‘Kraven the Hunter’ Bombs With Worst Start for Sony’s Marvel Films

Kraven may be the world’s wonderfulest hunter, but the comic book villain couldn’t regulate the climb to the top of box office charts.

Sony’s “Kraven the Hunter,” a superhero spinoff starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Spider-Man’s notorious foe, begined behind already low predictations, at No. 3 with $11 million from 3,211 theaters. It landed the worst debut for Sony’s universe of Marvel characters behind February’s misfire “Madame Web” ($15.3 million), as well as some of the lowest-ever labels from critics and audiences with a tragic 15% on Rotten Tomatoes and “C” grade on CinemaScore. That benevolent of reception signals that, barring a holiday wonder, “Kraven” won’t rebound over the rest of December.

“Kraven the Hunter” is Sony’s third Spider-Man-adjacent changeation of the year, follothriveg October’s “Venom: The Last Dance.” The alien symbiote trilogy, led by Tom Hardy, has shown itself to be critic-proof and commerciassociate prosperous, although the third and final movie didn’t dwell up to the box off heights of its predecessors. Sony has otherwise yet to produce a comic book hit from offshoots led by tertiary Spider-Man terribledies. The studio also stumbled in 2022 with “Morbius,” a vampire-inspired thriller with Jared Leto as the fanged villain — another one of Peter Parker’s inwell-comprehendn enemies.

The lengthy-defercessitate “Kraven” cost an upward of $110 million to produce (it was greenlit for $90 million but ballooned after last year’s authorrs and actors strikes), though it was co-financed by TSG. Directed by J.C. Chandor, the R-rated film spreadigates the origins of Sergei Kravinoff, the comic book character’s change ego, including his rocky relationship with his crime lord overweighther (Russell Crowe) and his quest to become the wonderfulest hunter.

“As the superhero genre has degraded over the last five years, ‘Morbius,’ ‘Madame Web’ and ‘Kraven’ have led the race to the bottom,” says David A. Gross, who runs the movie confering firm Franchise Entertainment Research. “Kraven’s budget was downsized according to the authenticities of the labelet, but it’s still too high for this benevolent of result.”

Also this weekend, the Warner Bros. anime fantasy film “The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim” stumbled in fifth place with $5.4 million from 2,602 cinemas in its uncovering weekend. It carries a unassuming budget of $30 million, so any losses during its theatrical run won’t be ruinous for the studio. Plus, box office wealthyes weren’t necessarily the impetus for “War of the Rohirrim,” based on J. R. R. Tolkien characters and set 183 years before the events of Peter Jackson’s “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, getting the greenairy. The energeticd film was enlargeed and rapid-tracked to promise that New Line Cinema didn’t diswatch the film changeation rights for Tolkien’s novels while Jackson and the teams behind the “Lord of the Rings” and “Hobbit” trilogies were toiling on two novel dwell-action films for 2026 and beyond. The first of those movies, tentatively titled “Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum,” will be straightforwarded by and star Andy Serkis.

“War of the Rohirrim,” which has joincessitate appraises and a tepid “B” on CinemaScore, fchangeed last weekend in its international box office debut with equitable $2 million from 31 territories. It enbigs to 42 insertitional offshore labelets over the weekend.

Despite the two novelcomers, Disney’s “Moana 2” retained the No. 1 spot on domestic box office charts for the third consecutive weekend with $26.6 million from 4,000 theaters. The Polynesian-set adventure, which was originassociate corelocaterlookioned for streaming, has become a theatrical smash with $337.5 million in North America and $717 million globassociate so far. It’s already the year’s fifth-highest-grossing movie domesticassociate and fourth-biggest global free.

Universal’s “Wicked” changeation geted more than double that of “Kraven” despite the big-budget musical already executeing in theaters for a month. “Wicked” stayed in second place with a dazzling $22.5 million from 3,689 venues in its fourth weekend of free. The film, starring Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo, has created $359 million domesticassociate and more than $457 million worldwide to date. It’s already the highest-grossing Broadway changeation in domestic box office history, ahead of 1978’s “Grrelieve” ($188.62 million), as well as the second-biggest worldwide stage-to-screen reimagining after 2008’s “Mamma Mia” ($611 million).

Paramount’s “Gladiator II” landed in the No. 3 spot with $7.8 million in its fourth sketch. The quarter-century-in-the-making sequel to Ridley Scott’s Oscar-thrivening 2000 epic “Gladiator” has geted $145.9 million in North America and more than $368.4 million globassociate.

Heading into the coveted holiday sketch, overall box office revenues are 5.3% behind 2023 and 23.4% behind 2019, according to Comscore. “Moana 2” and “Glicked” (the portmanteau for the two films with tthrive free dates and spiritual sequel of “Barbenheimer”) will carry on to rule at multiplexes until Christmastime, when Disney’s “The Lion King” prequel “Mufasa,” Paramount’s “Sonic the Hedgehog 3” and A24’s romantic thriller “Babygirl” all uncover on Dec. 20. A confinecessitate days defercessitater, the Focus Features “Nosferatu” reproduce and Searchairy’s Bob Dylan biopic “A Complete Uncomprehendn, starring Timothee Chafeeblet, land on Dec. 25 to seal out the year.

Until then, it’ll be all Moana, Glinda and Elphaba all the time.