The newest entry into the Star Wars Saga, Solo: A Star Wars Story surprised with an underwhelming performance in its opening weekend. It only earned an estimated $103 million in its four-day weekend. While no slouch and indeed beating every other movie, when you are part of a megabrand phenomenal figures are expected. Indeed, Disney forecast opening earnings between $130 to $150 million – on par with the previous spin-off movie Rogue One ($155 million) from late 2016.
A new Star Wars movie has always been a big event, the resurrection of the cult brand in 2015 with The Force Awakens has shown that. Neither time nor the mixed reception of the prequel trilogy has put a dampener into its popularity managing to make more than $1 billion per movie since Disney revived the franchise. Keeping this in mind, it’s not difficult to understand Disney’s initial projections.
As such, it’s difficult to precisely nail the reasons why Solo: A Star Wars Story failed to reach its goal. Critics did receive the movie fairly well and our very own Cade Onder lauded Solo for being a positive surprise and thrilling action romp. News of a troubled production culminated in the departure of filmmaker duo Christopher Miller and Phil Lord far into production which might have caused doubt and reservations regarding the quality of the movie. Famed director Ron Howard took over directing, leading to the majority of the movie being reshot. No doubt contributing to the massive production costs of over $250 million.
Another explanation might be the unusual release date in May, a mere five months after The Last Jedi. Also unlike previous entries in the Disney Saga which released every December. Could audience fatigue be a factor? Possible but not necessarily. Especially seeing how Disney’s very own superhero movies seemingly show no such signs. Thor: Ragnarok, Black Panther and Avengers: Infinity War came out in a span of only six months. All while each doing very well at the box office.
A jam-packed May release might have well cut into Solo: A Star Wars Story‘s success. Besides aforementioned Avengers: Infinity War, Deadpool 2 also released to a success and with the next entry in the dinosaur adventure series, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, looming at the horizon slated at a June 22 release, Solo will need all the help it can get in cinemas.
Whatever the reasons for Solo: A Star Wars Story‘s disappointing opening might be, it will be interesting to see how executives at Disney will react to this and handle future movies in the Star Wars franchise.
