any amount over marketing is gravy. Why did Amazon do this? Because streamers are beginning to realize two things-

1. Any box office profit over marketing is ... profit; and
2. A movie released in theaters may actually be a bigger draw to streaming services than a movie just released on the streamer!

Now that doesn't mean everything everyone knows is wrong- we can still say, for example, that John Wick 4 was a hit and that Mario Bros. monstrosity is an unexpected juggernaut. But because the box office itself has changed (and a lot of what is going on in the backend), it's much harder to speak with confidence about the performance of movies that aren't clear-cut.

TLDR; without knowing what arrangements were made, it's really hard to tell very much at this stage about the finances of DADHAT. For that reason, perception (the quality of the movie, the impact on the brand, the performance vis-a-vis expectations, and the collateral effect (if any) on merchandise and other products) will matter.

Air was also released to qualify for awards. They're changing the rules and you need to release in XYZ theaters to qualify.

It was never intended to make profit at the box office.

 

[Zardnaar]

It's a flop because not enough people are going to see it, but the people that ARE seems to like it so, as Payn say, it's not a bomb.

The movie is clearly not failing because its bad, I think we can all agree on that.

I had more than one friend tell me they were wary of it because of the last DnD movie from 20 friggin' years ago as if it had any bearing on this new one... seems weird to me when there's no link whatsoever between the two beside the franchise.

There's no real definition of bomb vs flop but I wouldn't call HAT a bomb.

Really crappy week 1 with big budget is usually a bomb. It was unlikely HAT would hit 300 million or more after week 1 but wasn't impossible.

If it opened to 30 million or less yeah bomb might be appropriate. Bomb to me is severe flop financially.

 

[OB1]

It was never intended to make profit at the box office.

And this is exactly what all of us non-flop posters are saying about D&D.

Paramount and Hasbro knew what the likely BO for a D&D movie would be around, and they overspent because of other economic factors. Paramount got a $150M movie for $75M in theatres and later on P+. Hasbro got a level of brand recognition for D&D that can't be bought with ads.

They both changed the conversation from D&D movies will always suck (like seriously, how many people brought up the 2000 movie in the six months before this film opened) to a praising of what a great story can be told with D&D.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Air was also released to qualify for awards. They're changing the rules and you need to release in XYZ theaters to qualify.

It was never intended to make profit at the box office.

If it was just being released to qualify for awards, they didn't need a large theatrical release, and they certainly wouldn't have done it in the spring.

It was done because of the changing priorities of streamers, but it also goes to my original point that we don't know about the back-end between Paramount and Hasbro.

The amount of confidence that people are speaking about, and the absolute terms (is there really nothing between a "flop" and a "hit") is staggering and wildly misinformed.

 

[Myrdin Potter]

I think it is quite simple. Box office flop is judged on the box office receipts vs. the production cost plus marketing with the general rule that you need to make 2x the cost to breakeven.

I think it is pretty clear that on the standard definition, D&D HAT is a box office flop.

Will the movie be an overall flop or success? Then you need to evaluate numbers other than the box office which are really hard to pin down.

This link has a bunch of examples:

17 Movies That Were A Massive Flop At The Box Office, But Now We Can't Imagine Life Without Them

<i>Matilda</i> was just too ahead of it time.

www.buzzfeed.com

You can love a movie and the movie can be a box office flop. Overtime, it may gain in reputation and establish itself. With the cash Hasbro is investing in D&D Beyond and the VTT, plus the attempt to make TV shows, maybe Hasbro decided up front that losing money on the film was fine.

For the most part, it got good reviews and came in close to "expectations" in week 1.