Transformers 7 sells well worldwide, but may not be very profitable

After the prequel story of Bumblebee, "Transformers: The Rise of the Power Rangers" once again set off a robot frenzy.

In North America, "Transformers: Rise of the Power Rangers" (hereinafter referred to as "Transformers 7") premiered more than $60 million, won the weekend box office by a narrow margin, and achieved a rebound based on "Bumblebee".

Previously, Box Office Pro data had predicted that the North American box office of "Transformers 7" was expected to be between $30 million and $40 million, or would continue to set a new low in the Transformers series, which did not seem to happen. At the same time, "Transformers 7" also earned more than $100 million overseas, replacing "Spider-Man: Across the Universe" to top the global list.

But on the other side of the coin, after the production cost of "Transformers 7" soared to $195 million compared to its predecessor, Paramount's profit target is still under pressure.

In the first week, the winner narrowly won the championship, and the media audience received mixed reviews

According to The-Numbers, "Transformers 7" earned a total of $8.8 million in the early session, including $1.2 million on Wednesday screenings and $7.6 million in subsequent zero screenings. That's higher than Transformers 5: The Last Knight ($5.5 million) and close to Transformers 4: Rebirth ($8.8 million).

Subsequently, "Transformers 7" was rolled out to 3,678 theaters in North America, and the box office soared to $25.65 million on the first day, driving the broader market to increase by more than 205% month-on-month, beating "Spider-Man: Across the Universe" to win the first place; But then "Transformers 7" fell by 25% and 17% respectively, and was surpassed by "Spider-Man: Across the Universe" in terms of ranking, showing the tendency of family flow.

In the past three days, "Transformers 7" earned a total of $61.05 million, and the revenue from a single library reached $16,600, narrowly beating "Spider-Man: Across the Universe" to top the list. That's nearly three times the same period ($21.65 million) for Bumblebee and better than the weekend earnings of Transformers 5: The Last Knight ($44.68 million), which actually had a Wednesday release date.

From the perspective of word of mouth, the freshness of "Transformers 7" on Rotten Tomatoes is as low as 53%, which is on the same level as "Fast and Furious 10" (56%), but it is still much higher than the series 2 to 5, and the mainstream media recognizes the human characters in the film more; At the same time, "Transformers 7" has a popcorn index of 91%, plus a score of 6.6 (16,000 reviews) on IMDb, which shows that the audience still has a positive attitude towards the film.

After the first weekend, "Transformers 7" received $5.16 million on Monday, which was still firmly suppressed by "Spider-Man: Across the Universe", but slightly better than the same period figure of "Transformers 5: The Last Knight".

"Transformers 7" is directed by Stephen Kapoor Jr., starring Anthony Ramos and Dominic Fishback, and voiced by Peter Cullen, Ron Pullman, Peter Dinklage, Michelle Yeoh, Pete Davidson and Coleman Domingo.

In fact, many of the styling and settings of "Transformers 7" continue "Bumblebee", and the timeline tells that in the 90s of the last century, the ultimate villain drove the fear beast to set off the earth crisis, and finally awakened the dormant Big Mac, united with the Autobots to transform and set off, an unprecedented decisive battle is about to be staged.

Facing the positive challenge of "Transformers 7", "Spider-Man: Universe" fell 54% to $55.51 million the following week, and the cumulative box office increased to more than $225 million, which has exceeded the overall score of "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse"; "The Little Mermaid" continued to earn $23.15 million, and the Nuggets were slightly behind "Aladdin" and still on track to reach the $300 million goal.

"Past Life" produced by A24 expanded to 26 theaters, and the weekend box office rose 124% to $520,000, surpassing "You Hurt Me" into the top 10 of the list; South Korea's top seed Crime City 3 edged down 20%, earning nearly $480,000 in bi-weekly earnings.

Under the combined force of "Transformers 7" and "Spider-Man: Across the Universe", the North American weekend market closed at $165 million, maintaining above the 100 million yuan line for 10 consecutive weeks. As of the 12th, the total monthly box office in North America rose to $489 million, which has exceeded fifty percent of last year's full-month revenue ($969 million).

Even if it is strong globally, it is not necessarily profitable

This thrilling victory in the first week of "Transformers 7" and surpassing the opening results of "Bumblebee" and "Transformers 5: The Last Knight", which is expected to reverse the dilemma of the series since Part 2; The aforementioned two local films closed at $127 million and $130 million respectively, so "Transformers 7" should try to get closer to $150 million. After the North American box office basically met expectations, the focus of "Transformers 7" fell overseas.

According to Comscore, "Transformers 7" has landed in 69 countries and regions, and the revenue outside North America has reached $110 million. Specifically, mainland theaters threw out with $40 million, the second highest opening for Hollywood movies this year, but in turn, it was 32% lower than "Bumblebee" in the same period; If you subtract this input, "Transformers 7" still has about $70 million overseas, which is 36% higher than "Bumblebee".

Markets such as Mexico ($7.3 million), Indonesia ($5.3 million) and Peru ($5 million) performed well, with the latter also having the best local premiere numbers in 2023.

Transformers 7 will make its way to Australia and New Zealand in late June, and its last big city, Japan, in early August. If Bumblebee's global revenue ($465 million) is benchmarked, Transformers 7 has a chance to challenge $500 million, but catching up with Transformers 5: The Last Knight ($603 million) may be difficult.

Transformers 5: The Last Knight

It is worth mentioning that the production cost of "Transformers 7" soared to $195 million, much higher than the shooting budget of "Bumblebee" ($102 million), and returned to the level of films 2 to 5 in the series. From this point of view, "Transformers 7" may only barely recoup the huge investment, and will not bring significant profits to Paramount.

In fact, the situation of "Transformers 7" is not a special case in the summer file, and Disney's "The Little Mermaid" is also facing "difficulty in returning to the original". According to the statistics of Xinghang News Agency, "The Little Mermaid" was released in Japan on the 9th, mobilizing 461,000 people in the first three days, and the box office reached 712 million yen (equivalent to 5.11 million US dollars) in the first week. This ranks third among imported films this year, behind Super Mario Bros. Movies and Fast and Furious 10.

In Disney's animated adaptation of live-action works, "The Little Mermaid" opened with similar results to the first two days of "The Lion King" (728 million yen), which ended with 6.67 billion yen, so it seems that "The Little Mermaid" is expected to attack 5 billion yen.

The Little Mermaid

After accounting for Japanese revenues, "The Little Mermaid" has accumulated $185 million overseas and will move towards a target of $250 million; with a North American expectation of more than $300 million, "The Little Mermaid" will be anchored globally at around $600 million, but it is insufficient compared to the net cost of $250 million.

Among them, it is worth taking out separately is "Fast and Furious 10", which ranks in the top three of the year with $654 million and will have a high probability of breaking through the $700 million mark, but because the film cost $340 million to build, it is still expected to record losses in theaters, even higher than "Transformers 7" and "The Little Mermaid".

"Fast and Furious 10"

Throughout the summer, the only major projects that have been determined to be profitable are "Guardians of the Galaxy 3" and "Spider-Man: Across the Universe", highlighting the high degree of competition in key viewing seasons. Since mid-May, at least one blockbuster has been released in North America every week, and there has even been an arrangement of "The Flash" and "Crazy Element City" "crashing" on the same day.

A compact release plan can undoubtedly maintain the popularity of the market, but it will inevitably lead to the revenue of each film being eroded by each other, indirectly reducing the return on investment of a single project. As the pattern gradually enters the middle of this summer, the white-knuckle battle between Hollywood studios will continue.