We've had a lot of folks all over the internet
be like, Marvel is failing, Marvel is failing,
and Marvel, oh, it's there, there, there. The
thing about us fans is first off, we have weird
short -term memory and we also have some weird
Mandela effects that kind of happen with us.
And so I want to talk about the business of the
MCU as a franchise and what they really did.
And because I'm a big nerd, I made a big spreadsheet,
okay, yesterday. Why? Because I'm a nerd. Okay.
So we're going to talk about this for a second,
but just to kind of demonstrate my point, right?
I'm going to bring up a movie, a couple of movies
and nobody, no looking it up. All right. Okay.
But what I want to bring up is a couple of points
and Jay, without looking it up, how much move
money, right? Did Captain America, the first
Avenger, you remember Captain America, the first
Avenger. That was a great movie. Right. It's
great. Yeah. How much did it do at the box office?
Oh, God, what year did that come out? Box office.
2010. Oh, God, I don't know. 2010. OK, so that
was early. That was that was definitely early.
I'm going to say. I feel like it's going to be
a very low number. I'm going to say 80. I'm going
to say 80 million. OK, you're way off there.
Right. But it did it did three hundred and seventy
million and some change. Right. OK. Which was
way less than Iron Man. Way less than stuff.
Yeah. Chat was like five hundred billion. Nope.
Three hundred and seventy, which, by the way,
is less than Captain America, Brave New World
or the Thunderbolts made in the box office. Right.
It made less money than Thunderbolts did or Cap
four. Okay, this is why I say if I would have
said to you what made more money Captain America
first Avenger or Captain America brave new world.
What is your instinct? Say Captain America brave
new world. Yeah, how much money did Captain Marvel
make everybody wants to say Captain Marvel was
a big old flop How much money did Captain Marvel
make in the box office? Absolutely I I thought
it was a flop. Everyone was mad. They're like,
oh, we have a female superhero. Females can't
be superheroes. Oh, this is so mad where it's
woke. How much did Captain Marvel make at the
box office? Well, now I now I'm worried about
my numbers. Four hundred million. One point one
billion dollars. Oh, wow. That is actually really
surprising. OK, Captain Marvel. made $1 .1 billion
in the box office. We don't remember. So now
we're going to bring up my cool, cool spreadsheet.
And we're going to look at the MCU phase by phase
real quick. And what I did is I tallied every
box office that has been done by phase. And how
much money Marvel averaged per film by phase.
We're going to talk about this real quick, okay?
Phase one, Iron Man, Incredible Hulk, Iron Man
2, Thor, Captain America, and the Avengers to
close out phase one, right? Incredible Hulk,
not necessarily a flop per se, okay? Because
the budget wasn't that high. Not huge they averaged
635 million per movie most of that dragged up
by the 1 .5 billion that the Avengers made Okay
Phase two it gets higher. We got Iron Man 3 Thor
the Dark World, right? Captain America Winter
Soldier Guardians of the Galaxy Avengers Age
of Ultron and Ant -Man. Okay, and with it with
phase two, they average 878 million eight almost
eight hundred seventy nine million per flick
okay now we keep going phase three this is where
marvel hits its stride and this is where i think
the mandela effect comes into play okay because
phase three was banger after banger after banger
after banger cap civil war dr strange guardians
2 spider -man homecoming thor ragnarok black
panther uh Avengers Infinity War, Ant -Man of
the Wasp, Captain Marvel, Avengers Endgame, Spider
-Man Far From Home. That was, that was phase
three. Right? And they just blew it up. Okay?
They just, it was huge. Huge. Okay? Because you
had, what, six movies in phase three that did
more than a billion dollars. Including Captain
Marvel. Right? Phase four, they take, now here's
the thing, and this is the thing that I want
people to think about for the business of this
thing. You weren't going to redo phase three
in phase four, okay? Like you hit such a stride
in phase three that anything was going to be
a letdown after phase four, or after phase three.
It just was. So you had Black Widow, Shang -Chi,
Eternals, which I think Marvel really counts
as its first financial flop because the budget
was massive. on the Eternals and it did not do
well in the box office. Only $402 million. Spider
-Man, No Way Home, Doctor Strange, Will 2 vs.
Madness, Thor, Love and Thunder, Black Panther,
Wakanda Forever. That's all your Phase Four movies.
$815 million per film. Okay. And then we get
into Phase Five, which is the one that everybody
kind of bluzz on, right? Ant -Man and the Wasp,
Quantum Media, Guardians 3, Right? The Marvels,
which did flop, it was their second real flop.
Deadpool and Wolverine, Captain America Brave
New World, and Thunderbolts. They're still averaging
in that phase $610 million per film. Right? That's
a lot of money. It's a lot of money. Is it a
step down? Absolutely. Is Marvel worried about
it? No. No, they're not. Not really. And now
you've got the start of phase six, which started
with Fantastic Four New Steps. I have got this
highlighted at 491 million because it's not out
of theaters yet, right? So as of yesterday, it
was at 491 million, 904, 286. I think it's going
to break 500, right? By the time it leaves this
theatrical run. Yeah. So. For every film that
they have made, they have gotten a total box
office of $32 ,475 ,550 ,762 in 37 movies. $32
billion. That is an average of $877 ,717 ,588
per movie. Which brings me to kind of my greater
point, okay Which is this Marvel is arguably
the most successful film franchise that's ever
been done There are 37 movies in and they've
made 32 billion dollars, right? No, but I I cannot
think of a scenario of anybody who's going to
make that kind of a franchise run that Kevin
Feige did and is still doing right like it's
just it's not that now before chat hits me because
i knew i knew somebody chat was going to go what
about star wars okay star wars is the movie That
Star Wars is the franchise that you could argue
Has done better financially, right? Looking at
the 11 wide release Star Wars movies that have
been released. They've there's 11 movies They've
grossed ten point three billion dollars for an
average of nine hundred and forty million per
movie Okay You can make an argument for Star
Wars right but but You can make an argument for
Star Wars But they don't have the track run of
37 films that Marvel has and Star Wars has been
around since 1977 the MCU started 2008 Okay in
17 years. They've made 32 billion dollars. So
what's that about 1 .8 billion a year in revenue?
So so that's where where I want to kick it over
to you Jay, right? And ask, when I break it down
this way, and based on kind of a lot of the commentary
we've heard and things like that, what does this
make you think about this? As far as franchises
go, putting your MBA, working on MBA hat on.
Well, I would say, I think it would be Oh, I
think it'd be a little unfair only to look at
movies because I will say I do remember Star
Wars when I was a kid and Episode 1 2 3 came
out There was so much merch that came along with
it like Star Wars Pepsi cans. That's people still
have by the way Star Wars everything So much
Star Wars So I think Star Wars also brought in
a lot of merch. Star Wars also has this like
never ending spinoff TV series going on right
now, both animated and live action. Looking just
at movies, I would say Star Wars should be doing
better. With less movies, because. They did start
in nineteen seventy seven. And what you're going
to run into is now you're going to have parents
taking their children to go see Star Wars. So
you have that kind of already that like nostalgic
like, oh, like I grew up watching Star Wars.
I want to take my kids to watch Star Wars. Marvel
coming out. What? 2010, you said. Don't super
have that or it's not. Well established yet.
I would say I'm here soon. I think it'll start
kicking in but Yeah, um, that's my thought, okay
So I'm going to address a couple of things in
the chat really quick. People who are asking
questions that are tangential to this. All right,
Superman, which again has not finished this theatrical
run. You can still see it in theaters. As of
today is at six hundred and six million six fifty
eight seven ninety two worldwide. So it's well
into profitability. It's 60 million over where
it needed to be profitability wise. I think we
talked about that a couple of weeks ago. It's
doing fine for a brand new DCU where the DCEU
ran the franchise into the fucking dirt, right?
And you've got to build back a lot of goodwill
from the audience. Superman did better than it
needed to to do that. It's a very good start
for the DCU. Very good start. to answer another
question. People are talking about adjusting
for inflation. I used to think of it that way.
And then I hit again. I talk about this podcast
a lot. Mr. John Campia, he does a really good
editorial on why he doesn't use adjusted for
inflation. And I agree with it. Right. So for
the longer version of what I'm about to say,
go watch his editorial on this. But the fact
of the matter is, is the reason it's hard to
do adjust for inflation is this. If you look
at adjusted for inflation, people talk about
Gone with the Wind, right? Okay. How long was
Gone with the Wind in theaters? Probably like
36 years, right? It was like the only movie.
Two and a half years. It was in theaters for
two and a half years. Nothing's in theaters for
two and a half years. Who knows how much money
can be made? And what that brings about is this.
At various iterations of time, Where people spent
money and where people spent their entertainment
hours varied heavily, okay? Movies now are not
just competing with other movies. It's not like
the 1990s when episode one came out where everybody
had a smartphone in their pocket and they could
spend their time watching Netflix, YouTube and
not leave the fucking house, right? In a post
COVID era with the cost of movie tickets these
days and the number of tickets that are sold,
et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. trying to figure
out all the various economic factors that go
into should we adjust this for inflation? And
again, if Gone With The Wind came out today,
would it sell as many tickets as it did in the
1930s when it came out? And I have to say the
answer is probably no. Right. So that's why I,
you know, using just the raw box office numbers
is still probably just the best metric to use.
The other question is do they do well in the
theater take the Star Wars sequels because everyone
goes to a movie like that hoping to do something
good So here's the thing and this is you could
pretty well bear this out If people don't like
a movie, they don't go back and movies people
don't go back to don't make billions Right. You
can say rightfully that the the fandom as we
move through the sequel trilogy It lost steam.
Force Awakens did two billion plus. Episode eight
only did one point three billion. Episode nine
only did a billion. And so they went down as
it went. So. Again, it's Star Wars, so everybody's
going to it's cultural. Everyone's going to see
it, but you see it with episode seven. Everybody
went back and back and back and back and back
to see episode seven Whereas you didn't get that
kind of run back with episode eight and nine
It was one of those were just everybody fucking
saw it. So that's that's where I would break
that down There's also yes somebody else brought
this in there's a fewer second -run theaters
I don't know if you remember this when you were
a kid Jay But I know I know it was a thing when
I was a kid where you had primary run theaters
where they did their first part of their theatrical
run and then second run theaters where After
they left the primary there was still time to
go see them in theaters a kind of budget theaters,
right? Those don't really exist anymore. They're
gone. Those businesses just don't happen Well,
it also just doesn't make sense because now we
Now you can get movies to streaming services
as well as out on blu -ray or whatever a lot
quicker than those if that's why that kind of
the cheaper Market kind of for moviegoers kind
of existed because there is such a long period
before they would come out on VHS six months
on average And that's the other thing is a lot
of the the movie studios and now Disney I think
has learned from this you'll saw it last year,
right? Where they started extending their theatrical
runs again and going look we're not putting this
on Disney plus Thunderbolts just got to Disney
plus I think this week right and They have really
extended their theatrical windows and I think
that that's good because a lot of the studios
have trained the audience Eh, I'll just wait
until it comes to streaming in two months, which
I think is one of the reasons why the raw number
of tickets go down, right? And yeah, movie theaters
these days are a real hard proposition when the
cost of tickets, half the cost of voting in the
movie, I'd rather just wait and buy the movie.
And I think that that's a lot of people's attitude
now. And I think that's why you're seeing certain
movies flop, right? Where unless it's like an
event movie, not as many people are going. Right.
I've seen a lot of good movies in the in the
theaters. We've talked about this much this year
that were great movies that fucking nobody saw.
That sucks. So but would you argue, do you think
that what Feige has done with Marvel can be replicated?
Can be replicated. Thirty seven movies averaging
almost a billion dollars a movie, almost 900
million, let's be fair. I, I think it, I personally
think it could, but I don't think anyone is going
to have the drive to do it, to be honest, because
to go through that many movies, I mean, keep
in mind a lot of people like to kind of come
in, get their success off of one project or maybe
a couple of projects. They move on to something
else. And you need some sort of consistency.
And I think that's kind of what DC has kind of
really struggled with. But yeah, I think it could
be done. I don't think anyone actually wants
to put in the work to do it, though. That makes
sense. It absolutely makes sense. And again,
that's why, again, I could say you can arguably
say that the MCU is the most the most successful
franchise of all time. Right. It just is. And
anybody who thinks that, you know, the other
thing I wanted to break down on this, and this
is, again, why I think it is. Let's look at what's
coming. All right. Phase six. OK. We have Fantastic
Four First Steps, which is out. Right. The next
movie is Spider -Man Brand New Day. Does anybody
think that movie is not going to make a billion
dollars? Avengers Doomsday. So far, an Avengers
movie has never not made a billion dollars. Marvel
has a hold spot on a movie, on a film next July
that nobody knows what it is. Nobody knows if
it's a hold spot or what they're doing. I suspect
it's Doctor Strange 3. Right. And it's going
to come out between Doomsday and Secret Wars,
much like Ant -Man and the Wasp came out between
Infinity War and Endgame and introduced the quantum
tunnel and the quantum realm and all the shit
they needed for for Endgame. I think it's I think
it's the next Doctor Strange. But again, and
do you think Avengers Secret Wars is not going
to make a billion dollars? Okay They're gonna
average more than a billion dollars in phase
six per movie Okay, he's gonna be up right around
40 billion by the time he gets to the end of
phase six So Yeah, anyway, let us know what you
think in the comments below Do you think it's
the most successful franchise of all time or
what do you guys think? Let us know