From Aquaman 2 to The Marvels, 5 Upcoming Superhero Movies of 2023 and Why We are Worried About Their Box Office Fates

Superhero movies are on a downward slump recently from a box office point-of-view (and even quality). Aside from a few hits here and there like The Batman and the recently released Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3, few films have been able to meet much success as they used to pre-COVID, and post-pandemic these films just haven’t hit well. The Flash Box Office: From Ezra Miller's Controversies to Constant Delays, 5 Major Reasons Why the DC Film is Failing to Find Success Worldwide.

With the much-hyped The Flash being a complete bomb at the box-office and joining the likes of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and Black Adam, it doesn’t look the audience has a superhero fatigue, but rather they have a fatigue of bad superhero movies. So, with five more comic book movies left to release in 2023, let’s take a look at the situation surrounding them and why their box-office fates might be worrying as well.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem

The upcoming TMNT: Mutant Mayhem has insane talent attached to it. With Seth Rogen writing it to the film having an incredible voice cast, the film should be summer’s go to animated adventure following Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse’s success, however the marketing has just been non-existent. Many don’t exactly know that a new TMNT film is coming out, and that’s surely set to hurt the box-office legs even if the quality of the film is top-notch.

Blue Beetle

The main issue that Blue Beetle faces right now is that its coming right after The Flash. If anything, The Flash’s box-office is a cautionary tale like no other, and considering DC as a brand desperately need a hit, Blue Beetle will be needing a good word-of-mouth to even pull in any money. He is a relatively niche character from the comics who is famous with the more hardcore fans, but the general audience doesn’t know him and that’s certainly to cause an issue. While Xolo Maridueña’s casting has the element of a familiar face attached to it, Blue Beetle will definitely need a lot more than that.

Kraven the Hunter

Aside from Venom and its sequel, Sony has only had one other film release in its Spider-Man centric cinematic universe, and that film is Morbius, one of the biggest box-office flops for last year. Considering the qualities of these movies so far have ranged from dumb fun to mind-numbing watches, the odds for Kraven the Hunter don’t really seem that impressive even with the casting of Aaron Taylor-Johnson. And with these films not having Spider-Man in them as well, it’s a bit hard to see why audiences would want to devote their time to these movies.

The Marvels

The first Captain Marvel made a billion at the box-office, but it looks like that won’t be the same case for The Marvels. Coming more than four years after the first movie, Marvel’s pull just isn’t the same anymore considering their Phase Four and Phase Five projects have been a bit mixed in quality to say the least. The Marvels will have to be really good and deliver a worthwhile adventure for it to even be huge, and that’s an uphill battle which the film will have to go through. Thankfully, with the inclusion of Iman Vellani and Teyonah Parris alongside Brie Larson, The Marvels will at least have a lot of buzz during its release.

Aquaman and The Lost Kingdom

Just like Captain Marvel the first Aquaman made a billion worldwide, however things aren’t looking that good for its upcoming sequel. Having been delayed to eternity and there being rumours that the film hasn’t tested well at all at early screening, Aquaman and The Lost Kingdom is looking to be dead-on-arrival more as the days go on. With the film scheduled to come out in December, there has hardly been a single piece of marketing that has been released yet aside from a few stills and it coming off the heels of The Flash as well, things aren’t fairing well for the Jason Momoa-starrer. From The Flash to Black Adam, 7 Much-Hyped Superhero Movies That Flopped at the Box Office Post-COVID Lockdown.

Whatever it may be, here is hoping that these films do indeed turn out to be good and have good box-office legs. Recent superhero movies like Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 and Across the Spider-Verse have proven that audiences will go to the theatres for good films, and here is hoping that same is the case for these films.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jun 23, 2023 07:11 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).