The Domestic Box Office run is ending, International is kicking in.

[Rahul]

We don't know if it's a current "loss", but most likely it will break even in terms of box office. It will not lose any money.

I admire your enthusiasm, but that's wrong. This movie will lose money in terms of box office. Actually quite a lot, probably more than "Ghostbusters". As you put it yourself later, it's the secondary revenue that might take it into the black down the line.

Even if we say it lost $30-40 million in box office alone secondary revenue will be many times that..my updated guess, with the China merchandising deal already announced the other day(much bigger than any recent or current US deal) as well as the bluray already in the top 6 on Amazon, we'll see and eventual return of $120-200 million from Beyond in less than 2 years(and that is a conservative guess).

RAMA

At current state, the loss will be probably more than double the amount of what you said. I will wait for some official publication or expert guess from a credible source for that. No arms-chair experts here.

And where the hell did you get that 120 - 200 mio. number? That's not what you make selling DVDs nowadays! That might have been a few years ago, but the media landscape has changed during that. Please post sources when you claim such enormous (and quity frankly impossible) numbers. And I don't mean that funky "for beginners" graph you posted a while ago, but actual estimations of the secondary revenue sales for Paramount.

Also, the nuTrek franchise is amazingly bad at merchandise. I see a few nuTrek uniforms every now and then. But if I want to go out now to buy a Cpt. Kirk action figure, it will more than likely have William Shatners face on it.

1. Established franchise. $340-350 gross is better than any foreseeable replacement. It's potential $550+ revenue in 2 years makes it a viable franchise.

This! This right here. That's the one and only reason you will see another Kelvin Trek movie! They know it will make some money (compared to, say, Ben Hur or other remakes). It's not as much as they hoped or expected. But it's not nothing either. They will probably loose money with 'Beyond'. But they now know what margins to expect, and can adjust budget accordingly. It's not stellar, and if Paramount had any other franchises they would focus on them. But right now, they now a Trek movie (literally any Trek, when you look how bland and undistinguishable 'Beyond' looked in the marketing) generates some money. Not much. But still money. They would love having big, more profitable franchises. But a small-but-calculatable income is the second best thing to have. It allows for better income planning, and let's you rent money at lower interests.

2. It already has a production team, writers, a story and actors signed up for it.

5. They already announced the movie so it would look bad for investors if they back down.

6. Good reviews and good fan reaction. Not as important for business as the others, but at least it can be marketed as "successful" and popular.

Nothing from this has ever had any impact on studio decisions though. As long as production hasn't started nobody has seriously commited to anything.

3. It already has sets and therefore less overhead than for a new franchise.

Studio sets might be a big deal for television shows. In movie business they're peanuts. When they moved production from LA to Vancouver for Beyond they didn't shipped the Enterprise sets. They trashed them and built completely new ones over there. That's cheaper. You might not have noticed, but all the sets seen in Beyond were completely new ones.

4. It'll hope for a less "down" period to release it in, acknowledging that was the market force at work at the time of Beyond's release.

That, one the other hand, will be impossible to avoid. Beyond seriously underperformed and lost money. They need some down-time for analyzing the problems and overhaul the franchise. When a franchise is successfull they try to start a sequel as soon as possible to cash in on it while it's hot. If it's not, like Star Trek now, the "Go!" will only come at a point they are sure enough in it that it will make some money. So expect a lot of first drafts on complete story changes, and a longer waiting period, until you will see a sequel. Also, ST4 will be as much a sequel and storyline continuiation to "Beyond", as "Beyond" was a continuation of themes and story from "Into Darkness".

 

[drt]

The one place Trek's older skewing audience will be of value is that they're probably more likely to still buy bluray/DVD discs than younger folks.

 

[Balok's Decoy]

I don't get why they didn't wait to open the movie on September 8 -- a Thursday night premiere on the 50th anniversary. That's good marketing, hit the milestone hard and promote it in ads. And they wouldn't have been competing with Suicide Squad and Jason Bourne. There's literally nothing major in theaters right now.

 

[wayoung]

I don't get why they didn't wait to open the movie on September 8 -- a Thursday night premiere on the 50th anniversary. That's good marketing, hit the milestone hard and promote it in ads. And they wouldn't have been competing with Suicide Squad and Jason Bourne. There's literally nothing major in theaters right now.

Summers over. September (and Feb) are dumping grounds for movies the studios don't have faith in / moderately priced movies that could become sleeper hits but aren't really expected too. Kids are back in school. Schools just started so they aren't going to movies on weekends they're partying/studying. Parents are done vacation, are dealing with kids back in school, aren't going to movies. Temps have dropped so people aren't hiding in theatres for air conditioning (less a factor nowadays everywhere has air conditioning but still factors a little bit).

Big budget movies generally stop in early August. Won't start again until the oscar bait comes out, and then one, big budget film success for Christmas (aka star wars, hobbit, lotr).

Every once in awhile someone tries a big budget outside of seasons. Sometimes it works and the seasons expand (Spider man started the summer season in May 15 years ago and it's slowly pushed back into April now that the number of bug budget tentacles increase) but, right or wrong, you're not seeing a $185 mil movie open in September.

 

[Kelthaz]

Summers over. September (and Feb) are dumping grounds for movies the studios don't have faith in / moderately priced movies that could become sleeper hits but aren't really expected too.

Exactly. It's the perfect release date for Star Trek Beyond.

 

[Roald]

How accurate is the 185 million budget anyway..? As much as I loved the film, it still seemed pretty small in scope... Is it possible that the production budget was actually a lot lower? Budget numbers are mostly unreliable, everybody knows that...

 

[wayoung]

Exactly. It's the perfect release date for Star Trek Beyond.

... unless you want to make money on a $185 million movie.

Let's put it this way.

Star Trek Beyond made more in its lower opening in July than ANY MOVIE EVER opening in September. Beyond's lacklustre domestic take, with its July opening, is still higher than the highest domestic gross for any September movie, and foreign has only ever had one September opening film ever exceed Beyond, and that was an animated movie which are easily adjusted and more accessible to / for foreign audiences than live action.

September is a dead zone. Big budget movies don't go there. At least until there are so many of them a studio has to risk trying it to fit their films in and that's a big risk.

You may think it's the perfect time to release a big budget movies because there aren't any others, but that's ignoring the reasoning behind the lack of big budget movies in September: Movies don't make as much money in the fall. People don't go to the movies in the Fall at the same rate as they do in the Summer and at Christmas.

Watch The Magnificent Sevens take in a few weeks. This is a reboot of a popular franchise starring the biggest names in the film industry. It has everything, (even more, imo) going for it that Beyond has. And it's budget was only $110 million. If it makes $500 mil maybe September does become a valid entry for bigger budgeted movies. If it doesn't, be glad Trek, with its much bigger budget and smaller stars, didn't try it.

 

[Captain of the USS Averof]

5. They already announced the movie so it would look bad for investors if they back down.

Studios never announce they won't make a sequel. Paramount's The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn was announced as the first part of a trilogy. Kathleen Kennedy and Steven Spielberg even had announced a Christmas 2014 release date for Tintin 2. Then a Christmas 2015 release date was announced. Then early 2016… then end of 2017… then early 2018. I won't hold my breath for it. The same with Paramount's already announced Terminator: Genisys trilogy.



Star Trek Beyond will not make a profit in cinemas. In terms of box office it will lose money, and that's a given. The secondary revenue might make profit for Paramount but even then not remotely as much as has been suggested.


Will we see a Star Trek XIV? I think most definitely. The name of the game for studios is movie franchises. Paramount's only money making franchises are the Transformers and Mission: Impossible. Other than that Star Trek is their biggest brand name. Paramount has less to risk with a new Star Trek movie than a new Terminator or a new Jack Ryan movie.

 

[wayoung]

Studios never announce they won't make a sequel. Paramount's The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn was announced as the first part of a trilogy. Kathleen Kennedy and Steven Spielberg even had announced a Christmas 2014 release date for Tintin 2. Then a Christmas 2015 release date was announced. Then early 2016… then end of 2017… then early 2018. I won't hold my breath for it.



Star Trek Beyond will not make a profit in cinemas. In terms of box office it will lose money, and that's a given. The secondary revenue might make profit for Paramount but even then not remotely as much as has been suggested.


Will we see a Star Trek XIV? I think most definitely. The name of the game for studios is movie franchises. Paramount's only money making franchises are the Transformers and Mission: Impossible. Other than that Star Trek is their biggest brand name. Paramount has less to risk with a new Star Trek movie than a new Terminator or a new Jack Ryan movie.

Jack Ryan's a TV show now starring Jim from The Office (John Krazinski) after Chris Pines reboot of Ben Affects reboot of Harrison Ford's reboot of Alec Baldwin's film underperformed, killing the film franchise ($135 mil on $60 mil budget, currently a better multiplier than Beyond).

 

[Captain of the USS Averof]

Jack Ryan's a TV show now starring Jim from The Office (John Krazinski) after Chris Pines reboot of Ben Affects reboot of Harrison Ford's reboot of Alec Baldwin's film underperformed, killing the film franchise ($135 mil on $60 mil budget, currently a better multiplier than Beyond).

Because… Paramount!

 

[KGator]

What Paramount looks at with ST4:

1. Established franchise. $340-350 gross is better than any foreseeable replacement. It's potential $550+ revenue in 2 years makes it a viable franchise.

STB will make about $15 million from China, about $80 million from the US and about $40-45 million from everywhere else. So let's say $140 million from theatrical release. Total revenue will probably be in the $330-360 million range at the end of 3 years assuming a $50+ million Home Video release.

Paramount is probably going to wait to see the HV sales before fully committing to the sequel. Now if HV sales disappoint the same way the box office did . . . . then forget it. You can wait all you want but more information on the "announced sequel" will simply never come. It will just be quietly shelved. Probably to see if the new TV series can bring enough new fans to the franchise to warrant restarting the film series.

 

[RAMA]

Nope. many of your assumptions are off quite a bit based on info I've cited before.

RAMA

STB will make about $15 million from China, about $80 million from the US and about $40-45 million from everywhere else. So let's say $140 million from theatrical release. Total revenue will probably be in the $330-360 million range at the end of 3 years assuming a $50+ million Home Video release.

Paramount is probably going to wait to see the HV sales before fully committing to the sequel. Now if HV sales disappoint the same way the box office did . . . . then forget it. You can wait all you want but more information on the "announced sequel" will simply never come. It will just be quietly shelved. Probably to see if the new TV series can bring enough new fans to the franchise to warrant restarting the film series.

I don't get why they didn't wait to open the movie on September 8 -- a Thursday night premiere on the 50th anniversary. That's good marketing, hit the milestone hard and promote it in ads. And they wouldn't have been competing with Suicide Squad and Jason Bourne. There's literally nothing major in theaters right now.

I explained this very concisely earlier in the thread. It would have been monumentally ridiculous to do such a thing.

 

[RAMA]

Small bit of news today: Beyond has officially surpassed STID as the biggest franchise money maker in China today..in 12 days of release.

 

[Kelthaz]

Exactly. It's the perfect release date for Star Trek Beyond.

... unless you want to make money on a $185 million movie.

Oh, I know. I wasn't being seriously. With such a huge budget Beyond needed a summer slot. My comment was about Star Trek Beyond's lackluster reception from mainstream audiences despite the positive reviews being more fitting for the September dumping grounds.

 

[wayoung]

Oh, I know. I wasn't being seriously. With such a huge budget Beyond needed a summer slot. My comment was about Star Trek Beyond's lackluster reception from mainstream audiences despite the positive reviews being more fitting for the September dumping grounds.

Maybe we'll get a $100 million Trek (like Mag 7) in two years and a Sep release becomes plausible

 

[KGator]

It'll be at least $340 million. It's at $323,459,798 updated. Another $7-8 million from China between now and Sunday..Another $3 million from Mexico in it's run. Another million or so from Brazil in it's run. $8-12 million in Japan possibly in October.

I was surprised to see the UK contributed $500,000 since it's last update. We might see that much from them in the next update.

We don't know if it's a current "loss", but most likely it will break even in terms of box office. It will not lose any money. Even if we say it lost $30-40 million in box office alone secondary revenue will be many times that..my updated guess, with the China merchandising deal already announced the other day(much bigger than any recent or current US deal) as well as the bluray already in the top 6 on Amazon, we'll see and eventual return of $120-200 million from Beyond in less than 2 years(and that is a conservative guess). Again refer to my graph on secondary revenue.

My guess, Paramount might want to think about lowering the budget, but encouraged by that much profit, they will possibly seek out more co-investors as they did with Beyond to keep their stake in it down instead. It makes for good publicity because most of the casual audience only hears of box office figures.

RAMA

$8-12 million in Japan? Are you kidding? Have you not seen the obvious pattern in every other foreign market? More like $4-6 million. I'll be happy with $5m.

Another $7-8 million in China? How? It's losing 2/3rds of its screens for the autumn festival. It will probably end up below IA5 ($63m) when all is said and done. It's run is pretty much over there.

And for the most absurd point you have made . . . The top 6 on Amazon Blue Ray sales!!! Hell the top 6 on ALL Blue-Ray sales is probably in the $700,000-900,000 range. And Amazon is just a portion of that. So if it hangs onto that top 6 spot for the next 40-50 weeks we'll start talking some real money!!!

Wanting to believe something so badly that you make up facts and figures is not productive on these boards. You know there is a difference between optimism and delusion. I think it's a line you crossed so long ago you can't even tell the difference anymore.

What exactly do you have pencilled in for home video sales? Based on the numbers you throw around you must be predicting what . . . . $80-120 million for Blue-Ray and DVDs?

 

[drt]

How accurate is the 185 million budget anyway..? As much as I loved the film, it still seemed pretty small in scope... Is it possible that the production budget was actually a lot lower? Budget numbers are mostly unreliable, everybody knows that...

Supposedly there was $30M spent on the aborted Orci version, so Beyond's actual budget was probably closer to $150-160M.

 

[Lakenheath 72]

I like to look at this in a broader context. We have the schedule of several studios already, up to four or five years from now.

Next year, the films are pretty much locked. So, we have 2018 and 2019. The summers will not be kind to Star Trek. Summer 2018 will have Avengers, Star Wars, Transformers, Jurassic World, Toy Story, Ant Man, and Aquaman. The next summer will have Star Wars, Avengers, Justice League, Incredibles, Transformers, and Indiana Jones.

The winters will be kinder with 2018 having Spider Man and Mary Poppins, and 2019 having Wicked.

http://www.movieinsider.com/movies/-/2018
http://www.movieinsider.com/movies/-/2019

Also, in consideration, how the series does. If the series does well, then this might indicate the franchise is healthy and there is a base for a possible fourth film. However, if the series does not do well, then this might indicate the franchise is ailing and there will be articles on the health of the franchise. This might raise doubts if there is a base for a fourth film.

 

[STMSTS]

There's really no question that there won't be another Star Trek movie...the question is does the box office of warrant continuing this particular series? It's not the total disaster that Nemesis was, but it definitely has put the franchise in a similar position to where it was after Star Trek V and Insurrection. In both those cases the studio ultimately pushed forward with a sequel, to vastly different results. In the case of Star Trek VI, the studio actually considered and did work on development for a revamp.

It's not a dissimilar situation to Mission: Impossible III, which underperformed mightily. That resulted in a 5 year hiatus for the series, which came back on a lower budget, in an installment that was designed partially as an potential handoff to a new lead (Renner). That might be what we get here, although I don't think Paramount wants Star Trek sitting on its bench for 5 years. I think they might also be hesitant to revamp again so soon - Kirk and Spock are iconic characters and are clearly what 'Star Trek' is in the minds of the general public - would they be able to successfully recast that again? That's a big gamble, as would be rebooting Next Gen or creating new characters outright.

Those factors lead me to suspect we'll get fourth film with this cast, sooner rather than later. The risk is higher rebooting or waiting too long, so I think it's reasonable for the studio to conclude that with some work on their end, they can make the franchise more successful. I'm sure Paramount wants to continue to do business with Bad Robot, which is good motivation to move forward. An Oscar nomination for Pine for Hell or High Water might also drive the studio to move quickly as well, and it doesn't hurt that Wonder Woman is likely to be huge. I wouldn't rule out a return to the director's chair for Abrams - it would be a coup for the studio to land him as a director and make this his first film since Star Wars. He has nothing announced which would be another factor for a quick turnaround. I wouldn't expect a whole lot of budget cutting (there's not much give in these types of franchise, sfx heavy films) but I would expect a move of the release window, likely to November, where the competition is less (Christmas is off limits indefinitely due to Star Wars). Hemsworth's particpation won't hurt either, but it's not like he's going to make or break the film (Blackhat anyone?).

 

[KGator]

Nope. many of your assumptions are off quite a bit based on info I've cited before.

I'll stick to my numbers and assumptions. I feel like your theoretical numbers are sometimes as fictional as the Star Trek Universe itself. You seem to hold anything that works for higher numbers and discount anything that suggests lower. You use movies that aren't comparable, ignore recent trends and cite older sources for a movie industry that evolves rapidly every few years. It's similar to when you cited all the great "social media" numbers to prove how popular and effective the marketing was and how the original tracking estimates for the opening weekend were way off base. I think you said you couldn't see how it would open to less than $70 million or something to that effect. This is even after multiple outlets predicted closer to $60 million. Once you get an idea (no matter how fictional) you simply cannot let go of it despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

I'm a Star Trek fan so I'm not exactly impartial - I want the movie to succeed - but you are a Baghdad Bob like PR machine when it comes to STB. There is no such thing as bad news. Either the negative news you hear is wrong or you have numerous sources proving that the so-called bad news is actually a good thing!