Indiana Jones dials “U” for underwhelming box office

Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny, Disney’s latest attempt at dredging the I.P. swamps for the most recognizable character the studio could build a Volume Stage around, isn’t the artifact of box office hope the Mouse House expected. Whipping up $24 million in domestic ticket sales, Variety projects the movie will fall somewhere in the $60 million range over the weekend, which is about as well as The Flash. While many viewers may be saving the fireworks display of a de-aged Harrison Ford for the Fourth of July, these projections reflect the opinion many have had since the film’s Cannes premiere: Indiana Jones belongs in a museum.

In May, critics first turned The Dial Of Destiny at France’s most famous film festival. Though many expressed the polite opinion of “Sure, we guess that’ll do,” the movie received its obligatory Cannes’ five-minute standing ovation. Mixed reviews followed, and if the “B+” CinemaScore has anything to say (versus the “A-” frickin’ Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken received), audiences aren’t digging The Dial Of Destiny as much as many hoped—at least not at the levels that audiences should for a movie that cost a reported $295 million and features the words “Indiana Jones” in the title. However, it’s not like CinemaScore means everything. DreamWorks likely assumed they would take a bath on Kraken, considering they opened it against Jones and its 4,600 theaters, but Variety reports the Teenage Kraken “doesn’t have any hope to recoup its $70 million production budget” either.

So what happened? Superhero fatigue? Bad trailers? Audiences still burned after they helped Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull gross nearly $800 million at the worldwide box office? It’s hard to say because Disney hasn’t had a bonafide hit that didn’t require an asterisk this year. But it speaks to a downturn in excitement for Disney’s never-ending intellectual property parade. The last season of The Mandalorian came and went; Quantumania hit with a thud; Elemental is another box office bust for Pixar; The Little Mermaid is bottoming out below all other “live-action” remakes except Dumbo; and Secret Invasion is also on television. Even the Disney stuff people like, such as Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3 and Andor, don’t seem to leave much of an impression. For example, Guardians did half as much business as Chris Pratt’s other 2023 hit: The Super Mario Bros. Movie.

Keep in mind; this is a Disney problem because recognizable I.P. is what people crave: Sony’s Across The Spider-Verse is shaping up to be the movie of the summer; Universal’s billion-dollar grosser, Super Mario Bros. is still this year’s biggest hit; and despite The Flash stumbling, the hype around Warner Bros.’ Barbie is very real. Maybe it’s time, and we mean this as constructively as possible, for Disney to turn off the sequel, remake, and reboot fire hose, and try something different. But who knows, maybe [sigh] a Haunted Mansion reboot will turn it all around.