It feels like movie after movie in 2023 was met with an inferior reception, particularly at the box office.
Superhero movies especially Marvel and DC are known for making close to $1b (or over) on a pretty consistent basis. 2023 appears to have changed that and for whatever reason.
Today, I will look at each release in dated order. I’ll also give my 2-pence as to what I thought happened from a general public point of view.
Please note, that I will be using Box Office Mojo for the amounts made worldwide at the box office.
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
Release date: February 17th
Box office earnings: $476,071,180
In fairness to Ant-Man, Quantumania was a very fun film. Granted, it wasn’t the best MCU film nor was it the best Ant-Man film but it was still entertaining nonetheless. I thought it definitely deserved a lot more credit than it got initially. The Quantum Realm has always fascinated me when it comes to these movies.
Shazam! Fury of the Gods
Release date: March 17th
Box office earnings: $133,838,006
The first Shazam! film was fantastic. No debating that at all. The second one though, I mean, it’s just a typical superhero movie above anything else and offers nothing unique. I also understand the poor box office generations were as a result of the DCEU changes from James Gunn. I saw the first one in theatres but I didn’t bother with this for one simple reason – it just didn’t matter moving forward and the trailers did nothing to get me excited for it.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3
Release date: May 5th
Box office earnings: $845,555,777
I don’t need to say much about the third Guardians movie. It did well and it rightfully deserved to do well. The third film smashed the other 2 out of the park when it came to this and was easily one of the best superhero films of the year by a country mile. It’s a shame that this is seemingly the end of this series but what a way to cap it off.
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
Release date: June 2nd
Box office earnings: $690,516,673
This is a monumental success for Sony, almost doubling the box office generations from the first movie. That alone just tells you what you need to know about this film. It did well at the box office, especially for an animated film and it was universally loved. It’s between this and Guardians 3 that are on top of people’s lists for superhero film of the year in 2023.
The Flash
Release date: June 16th
Box office earnings: $270,633,313
You’re going to see me discuss these types of issues again shortly but I feel like the main reason this film did poorly was because of Ezra Miller. After his legal battles, the things he was accused of were naturally not going to go down well with the court of public opinion. This further catapulted into a poor showing from DC, again. The end of the DCEU also likely played a part in this. I’m not surprised to see this film not do well as the projections initially weren’t great.
Blue Beetle
Release date: August 18th
Box office earnings: $129,288,072
To be fair to Blue Beetle, this was originally planned as a straight-to-streaming film but was very late on decided to be a theatrical release. This in turn hurt the film more because it meant the marketing wasn’t up to standard as we’d usually see from DC. In reality, just short of $130m isn’t a bad feat at all.
The Marvels
The worst MCU release so far, even worse than 2003’s Hulk. The question brought to me as a fan was; “do you even care about this?” I’m afraid I didn’t. The trailers didn’t do anything for me and Ms. Marvel didn’t do a good enough job in creating any sort of hype for the film. This reminds me of Shazam 2 in that sense where it just didn’t feel unique, especially for a Marvel film. I hope this makes Marvel rethink projects moving forward.
Release date: November 10th
Box office earnings: $205,873,824
Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom
Release date: December 22nd
Box office earnings: $334,821,279 (so far)
It’s surprising to see that Aquaman 2 has been the best-performing DC movie of the year but that doesn’t mean it’s done great. Considering the monumental success of the first film, the second was never going to come close to that for multiple reasons. Amber Heard. Post Covid and the DCEU issues. I didn’t care for or support this film due to Amber Heard and it’s something that I still stand by today. I won’t watch this film despite being a movie critic due to my personal beliefs. We also didn’t review the film due to that and we always want to remain fair in our reviews, this is something we feared we couldn’t uphold if we were to review it.
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