Earlier this month, Borderlands arrived in theaters to horrendous reviews and bad box office numbers. At the time, many assumed it might be the biggest cinematic dud of 2024. But, that title is now held by the newly released Crow reboot.
The idea of rebooting The Crow was already a strange and controversial one. Sure, the original 1994 film was a small but profitable hit, but it is more widely known for the tragedy surrounding the death of Brandon Lee during its production. The following sequels to the OG Crow failed to find success. Most people believed it was wrong to even reboot the series. Yet, Hollywood went ahead and made a reboot anyway. And what do you know, it’s flopping hard!
The Crow reboot released on August 23 to negative reviews from critics and moviegoers. After its opening weekend, it only earned $4.6 million domestically at the box office. Yikes! In comparison, Borderlands made over $8.5 million during its first weekend.
After about five days in theaters, The Crow has made less than $10 million. Meanwhile, Borderlands—which is reportedly already getting a home release in late August—is sitting at a cool $25 million worldwide at the box office.
Problems 1 and 2 are: no-one thought this was a good idea when they were announced and that turned out to be the case. Not letting people know was them cutting their losses - Borderlands ad spend was very much lower than a film of that budget should have had and it’s likely down to the fact that they knew it’d crash and burn so they didn’t want to throw good money after bad.
I thought it was a good idea when it was Jason Momoa as The Crow but that’s just cause I think he is a secret emo and it would have been funny.