‘Morbius’ Tops On Vudu, But Don’t Expect A Sequel To Jared Leto’s Superhero Stinker

For those keeping track, Vudu has announced that Morbius has topped the VO
VO
D charts in its debut weekend, which isn’t exactly a surprise. It’s currently sitting alongside Sony’s other early-2022 release, the $400 million-grossing Uncharted and DreamWorks’ $182 million-grossing The Bad Guys atop most of the usual VOD charts (YouTube, iTunes, Amazon
AMZN
, Google and Vudu). What’s notable, I suppose by default, is that Jared Leto’s poorly reviewed and poorly received Morbius is the rare Marvel comic book movie, albeit not within the MCU, to not be a theatrical hit. It’s no catastrophe, thanks to a frugal $75 million budget, but $73 million domestic and $163 million worldwide is not anywhere near what Sony was hoping for.

Sure, the $505 million gross of Venom: Let There Be Carnage (with no release in China) and the $854 million gross of Venom (including $269 million in China) was never in the cards, but the film’s lightning-fast drop (a miserable 1.87x weekend multiplier from a $39 million domestic debut) shows audiences didn’t like it any more than critics did. It’ll break even in the end thanks to post-theatrical revenue streams, but there’s a reason Tom Rothman didn’t announce a Morbius sequel at last month’s CinemaCon. Maybe Morbius can pop up in some future installment of the “Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters,” but that’s about it for the not-so-good doctor.

This isn’t Ghostbusters: Afterlife, which earned $197 million worldwide (including $128 million domestic) on a $75 million budget while earning decent reviews and solid consumer word-of-mouth. I’d argue there’s room to grow in terms of centering McKenna Grace, Carrie Coon and Paul Rudd in a new supernatural adventure that doesn’t turn into a remake of Ghostbusters. While a theoretical Uncharted 2 may suffer from the dreaded Tomb Raider Trap (when a superior sequel pays for the sins of its mediocre predecessor), when a $120 million non-sequel earns $400 million global, you roll the dice and make a sequel. I hope Sony realizes that Morbius is not a franchise begun but a bullet dodged (and that Venom may be a fluke).

The Bad Guys continues to show that Universal’s kid-targeted toons can concurrently thrive on PVOD and at the box office, while Ambulance will hopefully earn just enough in explicit post-theatrical revenue and implicit Peacock streaming viewership to make it “worth it.” The $40 million Michael Bay-directed actioner, one of Bay’s very best action movies, earned $51 million worldwide, or about half of what it would have needed to reach the “2.5x the budget” safety zone. However, Universal gets 80% of the money from VOD and related post-theatrical revenue, and any bump in Peacock viewership is going to be a modest win for the Yahya Abdul-Mateen II/Jake Gyllenhaal/Eiza Gonzales thriller.

Moreover, Ambulance will perform better on VOD/DVD and streaming because it had the marketing and awareness that comes with being a wide theatrical release. That doesn’t mean The Northman, which cost Regency and Focus $70 million and grossed around $70 million worldwide, is going to magically become profitable via PVOD and streaming ratings, but it’s a new variable to consider in this new world. And yes, titles like The Lost City are taking small theatrical drops even as they coexist on streaming and PVOD/EST platforms. Whether that’s because of viewer ignorance, a lack of theatrical releases or consumer preference I can only speculate.

Finally, Liam Neeson’s Memory arrived on PVOD just weeks after its theatrical release. While the Martin Campbell-directed actioner is better than any of Neeson’s thrillers since Cold Pursuit in early 2019 (or, if you count that one as a black comedy, The Commuter in early 2018), audiences have been burned by a slew of recent star vehicles (Honest Thief, The Marksman and Blacklight from Open Road and Briarcliff along with Netflix’s
NFLX
The Ice Road) which haven’t exactly ranked among the actor’s best films. I’m not sure how Briarcliff and Open Road make money with these films and their $7-$16 million domestic cumes, but they keep releasing them.