Star Wars: The Force Awakens Completes Its Run at the Domestic Box Office at $936m!

Star-Wars-The-Force-Awakens-Empire-coverLast week, after a 6 month run in US theaters, Star Wars: The Force Awakens completed its historic run at the box office. Finishing with a domestic haul of $936m, it pulled in enough money to secure its place at the top of the charts for at least a while with an approximate lead of $160m over the second place film, Avatar.

 

 
While that 936 million was enough to put it at number one domestically, the movie only reached third all-time at the world wide box office. When international theaters are included, The Force Awakens pulled in a whopping $2.066. But, that number still puts it significantly behind James Cameron’s box office mega-hits Titanic at $2.187b and Avatar off in the distance at $2.788b.

 

The discrepancy between The Force Awakens’ #1 spot domestically and its #3 spot worldwide can obviously be attributed to lower interest in Star Wars in some key foreign markets. Avatar, whose historic success is often attributed to the birth of the new generation of 3D films, had a great showing in foreign markets like China. Avatar’s foreign box office accounts for nearly 73% of its total haul. Titanic sees similar numbers with a foreign percentage just under 70%. The Force Awakens meanwhile got just under 55% from foreign theaters.

 

 

What that means for the franchise going forward is anyone’s guess and will be the source of much speculation in the coming years. With some exceptions, sequels have a tendency to do less business than the original. This is especially clear in the Star Wars franchise itself where A New Hope and The Phantom Menace sit atop the box office mound for their respective trilogies.

 
With the increasing importance of the Chinese box office, could the growing familiarity with the property translate to a bigger foreign haul for the rest of the trilogy? Or will foreign audiences continue to deliver strong, but not all-time performance with domestic box office pulling more than its typical share of the weight. Conventional wisdom would tell you Episodes 8 and 9 will pull in marginally less than The Force Awakens, but with the emphasis on exposing the rest of the world to the galaxy far, far, away in order to grow the market there, only time will tell if that bears any fruit for the subsequent films

 

Avatar

 

Avatar is pretty safe in its 1st place spot, but there will inevitably be speculation about Disney and Lucasfilm looking to re-release the film to possibly overtake Titanic in the second spot and perhaps push it over the $1 billion mark domestically. While that would have been an easy bet even 5-10 years ago, with the current crowded box office schedule and a new Star Wars film coming out every year, there isn’t much time in which Lucasfilm could slip a re-release in ahead of Rogue One or Episode 8. Would Disney really want to sap audiences from Doctor Strange or Thor to do a pre-release run ahead of one of the upcoming films? Will there even be a huge demand for a re-release of the first film of the trilogy when it’s been less than a year since it was in theaters and there is a new movie coming out in a few weeks?

 
It’s possible that they will chip away at these things over time with small limited runs, marathons, and special screenings and then maybe do a big re-release towards the end of the trilogy. But by that time, some new movie may have been the first to pass that $1b mark, making the accomplishment less desirable.

 
No matter what happens, for now The Force Awakens is the king of the domestic box office. And, even if it isn’t the king or queen world-wide, it still has an honored place in the royal family’s court. Considering the risk that was taken on in restarting this franchise under new leadership, what was accomplished financially was nothing short of historic. So, as the film moves into retirement we salute The Force Awakens as the conquering hero of the domestic box office. Long may you reign.

 

 

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108 thoughts on “Star Wars: The Force Awakens Completes Its Run at the Domestic Box Office at $936m!

  • June 8, 2016 at 6:45 pm
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    Not bad for the 7th film of a franchise. Titanic and Avatar were worldwide phenomenas that were released multiple times to reach their final tallies.

    • June 8, 2016 at 8:01 pm
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      The 7th Fast and Furious movie, release last year as well, actually outgrossed TFA internationally believe it or not. TFA is actually the 4th most popular movie internationally.

      • June 8, 2016 at 8:19 pm
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        It’s the 4th highest when not counting the US. The Worldwide gross includes the US, because the US is in the world last time I checked.

        • June 8, 2016 at 8:28 pm
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          That’s why I said internationally not worldwide.

          • June 8, 2016 at 9:00 pm
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            Asians and Middle Easterners love those F&F movies for whatever reason. Star Wars has always had a much stronger audience in the West and TFA’s results internationally are comparable to previous SW films relative to what they did in the US and UK.

          • June 8, 2016 at 9:17 pm
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            The previous star wars films were released decades ago, and the last 5 were made independently with small scale production. There hadn’t been a star wars movie in theaters for over 10 years when TFA came out. The film economy has changed a lot, and although percentage wise TFA performed like its predecessors, that model no longer works for a modern blockbuster. Which is fine, it just doesn’t mean star wars will be the cultural phenomenon on the scale it was in the 20th century.

          • June 8, 2016 at 11:44 pm
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            The prequel trilogy were not small scale productions by any stretch of the imagination. And they were only 10-16 years prior to TFA. The Phantom Menace was was the most anticipated film release of all time, having been 16 years after Jedi. The prequels each had budgets of over 100 million, with extensive global marketing campaigns.

          • June 9, 2016 at 2:50 am
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            I never said prequels, I am referring to previous 5 sequels to the original Star Wars. The last 3 came out 10-16 prior to TFA, who’s arguing that? My point is so much has changed since then, as was the case between ROTJ and TPM. The difference then was that TPM was made independently of a hollywood studio, the same as the last two sequels at the time. TPM-ROTS had a bigger budget than the previous sequels, but no where near record breaking 200+ million budget some blockbusters were pushing. (heck Pirates of the Caribbean 3 cost nearly 300 milllion) But beyond money, Lucas did continue his creative costs cutting way of filming. Never building full sets, or full scale ships like the Falcon. Prior to TFA, there had never been that much of the Falcon, or any ship, built a star wars production. I do think that, even adjusting for inflation, these Star Wars movies are getting a budget and scale of production that we have never seen. And as a result they will be expected to preform well. This was a delight for Lucas, but never a goal for him. Box office performance concerns is one of the reasons he sold the company, this was not something he wanted to worry about.

          • June 9, 2016 at 5:08 am
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            So what were the other 3 sequels to the original Star Wars before TFA besides Empire and Jedi? The fact that Lucas made them independently had little bearing on the extent of their distribution and promotion worldwide. They were comparable budget and promotion-wise to most other big studio movies of their time. Lucas simply had the financial means to fund them comparably to what a major studio could do. No, it they weren’t the biggest, but compare them to another effects-heavy studio trilogy made at the same time – The Lord of the Rings- which spent roughly 94 million per movie – a good 20 million less than each prequel. And they had massive sets and models, and huge casts and crew.

      • June 8, 2016 at 9:16 pm
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        There’s no accounting for taste.

        • June 8, 2016 at 9:18 pm
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          From a certain point of view, some would say Star Wars has no taste. Were just talking numbers and butts in the seats here.

          • June 8, 2016 at 9:26 pm
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            Ask me if I care.

          • June 8, 2016 at 9:39 pm
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            Then why are you reading this? Why did you even click on this article?

          • June 8, 2016 at 10:23 pm
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            Why did you click the article DB? Go F yourself your F&F crap, this is a SW site.

          • June 8, 2016 at 11:47 pm
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            LOL. So sensitive…

          • June 9, 2016 at 12:22 am
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            Stop projecting.

  • June 8, 2016 at 7:08 pm
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    Wow, it made a lot of money, must be a good movie…

    • June 8, 2016 at 8:57 pm
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      I love 3-comma tequila

      • June 8, 2016 at 9:15 pm
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        ..

  • June 8, 2016 at 8:25 pm
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    The 7th Fast and Furious movie, release last year as well, actually outgrossed TFA internationally believe it or not. TFA is actually the 4th most popular movie internationally. The real problem is if Disney isn’t able to increase the foreign appeal. Presumably every star wars film after TFA will have 1/2 to 2/3 of the domestic box office. If the trend continues, and the subsequent films foreign box office does climb above 55% of the total then Disney will need to rethink the forecast and production budgets. The last three films foreign box office wasn’t much more than the domestic, although they were made independently and for much less money. This percentage will not work wit 21st century hollywood studios. I also wonder how age range broke down for TFA, the domestic to foreign ratio, might point to a problem that the people going to see star wars movies are still primarily old fans, and its catching on less and less with new generations. I expect the strategy of focusing heavily on the oldest films, and completely ignoring the prequels to change. If you think about the Star Wars film that the average Chinese fan is most familiar with is ROTS, which was in no way connected with TFA.

    • June 8, 2016 at 8:50 pm
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      “The real problem is if Disney isn’t able to increase the foreign appeal.”
      .
      I call for auto-tuned Chinese pop-stars to be clumsily inserted into every SW film released internationally, preferably in between the 2nd and 3rd acts, bringing the plot to a screeching halt.

    • June 8, 2016 at 9:23 pm
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      Disney doesn’t seem to be focusing on the old fans, they believe these old fans are dumb and will swallow anything that has the old spaceships and stormtroopers. their strategy is entirely focused on the young adult female audience, it’s not a coincidence that both TFA and Rogue One have a young posh thin white British girl as a lead.

      • June 8, 2016 at 9:32 pm
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        I can see that too. Unfortunately, I suspect that they weren’t successful at it. After another movie or two, it will be clear if any general audience fans stick around or they’re just left with the interests of the core. JJ’s attempt at this with the Star Trek franchise fell pretty flat after just the second movie. Changing up directors and crews will probably help keep perspectives fresh. Expanding the core should be their ultimate goal, but ignoring the previous generation of fans does not give me faith that they want this.

        • June 8, 2016 at 10:04 pm
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          Don’t you find it insane that after what JJ Abrams did to Star Trek, Kathleen Kennedy didn’t think about anybody else than this hack to make the first sequel? Obviously she knows he’s terrible, but all she wanted was a stupid sci-fi in space that makes money thanks to the hype. She figured JJ Abrams could provide her exactly what she needed, not what the fans wanted.

          • June 9, 2016 at 1:24 am
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            Nothing you say bears any resemblance to the truth. Ever. I had friends over the other night and we were reading through your comments in voices that sort of suggest what you probably sound like. It wasn’t flattering. We were laughing our asses off. You’re doing yourself no favors.

      • June 9, 2016 at 12:55 am
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        You do know in a Star Wars Universe the posh accent is the Imperial Basic which gives them a higher ranking?

        • June 9, 2016 at 1:26 am
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          You do realize that a girl dropped at age 6 on Jakku can’t have possibly developed this accent? Even the other girl, “on her own since 15”, I’m sure she would be talking like uneducated thugs not like a high rank Jedi.

          • June 9, 2016 at 1:44 am
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            Depends on whether the girl was tutored by previous imperials or not. Lor San Tekka comes to mind.

          • June 9, 2016 at 2:27 am
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            She looked 6 years old when she was abandonned on Jakku. Why would Lor San Tekka teach her literature but wouldn’t give her shelter? She was living like a rat, speaking like a duchess.

          • June 9, 2016 at 7:21 am
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            She also spoke Hutt, and Constable Embro’s language so she was exposed to many language.

          • June 9, 2016 at 5:01 pm
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            Yeah, that makes it even more unrealistic than just the accent. Drooped at 6 years old, has British high society accent, fluent in 6 million tongues. But that’s okay, Rey can do aaaaaaaaaaaaanything.

          • June 9, 2016 at 5:17 pm
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            Actually being on Jakku and under the care of a trader would give her ample opportunity to observe and learn the different languages spoken at the outpost

          • June 9, 2016 at 6:27 pm
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            She didn’t seem to be under the care of anybody. She was living inside walkers wreck and could barely feed herself.

          • June 9, 2016 at 7:02 pm
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            Well at a certain age she must have struck out on her own. However, she probably stayed mostly in the outpost during her formative years.

          • June 9, 2016 at 3:08 am
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            “You do realize that a girl dropped at age 6 on Jakku can’t have possibly developed this accent?”

            Why not? Neither you nor I have any idea who she came into regular contact with on a day-to-day basis. For all we know, most of the human inhabitants of Jakku speak with a British accent. You don’t know. I don’t know. So how is it that she “can’t have possibly” developed the accent?

      • June 9, 2016 at 1:25 am
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        From one of my earlier posts:

        All this anti-female stuff is garbage and betrays a serious fear of women. I’ve seen this manifest itself in many forms when it comes to nerd culture. I’ve seen it here. I’ve seen at gaming tournaments. I’ve seen it at comic conventions. If a girl is put forward as a main character, someone digs for the feminist agenda. If a girl in a story exhibits any sort of authority over a man, the entire piece is looked at as an attack on men. If a girl sits down for a game at a convention, the geeks fidget, sweat, and mutter about it. Then they get behind their keyboard and go ballistic with an anonymous username. It’s cowardly. It’s juvenile. It’s silly.

        It’s ironic (and a bit funny) that some of these people championing the cause of the he-man manly man are probably not exactly the paragons of masculinity that they hope to project. Again, it most likely comes back to massive discomfort around around women. I’m going to guess that some of the guys here can’t get a girl to come within 10 feet of them. No wonder they cry foul when one is featured as a main character. What a bunch of crybabies.

        Don’t be afraid. They don’t bite (usually). I’ve dated a slew of them. I married one of them. They’re pretty cool, actually.

        • June 9, 2016 at 1:35 am
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          Re: “can’t get a girl to come within 10 feet of them”
          There’s a nice one – assuming all “guys here” are straight.
          So by your logic (evidence by your response) – that makes you “anti-gay” and afraid of gays?

          Re: anti-female stuff
          Besides bragging of your conquering of women & marrying one ( & what the …. does that have to do with this?! ) – someone claims Disney made BOTH of their 2x new Star Wars movies have a female lead & draws the quite logical conclusion that they did that to appeal to young female target audience & you jump to the conclusion that that was said because someone’s “afraid of women”?!

          So you don’t think that Disney would decide characteristics of their actors to target a certain demographic that they’d like to attract to their movie/franchise?
          If you seriously believe that – you’re delusional.

          • June 9, 2016 at 2:41 am
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            What sort of morass of reasoning is this? First off, it’s barely legible. Go secure your GED before responding to anything I say.

            Your premise that I’m anti-gay (I’m not) because I assumed he was interested in women (however futile that interest) is laughable. Try again. I’m not sure what sort of Mickey Mouse logic you’re attempting to employ, but you sound new.

            Head back to minors. You’re a bit out of your league, here.

          • June 9, 2016 at 3:12 am
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            Re: “it’s barely legible”
            What – is the font blurry on your screen?
            I suspect reading comprehension difficulties on your part.

          • June 9, 2016 at 3:29 am
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            “I suspect reading comprehension difficulties on your part.”

            No. Rather, you have an apparent issue with proper sentence structure coupled with a love affair with the hyphen.

            This PlatinumStar fella isn’t making simple observations regarding Lucasfilm’s desire to reach a broader audience. Is Lucasfilm trying to expand their audience outside of their traditional core demographic? Sure. No one can really dispute that. But this guy is repeatedly bellyaching the fact that there is some nefarious feminist agenda being promoted through these films evidenced in the simple fact that there is a female lead. And that’s just silly. And silly ideas are going to be refuted and mocked. If I accuse PlatinumStar of misogyny, and I do, it’s because of much more than the one post you read. Go read some of his earlier posts. It’s tin-hat crazy.

            I think maybe you walked into the middle of a dialogue a bit longer than you realize.

            And I wasn’t bragging about any conquests. I did say that I dated a bunch of women and married one. For most guy my age, that would apply to them as well. Maybe it sounds like bragging to someone that doesn’t get out all that much (not saying you don’t), but it’s actually quite normal. And if that makes me weird, well, I’ve certainly been called worse.

          • June 9, 2016 at 4:02 am
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            Re: “apparent issue with proper sentence structure coupled with a love affair with the hyphen”
            I’ll admit that I’m lazy and will frequently write stream-of-conscious in discussion forums. I consider these more of a ‘conversation’ than some written document I’m producing. Stylistically similar to just ‘talking’ to someone.
            I didn’t think what I wrote was – ( hyphen, gotcha! 😉 ) incomprehensible.

            So fair enough on the “middle of a dialogue” suggestion.
            I was simply responding to what I read:
            1) Disney adding women leads – agreeing that that was intentional ( reason = demographic targeting )
            2) Your response about being anti-female & then suggesting guys here not getting women within 10 feet of them & how you’ve apparently got lots of women & married one
            Just seemed your response wasn’t appropriate to the previous comment, which I think many would agree with. As well, that it veered into some *other* direction.

            Now I understand that there’s a different, possibly deeper ( i.e. motivation of possible misogynistic comments ) discussion going on here. Will leave you two to that. 😉

            Re: Diversity
            Again, I’m all for it. I not complaining about female leads. Just calling out Disney for most likely focus-grouping their choices for a great many aspects of these movies. Asians, Latinos, Women all being added to lead roles in Star Wars movies = great! As long as casting decisions or story twists or such as made to shoe-horn demographic targeting in.
            Side note: Even at a young age I was very impressed with how original trilogy had a *princess* who wasn’t your typical “damsel in distress”. A strong, capable & frequently snarky female lead was refreshing going back to 1977.

            Diversity is also why I mentioned gays. Yes, following some *snark* directed at your for assuming all guys on here were clamouring & anxious for those “women within 10 feet”. 😉
            Gays are a minority / under-represented group that hasn’t been represented in Star Wars movie.
            No, I’m not suggesting shoe-horning in a gay character just for the sake of it. But if people complain about representing a broader swath of society, that’s a group that should be represented at some point.

            I’m fairly certain I’ve broken further web forum etiquette rules with the length of this response, but wanted to clarify my previous comment.
            [ Less hyphens, but only marginally less parentheses as a compromise 😉 ]

          • June 9, 2016 at 4:48 am
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            No worries on the length of your response. I’m not necessarily known for my brevity. : )

          • June 9, 2016 at 11:22 am
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            Im no so sure it was only a demographical decision to write Rey as a lead in SW. Two trilogies have already had male leads, so one more would’ve been utterly boring imo. I, as a white male was actually glad when I first heard they are trying to do sometime different with the saga, not just the typcial white male leads like Luke ot Anakin. I was like, either pick an alien or a woman, or else its really just the OT over again…

          • June 9, 2016 at 5:00 pm
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            It’s only boring if you have a lazy scriptwriter who isn’t capable of anything but copying the exact same story of ANH and ESB combined.

          • June 9, 2016 at 6:15 pm
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            Its not about the story, its about the ark of a character. Luke’s story was the archetype of the hero’s journey, rising from under to be the champion. Pretty much every movie does this formula. Anakin was almost the same in an anti-journey-ish way (although Anakin’s story was terribly written), and it was already boring imo. No matter who’s the screenwriter, if you have a male lead who’s story you are trying to tell in a trilogy, you have to go through a similar pattern, and eventually going to have a similar story, especially in SW.

            Bringing in a female character was a wise decision, and brought some variety to this already overmilked saga. As I said either some alien or a woman. Another male lead would’ve been utterly boring (plus we already have Han Solo & Luke, so who needs someone else?).

          • June 9, 2016 at 6:34 pm
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            Having male leads is boring now, you should stick to chick flicks then, that is the lamest excuse I’ve heard to justify these new female heroines. Do you think the Alien series, Resident Evil, Hunger Games and Divergent should have sequels with male leads otherwise it would be boring because so far it always had female leads?

          • June 9, 2016 at 7:47 pm
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            Stop twising my words, Im not saying male leads are boring in general. Having yet another male lead in the 7th epsiode of the saga, yes it would’ve been utterly boring, especially with heroes like Han Solo and Luke already in the sight.
            Do you have comprehension problems? Im not saying sequel should fck up continuity, im only pointing out how bringing something fresh into the saga after two trilogies, like a female lead was a good idea, and at least tried something different. The gender of the leads have absolutely nothing to do with a movie’s quality. If the movie is good, than even wookie lead would do it…

          • June 9, 2016 at 8:30 pm
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            I hear you on that. I was also looking forward to diff leads.
            The fact that they chose female leads for both new Star Wars films kind’a made me think that they were targeting demo to attract broader audience.
            Similarly with Rogue One adding Latino & Asian leads – demo target for broader appeal, particularly foreign markets.
            Again – I’m happy to see it, but just pointing out that Disney is very likely to focus-group/target demo to maximize $.

          • June 11, 2016 at 9:17 pm
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            I think with Rogue One it was demographic decision, but with TFA it was rather a creative decision.

          • June 11, 2016 at 9:43 pm
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            I’d buy that idea.

        • June 9, 2016 at 2:17 am
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          I haven’t surrendered my critical thinking to the feminist propaganda that is fed to us through a Star Wars movie unlike you Mr Beta. I have every right to ask why and who decided to intentionally cram Star Wars with this propaganda no matter how hard it is for you to read it. And I’m glad to hear you’re sharing it with your friends. The truth will prevail.

          • June 9, 2016 at 2:44 am
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            Yeah. Because there’s nothing more alpha than crying about women in a Star Wars movie. If I don’t have a problem with it, it’s because I don’t cry foul and start to worry about my masculinity if a girl is cast in the lead of a movie. That might be your issue, but it’s not mine.

            “I haven’t seen you come up with any counter-argument.”

            My responses to your inane comments are full of counter-arguments. Chock full. Full daily allowance of counter-arguments. Eat ’em up, boy.

          • June 9, 2016 at 11:14 am
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            As a male fan I was glad to see a woman jedi in a SW movie. Why is it feminist propaganda to have a woman lead?
            The 2 trilogies’ve had male leads, so one more would’ve eventually been boring imo.

          • June 9, 2016 at 5:05 pm
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            Rey is not just a female character in SW, she’s the poster child for the 3rd feminist wave and a Mary Sue. She “doesn’ t need nobody”, no man, no dad, no mom, non nothing. SHe knows everything without having to learn or train. From piloting the Falcon like Han Solo and Chewie never dreamed of to mastering Jedi arts that are supposed to require decades of training, like the mind trick and of course beaten the main antagonist in a lightsaber duel although she never used one and she learned about the Force only two hours ago! If she was a boy, it would be just as bad, but actually she got all these absurd skills only because of the feminist agenda.

          • June 9, 2016 at 6:04 pm
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            You are parroting the same thing over-and over again, while calling TFA unoriginal…
            However, I dont think it was a feminist agenda, it was rather bad writing to rush character developement. Or it will turn out that her memory’s been wiped out/altered and she is already a jedi master, or something like that…
            Still, I stand by my point. If Rey’s character would’ve been a male again, imo it would’ve been boring as fck and in that case TFA would’ve been really a copy paste of ANH.

          • June 9, 2016 at 6:30 pm
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            So Rey was a Jedi master at age 6, she knew the mind trick, was expert at lightsaber fighting, was an ace pilot but someone erased her memory and dumped her on Jakku. Now all of a sudden her sleeping skills awoke and she’s the master Jedi she was at 6, right? That is more than lazy writing that is retardation.

          • June 9, 2016 at 6:44 pm
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            Not really at age 6. What if she was dumped on Jakku only a couple of years before and her memory was altered to belive she spent her whole life there? Would’ve been a good twist…

            Btw Luke faced Vader, one of the strongest force users in canonic history after like 4 days of levitating rocks. Luke never trained with the lightsaber or with any meele weapon at all… Rey at least knew how to use the staff.
            You know why Luke defeated Vader in ep VI? Was it because he trained more with the lightsaber? Obviously not… He defeated Vader because he was trained MENTALLY to defeat his father. In ep V Luke was full of despair, fear and many-many questions. He wasnt ready yet, so Vader defeated him.
            In Ep VI Vader was the one who was struggling between light and dark, to obey his master or to save his son… He was the one full of questions and despair and Luke was the one who overcome his emotions, and thats why he won, not because he trained with the lightsaber to be level 100 space kung fu warrior. Its much more than that.

            I blame Lucas for this. In the PT he made it seem like in order to become a jedi you have to train as a kid with a retarded mini- lightsaber like a space ninja. The force is not about that. Its about controling your emotions and overcome your bad side. Rey overcome her feelings and defeated Kylo who was struggling over the weight of killing his father. Kylo lost his focus, Rey gained it. Rey wins. Simple as that.

          • June 9, 2016 at 7:25 pm
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            By trying hard to justify Rey’s skill with “erased memory” twists, you are only acknowledging that she is overpowered and has a set of skills she doesn’t deserve because she didn’t work for it. Rey didn’t train eiter mentally or physically, she doesn’t even know about the force and thinks Luke is a myth!
            Lucas stressed that to become a Jedi you need to train, there is no other way, and it’s a good message. Kathleen Kennedy is telling you that you don’t need training to develop skills, you can asquire them magically because girl power and because Rey must be the daught of somebody powerful. Kathleen kennedy praises nepotism, Lucas praises hard work and dedication.
            Luke trained with Yoda for undetermined time, it can have lasted months. Besides, between ESB and ROTJ Luke had plenty of time to go back to Yoda for training. In TFA, the timeline doesn’t make sense, there is no room for Rey to have been trained by anybody.

          • June 9, 2016 at 8:07 pm
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            Show me the scene, where Yoda was training with the lightsaber with Luke. Rember when Luke entered the cave in ESB to face with this on fear? Yoda told him NOT TO bring his weapon for reason.

            Lucas only proved that he had absolutely no idea about what made Star Wars good. The prequels clearly showed he didnt understand what Lawrence Kasdan, Gary Kurtz and Irwin Kershner wanted to say with ep V.
            Having 5 years old training to become ninjas in a room with utterly ridiculous mini-lightsabers was the point when Lucas took his biggest dump on the saga after Jar-jar and the midichlorians. He completly and utterly ruined the jedi and the force in that scene.
            The force is not about becoming a level 100 space kung fu master, with 10.000 midichlorians (right stolen out from Dragon Balls). It was always a lot more than that (at least it was a lot more in ep V and VI).
            And Im really glad the new epsiode went back to the OT way of the jedi and to the age where lightsaber battles were about the internal conflicts of the characters, and not about making demo videos for ILM, like the prequels.

            Rey vs Kylo was about Rey finding the force. Indeed, she didnt take lessons as a 5 years old waving her mini lightsaber like a fckin disgrace, but found the way to concentration. She was running away from Kylo during the entire battle, until she meets the true nature of the force. She opens her eyes and she is reborn. Kylo lost the little focus he was having after the emotional bomb which was his meeting with his father. The already injured warrior lost his way to connect even with the dark side, and lost. Simple as that. Its not about training, its about the internalisation of the characters.
            This makes sense because, just as the OT’s, the TFA lightsaber battle has nothing to with slashing shiny objects together. Its just a way to tell a story about the characters who are fighting.

          • June 9, 2016 at 10:37 pm
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            You’re one of these history revisionist and JJ Abrams fanboys. Gary Kurtz was just a producer he had no input the story. Irwin Kershner directed ESB but it was Lucas story and he was on sets to make sure Kirshner did what he envisioned, not the other way around. As for Kasdan, he’s a phony, Lucas was too nice to shame him in public. Did you know that Kasdan wanted Yoda to be a strong lightsaber wielding being instead of the wise monk that Lucas made? Why do you think Lucas didn’t call Kasdan back for the prequels? Kasdan is a hack that was lucky to work with Lucas, and TFA is just proved it, to come back from retirement to write this embarrassment of a ANH copycat with gender swapping, this guy has no shame.

          • June 11, 2016 at 9:04 pm
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            Im not a fan of JJ. Imo the only good work of his were the early seasons of Lost. I think all of his movies are ok, but non them were really great. But still a thousand times better than all of post 80s Lucas’s work.

            As for Gary Kurtz. He had really strong impact on all of Lucas’s good movies (American Graffiti, SW IV and V). He was heavily involved in every phase, including editing and ofc story (Lucas’s original script of the Adventures of Luke Starkiller was nothing like the final product. Han Solo supposed to be a 60 years old alien for instance). Kurtz was needed to keep Lucas on leash about his crazy ideas. I dont need more evidence to that than ROTJ. Ever since Kurtz left after ep V, Lucas only made terrible movies. ROTJ was a childish moneygrab, the worst of the OT, and the one which was the most similar to the shitty prequels.

            Lucas still made Yoda a lightsaber wielding warrior in the prequels. It was ridiculous and ruined the character in every possible way.
            Lucas didnt hire Kasdan because of his ego. He thought all of his ideas are masterpieces, so he will make the prequels alone after 20 years of not directing any movie. He was terribly wrong. TPM is probably one of the worst big budget blockbusters ever made, and one of the worst directorial works in the history of cinema. The script is an incoherent mess (see RedLetterMedia’s reviews for detalis) the acting is horrendous (Lucas made Oscar winning actors like Natalie Portman look like a total whack), the pacing and the editing are boring, lifeless, uninspired mess and so on. I could continue all day, but this has been overdiscussed in the last 17 years. TPM is still bashed ever since its release. No movie ever managed to be that bad. I respect Lucas for his early work in the 70s, but Im glad he took his hands off Star Wars before ruining everything. Disney managed to resurrect Star Wars on a certain level with TFA, but it still needs a very good ep VIII to cleanse the prequels’s and the ,,special edition’s” dirt from its entity.

          • June 12, 2016 at 1:49 am
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            So you’re telling me ROTJ is bad but TFA resurrected Star Wars? You must be off your meds. ROTJ is a brilliant closure to the trilogy, the confrontation between Luke, Vader and Sidious was splendid, and it was very difficult to make Vader turn back from the Dark side without making it look phoned in and goofy like JJ Abrams would have done. It had a new Death Star but the assault was completly different from ANH, it didn’t feel like the same thing again. Now compare this to the Starkiller baser abomination… Besides George Lucas put the Death Star in ANH only because he was never sure that he could be doing the sequels otherwise he would have kept one Death Star throughout the trilogy.
            You sir have no taste and you are obviously caught up in the hype and propaganda. I don’t where does the ROTJ bashing come from. People are hating on the Ewoks, they don’t bother me, and as a kid I actually liked them. I guess you’re just repeating what you heard from RedLettermedia, these morons say they liked TFA. Obviously paid high bucks for a positive review. These guys became famous for nitpicking absurd details from Star Wars, but they loved JJ Abrams turd.

          • June 12, 2016 at 11:54 am
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            Im not saying ROTJ was bad. Although I dont think its a good movie either. But its certainly the worst episode of the OT, without any reasonable doubt. It had some very good scenes (Luke vs Vader and the ending was well made (despite what many people say a happy end was needed to end the OT), but overall you can feel too much from the prequels atmosphere. No wonder though after Kurtz left.

            The props are way too childish to appeal to them, way too obviously cheap plastic rubber. The design of the gamorrean guards for instance is the typcial 80s kid’s stuff. The new death star never really bothered me too much, because the focus was much more about Luke vs Vader. Han Solo was awkward, clumsy and overal very uselss. Some of the matte painting are also too obvious, because they sold the Millenium Falcon set after ep V, but didnt rebuild it after for budget reason I guess.
            The directing and cinematography are not even remotely close to Kershner’s brilliant direct of ep V (no wonder though why Marquand’s name is barely mentioned when talking about SW). For example just rewatch the scarlac pi scene. Why did they use so much close up shots? That scene really needed more wide shots.
            The endor chase scene is very bad. That early 80s bad blue screen effect just hits the audience. Its funny though, because the brilliant ANH ending scene used a lot of blue screen aswell, but it was much-much better done.

            And so on. ROTJ was the time when SW started its downfall. That was the era when Lucas realised his movies are perfect for merchandising. The ewoks are a disgrace. They completly take you out of the scene, are stupid and make absolutely no sense beside the obvious opportunity of future cash-grab (the Ewoks series lasted only 2 season though). Your nostalgia, and blind bond to Lucas prevent you to see how bad ROTJ and the prequels actually are, and why all the reasonable people talk high about TFA. TFA managed to resurrect a dead series after 10 years. There are no other sequels in any franchise which managed to do this (just look at Terminator Genisys).

            Im immune to all propaganda, because I’ve seen too much movies and Im too experienced to oversee what is happening in Hollywood.
            The first time I’ve seen TPM in 1999 in the cinema I immidiately knew it was a horribly bad movie. I didnt need the internet like many people who were enlightened just later about the true nature of the prequels.

      • June 9, 2016 at 2:38 pm
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        Daisy Ridley is hot!!!! Thats all I care about 😉

        • June 9, 2016 at 5:08 pm
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          She looks like a boy

          • June 9, 2016 at 6:05 pm
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            So you like boys???

          • June 9, 2016 at 6:30 pm
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            It’s you that finds her hot, so I would assume you do.

    • June 9, 2016 at 5:43 am
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      To be honest, I’d rather than Star Wars movies make “only” $700 million worldwide than have Disney pander to Chinese audiences like some other companies do. *cough cough* DREAMWORKS

      • June 9, 2016 at 6:04 am
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        Me to. And I’m sure Lucas would too. But this is Disney’s Star Wars now, and there isn’t much more to them than money unfortunately. Lucas acquired Star Wars form his imagination, Disney acquires stories from corporate and licensing buyouts.

    • June 9, 2016 at 11:07 am
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      F7 only outgrossed TFA in the chinese (and some other) market. For example: TFA outgrossed F7 in Australia by 40m in the UK by 120 (!) million Japan by 65m, Germany by 67m, France by 51m etc. TFA broke several records in foreign markets aswell. Its just not that popular in China.

      And despite the chinese revenue looks great on paper, studios recieve the smallest amout of money from there (20-25%). So even though on paper F7 made more than TFA in the foregin markets, eventually TFA was the one which made more money from the international market aswell.

      • June 9, 2016 at 3:54 pm
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        Your trying cloud the data. The China market is most of the international market and only representing more of the movie audience every year. It is bigger than all the other countries you listed combined. It’s like your saying we mapped all the planets in the solar system except Jupiter.

        Take the film The Mermaid for instance. It’s one of the highest grossing movies of the year worldwide, but most people outside China, especially in the US haven’t even heard of it.

        • June 9, 2016 at 4:51 pm
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          No, this isnt ,,clouding” the data, this is simple mathematics.
          For US movies like Furious 7 or TFA the studios only get 20-25% of the chinese revenue, while from other foreign markets way more (around 40%). For example if a movie makes 400 million in China, a US studio only receives 100 million. For this revenue a movie only has to make around 250m in the UK for instance.

          So, eventually TFA made more money than F7 in the international market, becuase the studios received a higher percentage from Germany, Uk, France, Japan etc where it was way more succesful.
          And one more thing: Studios dont receive 90% from the OW in China, like in the rest of the world.

          So again, China is currently only a good market on paper for a US movie. The most important market is still the domestic and the european.

          • June 10, 2016 at 6:41 am
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            US is still an important market, but the European market is capped out. Its all about potential dude. China alone has nearly twice the population of the european continent. And movie goers are still a growing market that has yet to be fully realized by western movies. Europe’s movie fans are still their, but they are not getting any bigger. TFA is a perfect example of movie that can break all records in North American and Europe and still be no where close to beating Avatars box office hall. China is now necessary to being a number one movie globally. Getting Europe and North America is still solid, but will not get you the phenomenon status. The $$ from China might be less but the size and age of the audience is what makes it so appealing. The marketing appeal of so many eyeballs we an ever increasing shopping power is crucial, especially when insuring a franchise continues on to new generations. Star Wars might make more money per person by just sticking to the western world, but franchise have to engage the east to make it in the 21st century. Disney needs to make these characters household names globally. Star Wars made into the top 50 in China, so not bad, but if the next movie and especially episode 8, preform weaker, then I think Disney might be a risk of Star Wars losing its international appeal with the new generation. TFA was the first one out of the gate for the franchise in many regions, not the 7th film like it was for us, so it is a little surprising that it didn’t do better. Again for a film to break all records in some markets, and come nowhere close to breaking records in others is a little concerning. It might indicate that it didn’t catch on with audiences initially, but might from with more films. It will be interesting to see how Warcraft and other potential new film franchises debut internationally this year in comparison. Its all about the franchises potential now.

          • June 11, 2016 at 8:34 pm
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            China is indeed the most important developing market, but as long as the foreign studios have these heavy limitations (only limited number of foreign movie are allowed to be released annually, studios receive the smallest amount of money from there with the 20-25%, and a foreign movie is only allowed to be released for 4 weeks) they cant really make big money from China.

            The current record is F7 with its 390 million, but that equals with only around 100m gross revenue for the studio.
            Chinese studios arent stupid, they lobby to protect their own movies (like The Mermaid).
            Plus, the chinese market is famous for huge percentage of pirating.

            TFA made a gigantic 936m in the US which equals with 514m revenue for the studio. For this amount of money TFA needed to make 2 billion dollars in China.
            I think ep VIII will be more successful in China though, because TFA was well recevied and Rogue One will feature a chinese star which can increase the awareness for the entire saga.

  • June 8, 2016 at 8:43 pm
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    Oh god, only third globally?! I do hope that’s enough for Disney not to reconsider making more of these things forever.

  • June 8, 2016 at 8:44 pm
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    If Titanic hadn’t been re-released in 2012 globally in 2012…then its worlwide gross would we $1.8 Billion, which would have made The Force Awakens #2 film worldwide.

    • June 8, 2016 at 8:49 pm
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      But if you adjust for inflation without re-releases it goes right back to #3.

      • June 8, 2016 at 8:50 pm
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        If you adjust everything for inflation you get mostly Gone with the Wind and those era films when VCRs and TV, or Cable TV wasn’t as common. If you didn’t see things in a theater, you didn’t know when you’d ever get to see them. Now everything all is guaranteed to be seen within 6 months on home video somehow.

        • June 8, 2016 at 8:51 pm
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          Huh. Soooo…the take away should be that, unless you own Disney stock, none of this matters at all.

          • June 8, 2016 at 8:58 pm
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            It matters to those who find the film industry and the business of making movies interesting. Box Office results show trends in audience preferences and have impacts on what types of movies will be released in the future and how they will be marketed. Some find this interesting. If you don’t, you don’t need to read about it.

          • June 8, 2016 at 9:01 pm
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            It really doesn’t show audience trends at all. The waters are so totally muddied with premium addons, ticket price hikes, and BS opening “weekends” that last all week that there’s not much useful information to be gleaned from BO results. But you go on with your bad mod self there.

          • June 8, 2016 at 9:29 pm
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            You are quite the cranky one aren’t you?

          • June 8, 2016 at 9:32 pm
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            He fits his name perfectly, Debbie Downer would make him a great wife, and he’s made me not wanna watch any episode of Dr Who with that dude.

          • June 8, 2016 at 9:34 pm
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            Capaldi is great! Not even annoying internet trolls will make me stop watching his wonderful performance. 🙂

          • June 9, 2016 at 10:55 am
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            Is there any explanation why TFA deflated from 936m to 927m on the adjusted list? I mean, the movie was just released…

          • June 9, 2016 at 7:53 pm
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            I don’t know for sure. But my guess would be that they are using inflation numbers to calculate the adjustment that pre-date the revenue brought in for the film making the amount earned by TFA worth less than 100% of the actual earned B.O. If that’s the case it will likely be rectified the next time they get new inflation data.

            But again, that’s just speculation on my part. Could also just be a typo.

        • June 9, 2016 at 1:41 am
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          Re: “you get mostly Gone with the Wind and those era films when VCRs and TV, or Cable TV wasn’t as common.”
          No you don’t ….Google is your friend.

          You get:
          #1 Gone with the Wind
          #2 Avatar
          #3 Star Wars
          #4 Titanic

          Kind’a disproves what you wrote.

  • June 8, 2016 at 9:06 pm
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    Haha Bob Iger and Kathleen Kennedy were desperate to hit the billion mark

    • June 9, 2016 at 12:50 am
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      And how do you know this? I mean, I’m sure they were more than pleased, but where do you get the “desperation” part?

  • June 8, 2016 at 10:23 pm
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    “(…) the movie only reached third all-time at the world wide box office.” Only? Are yo kidding me? It made over 2 billion dollars! Only two films have earned more than it. This is a huge success for Lucasfilm and you are presenting these news like it was some kind of failure. I cannot understand such an attitude.

    • June 9, 2016 at 1:48 am
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      Re: attitude – “only reached third”

      It could be a reaction to the ravenous SW-fanbois during opening days with the:
      “suck it James Cameron – your giant Smurfs are going DOWN!”
      “Titanic’s about to get sunk (again)…by Star Wars!”

      And all the predictions that this was certain to be the #1 top grossing film of all time.

  • June 9, 2016 at 1:44 am
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    who the hell was still watching this in theaters after it came out on home video two months ago?

    • June 9, 2016 at 1:45 am
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      People who have inferior-to-theatre sound/video systems?

    • June 9, 2016 at 6:39 pm
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      People that like the theater experience or wanted to introduce their kids to the theater experience but couldn’t go during the early run for one reason or another?

  • June 9, 2016 at 2:25 am
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    I very much doubt any other SW film will come close to getting those kinds of numbers, Especially with one film out a year till 2030.

    • June 9, 2016 at 10:50 am
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      Probably no other film, SW or not, will be able to achieve this performance in the close future, especially in the US. WW there might going to be a film because of inflation, and the growing asian market, but 936 million in the US? No way.

      • June 11, 2016 at 10:06 pm
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        Which means the media will start attacking the next SW film that doesn’t do as well, You can bet on it.

        • June 11, 2016 at 10:31 pm
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          Well, the haters will definitely going to.

  • June 9, 2016 at 5:38 am
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    The only film that could possibly hope to top Avatar now is Episode IX, simply because it has that whole “end of the story” going for it, and only if Episode VIII is well-received globally. Regardless, TFA was a friggin’ beast at the box office, so kudos.

    EDIT: By the way, cue all the clickbait articles shouting

    “Star Wars only made $2.1 billion, is there STAR WARS FATIGUE??! CAN THIS FRANCHISE BE SAVED??!?!?”

    • June 14, 2016 at 9:49 pm
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      It’s not actually, the list adjusted for inflation is just as flawed and meaningless as the normal list. There is no “correct” list, it could most likely not be possible to make one without arbitrary decisions.

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