r/movies • u/ChiefLeef22 r/movies Contributor • 4h ago

Article ‘The Odyssey’ Proves It: Audiences Want Movies Made the Hard Way | This year's breakouts like 'Project Hail Mary' and 'Obsession' were made by filmmakers who sweated. While CG-stuffed franchise disappointments such as 'Supergirl,' 'Moana,' and 'The Mandalorian and Grogu' looked lazy.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/odyssey-box-office-2026-practical-effects-1236652219/
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u/BonjaminClay 3h ago

Yeah I know it's trendy to hate on but that movie doesn't belong next to Supergirl and definitely not next to Moana.

Moana was a nostalgia remake made too early for anyone to have nostalgia because The Rock is getting old. It was pure cash grab and nobody was asking for it.

Mando is a movie based on a very popular show with an original story continuing the saga. I think the complaints that it was basically a slightly higher budget mini season 4 are valid... But there was demand, it wasn't a lazy rehash, and there was a TON of love and effort into it with lots of exceptional sets, puppets, and detail. I won't argue it's high art but comparing it to a Moana style cash grab is disingenuous at least.

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u/round-earth-theory 2h ago

It was a fun movie. I think people are mostly annoyed at how poorly managed Star Wars is and so they took it out on Mando. It's fair enough to say the movie doesn't make waves in any way, but it was a good "just watch it" movie.

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u/coolpapa2282 2h ago edited 2h ago

It was fine, but we went back to re-watch season 1 of Mando after it and holy shit. S1 was so good - Mando himself is a little amoral outside of his own weird code, and willing to do basically anything to protect The Child. Grogu is adorable always, but they had space for him to grow a little as we learned about him.

But now they've sanitized Din Jarin a little (he works for the Senate now, yay!), the power creep of fights he can win just by being a badass is crazy, and they can't do anything interesting with Grogu because these two have to keep having adventures until they stop making money. It just feels like there's nothing interesting for them to do, and the baggage of lore that they have now means they can't tell cool small stories like S1 anymore.

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u/round-earth-theory 2h ago

I bailed after season 1 so to me it was fresher and I don't have all of that lore expectation, so it certainly failed audiences in the way it handled prior lore. But taken out of the greater context, my argument is that it's an alright piece of cinema on it's own.

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u/Poku115 3h ago

There wasnt demand though thats the whole debacle, people keep acting like its a sin cause it flopped or that its overhated, when in reality it barely crossed the average persons mind, overshadowed by things like michael

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u/ZenMasterOfDisguise 3h ago

people keep acting like its a sin cause it flopped

It made $350-million in the box office globally, that is considered a flop?

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u/Useful-Soup8161 3h ago

It made what it needed to make so it’s not really a flop but it wasn’t a hit either.

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u/Poku115 1h ago

It lost about 100 mill at the most generous estimate

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u/Useful-Soup8161 40m ago

It was made for around $165 million and made $344 million at the box office. It made about what it needed to make.

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u/Poku115 39m ago

Ah yes, cause theaters take nothing from tickets, and marketing is just imaginary money right.

Go asks forbes or variety, it flopped dude, it needed 440 mill at the most generous estimate

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u/Useful-Soup8161 36m ago

I mean I assumed the marketing and advertising budget was included in that $165 million but I could be wrong.

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u/Poku115 34m ago

The rule of thumb for big budget movies like disney or wb movies is 2.5x of the budget since theater take about half of the tickets and marketing. Variety confirmed the break even points to be around 500 mill

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u/AwesomePocket 3h ago

It lost money. It was a flop.

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u/BonjaminClay 2h ago

Exactly. People are brain wormed on this so bad. It made a small amount of net profit in theaters but they will sell physical media and probably solid mountains of toys, not to mention parks revenue which is all Disney actually cares about. Disney is probably disappointed that it didn't make them MORE but it was clearly a profitable venture.

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u/Neuvost 2h ago

I was about to respond, "Disney didn't buy Star Wars for $4B just to make modest profits," and while that's still kinda true, these tax filings supposedly say they've already made $12B in revenue, so maybe they have gotten to the point where making a modest profit isn't so bad. It just might not be a great sign for how important Star Wars is as a brand going forward.

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u/ZenMasterOfDisguise 2h ago

Yeah, I saw that for the past 5 years or so, Disney sells like $1-billion worth of baby yoda/grogu toys every year, just toys of that 1 character have probably made them as much as they paid to buy Star Wars

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u/Poku115 1h ago

Considering it needed 440 million (thats the most generous estimate) to not lose money, yeah

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u/Poku115 3h ago

Considering the movie didnt make a cent of profit, yeah

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u/mbdtf95 2h ago

If you invest $1k into stocks and sell for $10k, that will be considered a success, but if you invest $100k and sell for $10k that will be considered failure/flop.

Same way for Mandalorian which had huge budget and therefore actually lost money.

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u/ZenMasterOfDisguise 2h ago

Mandalorian and Grogu is being released on Blu Ray in August, that will bring in more money. But besides that, Disney makes over $1-billion EVERY YEAR from Grogu merchandise.

Supergirl flat out lost money. When it is all said and done, The Mandalorian movie is not losing Disney any money, its keeps their Grogu merchandising money flowing which rakes them in billions

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u/Poku115 1h ago

So when its a project you like you move the goalposts but when not only the BO matters got it

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u/ItsDanimal 1h ago

Back in the day they used to make whole-ass TV shows just to sell toys. It's not far-fetched to think Disney is OK with the movie doing bad in theatres if the point was to re-coup the losses via toys.

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u/Poku115 58m ago

Then they probably wouldn't pay for the most costly US add aimed at adults (the super bowl)

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u/ItsDanimal 43m ago

I think that is one of the craziest parts about them making so much on merch. This isn't even a kids franchise (Mando specifically). The entire series is aimed at adults, yet kids are buying grogu stuff like hot cakes.

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u/ZenMasterOfDisguise 1h ago

lol at "move the goalposts". My original comment had nothing to even do with the profitability of the movie, I was only talking about the popularity of the movie. I think "flop" is a term about a movie being unpopular, not a movie that is popular but had a big budget and comes just short of breaking even. I have had like a dozen people replying about profit numbers when that was never even what i was talking about

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u/Poku115 1h ago

That is kinda the point bud, it did even worse than solo and with a lower budget, it wasnt popular at all beyond the niche that watched it

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u/ZenMasterOfDisguise 42m ago

Both Mandalorian and Solo were seen by a similar number of people, neither one was a flop. A flop is a movie that like no one sees. Morbius was a flop. Supergirl was a flop. Solo and Mandalorian and Grogu were underperforming movies, but not flops. That was the only point I was trying to make, and now I have to reply to dozens of annoying redditors who cant understand a simple point I was making

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u/Poku115 35m ago

Yes cause your point is wrong cause you dont define what popularity or what flop means. Just because a niche audience watched it doesn't mean it was popular

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u/BonjaminClay 2h ago

I absolutely wanted a Mando movie more than any other movie I've seen them propose and calling it a flop when it clearly made money, just because it wasn't a billion dollar ultra hit like past SW movies is bad faith IMO.

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u/Poku115 2h ago

Its a flop cause it didn't make a cent back, doesnt matter how much money a movie makes if it cant offset its budget and advertising. It made about 180 million less than needed to break even. The world cared for it as much as they cared for thunderbolts or the marvels.

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u/BonjaminClay 2h ago

Source that info because the argument hinges on the size of the marketing budget and I have trouble believing they spent as much on the marketing as on the film itself. You also aren't thinking about the merch, toys, and Disney's ultimate priority: parks revenue. Thinking the mouse didn't make money on this is wild.

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u/Poku115 1h ago

It really doesn't matter how much you wanna move the goal post by including merch, the film didn't make back the money it put.

both the most generous and most realistic break even points are touched in this article

I guess you forgot the superbowl add