Sometimes Harry and I bet on how much money a movie will gross. Our first bet was about Sucker Punch‘s earnings with DVD sales one month after release. I said that Sucker Punch would take a loss on its $82 million budget. Harry said its box office would cover the production costs while DVD/Blu-Ray/digital sales would recoup the marketing costs. Sucker Punch made $89,792,502 worldwide box office.
On August 13, 2011 Harry sent me a tweet indicating the DVD and Blu-Ray costs had pushed Sucker Punch just over $101 million.
Drat.
Another bet was an extension of one I made at work. I said Taylor Lautner’s film, Abduction, would not make its money back ($35 million budget). Harry quickly replied with a prediction that it would do $50 million worldwide box office MINIMUM. The movie isn’t even out of theatres yet and it’s already at $70 million.
“Always bet on the abs,” Harry tells me.
But the bet we have going on currently is about The Avengers. He says worldwide box office will top $1 billion – I say it will be under. Here’s my reasoning:
1. None of the Marvel’s Films Leading Up to The Avengers Made Close to $1 Billion
Let’s take a look.
 $365,948,718 |
 $448,512,824 |
 $623,933,331 |
 $263,427,551 |
 $585,174,222 |
 $245,360,480 |
 $0.00 |
 $890,871,626 |
I put the last two in there for fun. Spider-Man isn’t in The Avengers and so his box office doesn’t count. Spider-Man 3 wasn’t even the franchises’s biggest take, but you get the idea: did not break $1 billion. And Captain America (1990)? Didn’t come to theatres at all.
2. Anecdotal: Non-Comic People Don’t Know It’s Coming
This really won’t matter until later, because the ideal time for marketing a film heavily is closer to release, but I think it’s worthy to note how many people I talked to who didn’t know the movie was coming out. And I’m not talking about people who don’t watch comic movies. One of my friends watched the extra teaser at the end of all of these movies and he still didn’t know there was an Avengers movie coming. I’m pretty sure we talked about it each time, too. He just forgot because he doesn’t read comics so he doesn’t care as much.
“I guess I’ll watch it,” he said, after watching the trailer:
3. One Fairly Successful Movie Doesn’t Ensure a Franchise
What if you missed Thor or Captain America? How jonesed could you be that they would be working together? Part of the excitement of The Avengers is that they are all working together, but this matters less to a movie-going audience who asks “Who’s the guy with the bow?”
Harry is undefeated. But now it’s my time. What you do you think: Will The Avengers crack $1 billion?
Side note: If anyone wants to make other friendly bets about any other movie I’m in. Name the movie. Name the terms. I’ll take your bet and feature it here.
Sean Ewington is your friendly neighbourhood movie/video game critic, and comic author. He is the co-writer of the Up Up Down Down webcomic and owns and operates 2dreviews. Sean has written for various online publications like Broken Frontier and Brutal Gamer, as well as print publications including the Metro - the world's largest free daily newspaper. 
I think you are miscalculating the disproportionate response to this movie by nerds everywhere. For one thing, you have the comic-book nerds who are out of their minds excited that this movie is even becoming a reality, let alone one that’s been in the works for four years. Talk about tantric fandom. They have been stringing us along for YEARS.
Then you have the multiplier of Joss Whedon. He’s a wild card. I’m not sure I understand his ultimate stardom because—I mean seriously—Angel? Really? But what do I know. Firefly was awesome. Either way, this man has some serious pull in the nerd community and he will bring it.
Then you have the multiplier of Robert Downey Jr. This guy is like Johnny Depp. He could make a movie where he takes a dump for an hour and a half and people would come in droves. DROVES.
If the movie does well among the nerds and the true fans, it will blow the box office away.
For the sake of future awesome comicbook movies, I actually hope you lose this one. Sorry buddy!
a billion is a lot though. and to reach a billion, you need the “other” demographic with the soft skin and the curvy curves. i’d love to hear anyone’s elevator pitch for why this movie is a worthy choice for date night. the best i can do is “a bunch of really cool comic book superheroes banding together to fight bad guys”.