The death of the superhero genre
It has been said for years since the COVID-19 pandemic, but it finally appears to have become true: Superhero movies, as presently constructed, are dead.
Marvel has struggled since Avengers: Endgame wrapped up its decadelong narrative told over multiple films in a satisfying bow in 2019. Since then, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been cluttered with shows and movies that range from forgettable — do you remember Eternals? — to terrible, such as the fourth installment in the Thor franchise, with exceptions few and far between.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps was supposed to reignite the MCU. The costumes and the set design looked good, and even social media commentators who had grown sick of the MCU’s lazy and politicized content gave it good reviews. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an 86% critic score and a 91% audience score. By all accounts, it is a good film.
But it isn’t a successful one. On a reported budget of $200 million, the film needs around $500 million to break even for Disney. It is projected to finish between $500 million and $510 million globally, meaning it would barely break even at the box office, assuming that the budget isn’t higher than reported, thanks to the all-too-expensive reshoots that plague the superhero film genre these days.