Traditionally, the summer movie season has become synonymous with Hollywood’s biggest franchises. But as big titles invade every month in the moviegoing calendar (Disney’s mother-of-all-tentpoles ‘Avengers: Endgame’ is already in theatres, and ‘Captain Marvel’ — like ‘Black Panther’ before her — grossed $1 billion (Dh3.6 billion) worldwide in the first quarter of the year), it’s harder to tell which summer movies are truly events.
Here are eight of this season’s key franchise releases (defining a franchise as a series with at least three instalments):
‘GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS’ (MAY 30)
— Number of films: 3
— Average box office: $185 million
— Average Rotten Tomatoes score: 75 per cent
Technically the 35th instalment in the venerable rampaging-giant-lizard franchise, ‘Godzilla: King of the Monsters’ marks the third outing in Warner Bros.’ more recently minted ‘MonsterVerse’ after 2014’s ‘Godzilla’ and 2017’s ‘Kong: Skull Island’. Teeing up ‘Godzilla vs. Kong’, due next year, ‘King of the Monsters’ will provide the latest test of the remaining appetite for a series that already holds the Guinness World Record for the longest continuously running movie franchise.
‘X-MEN: DARK PHOENIX’ (JUNE 6)
— Number of films in series: 12
— Average box office: $215 million
— Average Rotten Tomatoes score: 74 per cent
Released two years before ‘Spider-Man’ and five before ‘Batman Begins’, Bryan Singer’s 2000 hit ‘X-Men’ helped kick-start the modern superhero craze, introducing Professor Xavier, Wolverine, Magneto and the rest of the Marvel mutants. But as the franchise has sprawled through sequels, prequels and spin-offs like ‘Deadpool’ and ‘Logan’, the reception among critics and audiences has swung between wildly enthusiastic and meh, and it remains to be seen where this delayed continuation from the underwhelming ‘X-Men: Apocalypse’ falls along that spectrum.
‘JOHN WICK CHAPTER 3: PARABELLUM’ (JUNE 6)
— Number of films in series: 3
— Average box office: $68 million
— Average Rotten Tomatoes score: 88 per cent
A slick, hyper-violent action thriller starring Keanu Reeves as a hard-bitten assassin with nothing left to lose, 2014’s ‘John Wick’ proved a surprise sleeper, spawning a cult franchise with its own increasingly ornate mythology. Impressively, the follow-up took in more than double the first film’s $43 million haul. But the third instalment — with the now 54-year-old Reeves returning for more “gun fu”-style action — will truly test whether the series can continue along that trajectory.
‘ANNABELLE COMES HOME’ (NOT SCHEDULED YET)
— Number of films: 6
— Average box office: $91 million
— Average Rotten Tomatoes score: 58 per cent
Centred on real-life paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren, 2013’s supernatural horror film ‘The Conjuring’ scared up $137 million in grosses and strong reviews, kicking off a string of sequels and spin-offs that have delivered wildly varying critical and box office results. A sequel to a prequel to ‘The Conjuring’, 2017’s ‘Annabelle: Creation’ was seen as one of the stronger instalments but — in a summer that will also see Chucky reborn in a ‘Child’s Play’ remake just one week earlier — it’s unclear how much appetite there is for scary-doll movies.
‘TOY STORY 4’ (JUNE 20)
— Number of films in series: 4
— Average box office (domestic): $284 million
— Average Rotten Tomatoes score: 99 per cent
Injecting a simple premise — toys that come to life — with savvy humour and heartstring-tugging emotion, 1995’s ‘Toy Story’ made history as the first fully computer-animated feature-length film and set the template for all of Pixar’s smashes to follow. But two decades on and nine years after the beloved best picture-nominated ‘Toy Story 3’, Pixar pushes the franchise to an unprecedented fourth instalment — with Sheriff Woody, Buzz Lightyear and the rest of the gang on a fresh adventure involving a new arts-and-crafts toy named Forky. Could audiences start to tire of this plaything?
‘MEN IN BLACK: INTERNATIONAL’ (JUNE 20)
— Number of films in series: 4
— Average box office: $207 million
— Average Rotten Tomatoes score: 66 per cent
Sony Pictures captured box office lightning in a bottle in 1997 when it paired Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones as secret agents charged with keeping Earth safe from rogue intergalactic aliens. Now, after two sequels produced steadily diminishing returns at the box office, the studio is hoping to give the sci-fi comedy franchise a new lease on life, with Chris Hemsworth, Tessa Thompson and Liam Neeson stepping in to try to replicate the unlikely chemistry of Smith and Jones.
‘SPIDER-MAN: FAR FROM HOME’ (JULY 4)
— Number of (Spider-Man) films: 9
— Average box office: $290 million
— Average Rotten Tomatoes score: 74 per cent
Since 2002’s ‘Spider-Man’, Sony Pictures has kept its sole comic book franchise humming through an ever more complex web of reboots, sequels and spin-offs. Following up on Spidey’s highly successful re-introduction with 2017’s ‘Homecoming’, which fully immersed the character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, ‘Far From Home’ takes the web-slinger — now played by Tom Holland — on a school trip to Europe with his friends, where he comes up against Jake Gyllenhaal’s villain Mysterio. The goal is to make it past ‘The Amazing Spider-Man’, which stalled out after its sequel.
‘FAST & FURIOUS PRESENTS: HOBBS & SHAW’ (AUGUST 1)
— Number of films: 9
— Average box office: $117 million
— Average Rotten Tomatoes score: 57 per cent
Since roaring out of the gate with ‘The Fast and the Furious’ in 2001, this series has adhered to a simple (some would argue simple-minded) formula of muscle cars, muscle-bound stars and high-octane smashy-smashy to increasingly robust worldwide box office. But with ‘Hobbs & Shaw’, the franchise takes a somewhat risky left turn, spinning off Dwayne Johnson’s federal agent Luke Hobbs and Jason Statham’s mercenary Deckard Shaw in their own buddy action-comedy. Vin Diesel is nowhere in sight.
