Street Fighter Stumbles as You Can See Everything Wins the Weekend Conversation

Street Fighter had a disappointing debut this weekend, and Mortal Kombat has now won the Hollywood round. It wins on box office, with critics, with audiences, and even on sequels, since Mortal Kombat is already on its second movie. Meanwhile, A24's three hour documentary You Can See Everything, built around Elizabeth Holmes, is what everyone's talking about. Later in this piece I'll also get into why I think the holdup on Lanterns season 2 might come down to Kyle Chandler's contract.

Ed Boon wants a Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter crossover, game first

On Friday, Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon tweeted that he's all in on a crossover with Street Fighter, although he said game first, then movie. He's probably even more bullish on the idea now. I don't know if Street Fighter is going to get a second movie. To be fair, we're not sure Mortal Kombat is getting a third one either.

Still, I think Mortal Kombat is such a strong brand and has been so prolific for so long that you'll get another movie someday, probably maybe even sooner rather than later. But I think it'll have a different cast and writer director, even though the writer said he was working on a third script. We'll see.

Yes, Mortal Kombat 2 underperformed back in May. That had a lot to do with Warner Bros. pushing the movie back months at the very last minute, because it was originally tracking to open with 50 million dollars with its initial October release date. Now it's looking pretty good, the same way James Gunn's Superman got a glow up from Marvel underperforming that same year. Comparison makes a difference.

Why Street Fighter landed in a space where nobody is happy

Going into the weekend, Street Fighter looked like it might open close to 40 million dollars, on par with Mortal Kombat 2 and Dungeons and Dragons, two movies that performed almost identically. Instead, we got another Masters of the Universe. Some people liked Street Fighter, but not enough. Even with this debut, the gaming space is still very hot in Hollywood.

One interesting thing is that it skewed older, with men over 35 making up 45% of the audience. It's not performing well with kids and families, who have only made up 11%. It's PG-13, but barely. That's too bad, because if they knew they'd do so poorly with families, they could have gone R, which Mortal Kombat 2 did and did better. Or maybe they should have been more family friendly and performed a little more in the direction of Minecraft. The diversity demos are solid, though.

Is Street Fighter an older brand? Street Fighter 6 came out in 2023 and sold 7 million units. Mortal Kombat is technically on its 12th main game, a reboot that came out the same year and sold 8 million copies. I feel like Mortal Kombat is more in the public eye month to month. Also, the movie doesn't look anything like Street Fighter 6. It modeled itself on the more classic versions of the game and the older movies. Maybe that was another mistake.

There's also been interesting commentary that both of these fighting game movies don't have a lot of fight choreography, unlike martial arts films, the John Wick movies, or other movies from the David Leitch and Chad Stahelski company, which just churns out fighting movies. Perhaps going forward, these adaptations should hire directors with a lot more experience making martial arts films.

Elizabeth Holmes deserves credit for You Can See Everything

The real superstar this weekend is A24's You Can See Everything, which is definitely having a moment. So how did Elizabeth Holmes, of all people, deliver a knockout in the pop culture conversation? I think the answer is the youngest generation of moviegoers, Hollywood's nemesis. Hollywood would like to be friends with that generation, but it seems only A24 truly understands it. So far, outside of a handful of titles such as Backrooms and maybe Minecraft, there hasn't been a lot of money in courting them.

Nathan Fielder is getting a lot of credit, as is Lance Oppenheim, who just directed his first narrative feature, Prime Time, also for A24. But I think Holmes deserves a lot of credit here. It was her idea to have a documentary made about herself. She approached A24, who then put her together with Fielder and Oppenheim. She certainly seems to have a real skill for putting herself in the eye of the storm. I don't know what this will mean for her, but it certainly adds to the legend, good or bad. I think she's trying to change her narrative, though I don't know if she is, and I think she'll take the fame anyway.

The Rotten Tomatoes scores are insane, both critic and audience. A24 shrewdly opened this three hour documentary in under a thousand theaters, which means no CinemaScore, and CinemaScore has not been kind to A24. It's on track to open with 12 to 14 million dollars, which would be the second highest opening ever for a documentary. Young white people showed up, with Fielder and Holmes creating "the Avengers of manipulative mind games." It's like a New Yorker article brought to life. I haven't seen it yet; I'm planning to see it next weekend.

It's only doing well for a documentary, though, and it might even be a one or two weekend event. We don't know what its final box office will be. Sometimes moments don't turn into long term things, and the demos show it has a pretty niche audience.

You Can See Everything could become the first documentary nominated for Best Picture

It's pretty much guaranteed at this point that You Can See Everything will become the first documentary ever nominated for Best Picture. They have up to 10 spots, and I think it's going to get nominated. The question now is whether it can win. With no strong front runner so far except The Odyssey, and Nolan having already swept the Oscars recently with Oppenheimer, this would be an opportunity for the Academy to do something bold and big. They kind of like to change up what they're rewarding, and they've been doing a lot for horror recently.

I do think this is kind of opening the way for documentaries to be more commercial and more of a theatrical event. That's very scary, though. The goal of a documentary should be to convey a message and tell the truth. If the goal becomes box office, will people twist what the documentary is about? We're on a slippery slope when it comes to the truth as it is.

It's going to expand to more theaters, but in the age of event moviegoing, people might think it's three hours and wait for digital or HBO Max, where it will eventually go. Still, I think it will be an event until the end of the month, and a problem for Clayface and Wildwood this coming weekend, because it's been selling out like crazy. Hollywood didn't really program Halloween weekend, so I think it runs until November 6, when Godzilla Minus Zero hits IMAX and goes after the same hip Gen Z audience. That's still a long way before the Oscars. "Awards season is a marathon, not a sprint."

Small movies like Whale Fall are competing with binges at home

Hollywood overbooked the weekend again. Small movies are competing not only with other films but with streaming at home. Carrie, Crystal Lake and The Diplomat are all binges, basically eight hour movies that just dropped. I watched all three in two days. Then shows like Vision Quest drop one and a half to two hour chunks a week. You might decide to catch up on those instead of going to the movies.

Would Whale Fall or the latest Sense and Sensibility ever have performed really well in theaters, even on different weekends? Sense and Sensibility has stronger audience scores, but critics are about even. It's the second Sense and Sensibility movie, the first being quite famous, and there have been three BBC adaptations. I think both are really digital and streaming plays, with theatrical as advertisement, like Heart of the Beast and, sadly, Forgotten Island. There's nothing wrong with that. The Invite ended up like that and is maybe going all the way to Oscar nominations. As long as the movies aren't expensive, it works, though Forgotten Island was probably kind of expensive because animation is.

The real winner, I think, is Austin Abrams, who is slowly but surely turning himself into a leading man, catching up to his Euphoria co-star Jacob Elordi. Dog Stars and Whale Fall opened about the same, but Dog Stars has much worse scores. Whale Fall shows Abrams can do more than the quirky comedic roles he's very good at. I think he could even get a highbrow drama after this. He has two movies in the top 10 and nothing booked for the foreseeable future, which surprises me.

Netflix starts reporting box office, and Ramayana splits IMAX with Godzilla

Speaking of awards season, Netflix opened another strong front runner in just four theaters, two in Los Angeles and two in New York City, and I believe it has the best per theater average of the year so far. It's more on the industry and cinephile radar for now. It's also the first movie in Netflix's new initiative to release films in theaters for approximately 45 day windows and officially report box office. It won't hit Netflix until December 2. Its Rotten Tomatoes score is very good but not in the 90s, and I was surprised the New York Post gave this LGBT movie a glowing review. Next up is The Mosquito Bowl on Halloween weekend, which could do well with no other big movies out.

Other Mommy plunged 72% in its second weekend, and I expect trigger happy Universal to get it onto digital in time for Halloween, though there's no announcement yet. I liked most of it; the ending is a super bummer, but I don't think it's a bad movie.

India has another movie debuting in the top 10, but Ramayana is the one to keep an eye on. I saw its IMAX trailer and it's very cool and very epic, but it's opening the same weekend as Godzilla Minus Zero. It seems they're splitting the IMAX showtimes. I don't know why they'd do that to themselves, but perhaps it's the only way both could play IMAX, because those screens are so in demand.

Lanterns season 2 may hinge on paying Kyle Chandler

On the Nielsen charts for the first weekend of October, Lanterns isn't on the overall chart and fell off the acquired chart. Episode 8 dropped on October 4, the last day of this chart, so maybe it rallies with binging next week, although a lot of people had such a bad reaction to that episode. I don't think viewership necessarily went down. The problem is that it didn't go up while everything else did. The acquired chart floor was 536 million minutes, and Lanterns has consistently been around 520 million, so I wouldn't be surprised if it was number 11.

Still no word on season 2, which is very suspicious given the strong headlines out of HBO. Peter Safran recently said a decision should be made by the end of the year, but there's already a writers room. My guess is that since they only intended a single season and didn't think Kyle Chandler's Hal Jordan would be so popular, there's a chance they only signed him for one season, with no set salary for a season 2. Even if there is, he could pull a Jennifer Lawrence, who did that with The Hunger Games, and refuse to show up without more money. They want to keep the budget cheap, which apparently is why John Stewart still isn't going to space.

Some of you liked the ending, but a lot of us really hated it. Now I think we know Damon Lindelof and Tom King aren't coming back. If they bring back Chandler and do the Parallax storyline, I think I could get excited again; we did have a really good time for seven of the eight weeks. I think if Chandler doesn't return, it will make things more difficult for Aaron Pierre going forward, so it would be in everyone's best interests to bring him back.

Percy Jackson and Ice Age show Disney's Netflix deal paying off

The Wonka IP is strong on Nielsen, a very good sign for Netflix's animated Wonka prequel hitting theaters next year. Big Bang Theory is supercharged thanks to Stuart Fails to Save the Universe, which has been renewed. East of Eden couldn't crack 1 billion minutes but looks better there than on Netflix's own charts. Ted Lasso, American Horror Story and Toy Story remain strong, Reacher is very hot for Prime Video, A Different World continues to be great for Netflix, Monster fell off quickly, Nate Bargatze's Breadwinner looks better here than on Netflix's charts, and The Love Hypothesis didn't last long.

I loved East of Eden, but I just don't think it's a Netflix show; I think it's an HBO show. I'm nervous about Lonesome Dove after Little House on the Prairie didn't hit either. Netflix is having real trouble and has switched over its executives, and someone I know in the industry and I wondered if it really is the binge drops. I think they may have to abandon the binge. East of Eden got trounced by Josh Hartnett on a rowboat fighting a monster, which did more in a single weekend than East of Eden did in a week and a half.

A few months ago, Wall Street said Disney shouldn't even have Disney Plus because it was losing money licensing its content to other streaming services. Disney isn't getting rid of Disney Plus or Hulu, but it just did a deal with Netflix. Percy Jackson debuted at number three, which should make Disney extra cash and grow the show's audience. Then again, Interview with the Vampire got a big boost on Netflix, but that audience didn't run to AMC. The Ice Age movies also just hit Netflix and take up half the movie top 10. Ben Affleck, without Matt Damon, and Tyler Perry also did well.

The Odyssey is already big on digital, and all eyes turn to Clayface

On Apple's charts, The Odyssey is number three on pre-sales alone for November 17. That's the same release timeline Universal used for Oppenheimer, which won a bunch of Oscars. I think The Odyssey will get nominated for a ton of them; the question is whether it wins as many. Warner Bros.' Halloween strategy is working yet again with Practical Magic 2, not to the same degree as Beetlejuice but still kind of working, and its bundle is also in the top 10. The Invite is starting to fall out, and I wonder if it peaked too soon, which is why Universal is waiting so long on The Odyssey.

This coming weekend, can Clayface turn the DC narrative around after Supergirl and a divisive Lanterns finale? Something really awful would have to happen for it not to be number one, since Street Fighter should drop to the teens. The review embargo lifts Wednesday, and critics can't see it before Tuesday night, though there have been a lot of influencer screenings. Wildwood, Wicker, Ali G and Clara and the Sun also open; I think only Wicker has real momentum.

On TV, The Terminal List returns Wednesday, still a binge on Prime Video, alongside Netflix's new Stanford prison experiment title and ABC's Dolly Parton celebration. Thursday brings season 3 of Nobody Wants This. I've already seen the whole season and overall I think it's really good, though one subplot became super annoying and kind of almost ruined the season for me.

Do you think Clayface will end up Fresh or Rotten on Rotten Tomatoes?