Daily Variety — Box Office: Good First Steps for ‘Fantastic Four’; Cosplay Soars at Quieter Comic Con

Welcome to Daily Variety, your daily dose of news and analysis for entertainment industry insiders. It's Monday, July twenty eighth, twenty twenty five. I'm your host, Cynthia Littleton. I am co editor in chief of Variety alongside Ramin Setuda. I'm in LA He's in New York, and Variety has reporters around the world covering the business of entertainment. In today's episode, we'll get the lowdown on another big summer box office weekend from Rebecca Rubin and Michael Schneider breaks down four

Yeah, Fantastic four First Steps opened to one hundred and eighteen million dollars domestically, and that was enough to be the fourth best opening weekend of the year. But kind of more importantly for Marvel, it was the studio's first movie to open to above one hundred million dollars in twenty twenty five, and they've had a bit of a rocky go and so it's been encouraging for them.

Aeople showed up they wanted to see. I am such a Vanessa Kirby fan. I'm going to give her outside credit. What did the early numbers tell you about who turned out to see this movie?

It was overwhelmingly male. About sixty eight percent of opening weekend audiences were men, and that was a little surprising

Imax has been around for a long time, but they really seem to be part of the conversation now every weekend like they haven't been before.

Yeah, it almost feels like it's become part of the marketing campaign for a lot of these big films, and Fantastic four is one of them that uses IMAX cameras and so's it's almost become a selling point. And of course for theater owners and studios, those tickets are more expensive and so they are more than happy for people to shell out for that.

Recca, as we spoke a couple of weeks ago about Marvel, had a lot writing on this both to have good critical reception. Have the fans embrace this and like it, and of course have people show up and go through the turnstiles. They appear to have both of those, because the reviews have been very strong and these are new faces coming into the MCU. It's one of Marvel's first real successful attempts in post pandemic times to spotlight newer heroes. And of course Fantastic Four have been on the big

And the movies that have really worked for Marvel post pandemic have been the real heavy hitters like Spider Man, No Way Home, Deadpool, and Wolverine, Black Panther, Wakonda Forever just sequels to some of their biggest properties. But the ones that haven't been as successful are Thunderbolts Eternals, the Marvels just characters that people were not as familiar with.

Another question I know that you were looking at going into this weekend, was was there room enough in this town? Two superhero movies and would Superman hang in there in weekend three with the Fantastic Four arriving. How did that play out?

Yeah, it was a big question of whether or not two superhero movies would be able to succeed in the month of July, and a lot of people thought that was risky because many comic book adaptations have not been doing well. There was a time that superhero movies could truly do no wrong at the box office. It didn't really matter what the reviews said. Everyone went out to

Let me ask you regarding the large screen the premium screens. Are there enough of those theaters so that Superman and Fantastic Four could have a decent distribution in these theaters or is it the kind of case that whatever the new movie is coming in kind of crowds out anything else that might be holding on. Definitely the latter of what you said. The new movie tends to take up all the oxygen, and it's definitely something that these distribution

It seems definitely film dependent. Something like Superman has had pretty strong week to week holds, and they think that definitely speaks to just the strong word of mouth, people are talking about it, really enjoying it on all audience, all family film. But the box office right now is

Certainly this beats the alternative. Next Up TV editor Michael Schneider dishes about the buzz, the biz, and of course, the cosplay that was on display this past weekend at San Diego Comic Con. Mike is one of the Kings of Comic Con, doing no less than three big panels at the four day event.

Welcome to the return, the long awaited return of Phidias and Firm. We last celebrated at the end of Phidias and Here at Comic Con is who here was there at that finale?

Now, Michael Schnyder, just back from San Diego and the wilds of Comic Con four busy days. What stands out to you now?

Yeah, I was cosplaying as a frazzled and now exhausted journalist and you can tell my costume is off, the sweat is still dripping from my brow.

It just makes it authentic.

It was very authentic.

You know.

It was a fun comic con. It was a crowded comic con. It was not a newsy comic con. There wasn't a lot coming out of it. I think that's a sign of the times and what the studios are now investing in, and it's not necessarily in big events. That being said, there was some amazing fun activations from especially Disney and NBC Universal and a couple other studios, and some great panels, but nothing that was big hall h worthy as there have been in years past.

Probably the closest from my vantage point very far away, was when George Lucas himself Yoda appeared in the at the convention to talk up something that is near and near to him, his upcoming museum.

He had actually never made it down to San Diego Comicon before and it took his own museum to bring him down there. So that rounded things up. But Hall H which normally is busy on Sunday with Marvel panels, what have you, that was the only panel on the final day of Comic Con.

Well, of course journalists down there are looking for headlines, but for fans, you said, the crowd was biggest as you've seen since the pandemic. Were the fans happy despite the lack of headline news?

You could tell more people were in costume this year. I brought along my sons and they definitely noticed that as well. And there were a lot of fun events, including things that didn't require a pass, so if you didn't have a ticket into Comic Con, you could still go to crunchy Roll had a big two day concert event. They had all these activations all throughout downtown San Diego. So thankfully one of the sponsors with a big pop up this year was Old Spice hopefully passing out deodorant.

Very helpful and close like that there was one that was quite topical, and you were there for the whole thing. Mike tell us about the south Park panel. That was probably the buzziest thing of the week.

Yeah, that the south Park panel, which also, to be fair, included Mike Judge talk about Beavis and Bud Heead and also Andy Samberg talking about his show Digimon. But everyone was in hallh on Thursday night to see what Trey and Matt would say, especially after that episode aired on Wednesday, the South Park season prenier that the shot heard round the White House and the boys man Trey. They didn't say much, of course, you know, as a journalist, I

In addition to royally aggravating the President, they also struck a very big and groundbreaking deal. Were there any indications that they have just set a deal with Paramount, which is in the throes of a transition to a new owner. But they've just set a deal for fifty new episodes and expanded streaming rights. Did they make any reference to that.

No, you know, they didn't, And that was the originally why we were excited to go to that panel before that episode aired, because we thought, well, they were sort of battling sky Dance. As you know, they were not happy with Jeff Shell and sky Dance because they had a agreement on They had an agreement in word with Paramount for a new deal. Skydance came in and wanted

Mike, you are a highly in demand moderator and you always get some great slots at Comic Con. This year we did three big, high profile panels. Let's start with King of the Hill, the return of this beloved former Fox animated calm family comedy that kind of broke all the rules of animated even for adult animation.

There's a lot of anticipation. I think people really still love this show. There's a huge activation outside the convention center for King of the Hill as well, and that line just snaked down the marina. They aired an episode first time people had seen it, and I really think fans of the original King of the Hill are going to be really impressed with what they've done with this show. And we had a great conversation, a lot of fun, and the crowd was just just overwhelmed.

This show brought a Texas sensibility to screwing American culture and that did not always hwe to the more conventional wisdom in Hollywood or New York.

They do a good job of threading that needle, very much like South Park in a way in that you know, you can come to the show from any different political viewpoint and maybe you're watching and thinking that, well they're satirizing that, and other people maybe looking at how they're satirizing something else.

Speaking of shows coming back, another panel you did was Phineas and Ferb. I still love the theme song. Tell me what was it like to get back with Swampy and Dan in that game?

Well, this one was really special because I did the farewell panel for Phineas and Ferb back in twenty fifteen there at Comic Con, So in some ways we've come full circle and to be back ten years later after saying goodbye to Phineas and Ferb and welcoming them back and again, this is a show that hasn't missed a beat. If anything, it's become even more perhaps geared towards the

Tell me about the third panel you hosted down there.

The third panel had a chance to talk to a bunch of producers from some of the Sony dramas, including Ron Moore, talking a lot about the franchises, because you know, they've they've really turned Outlander into a franchise with the new show The Blood of My Blood for All Mankind, which is one of my personal favorite shows, has a spinoff coming up called Star city that The Boys, of course, has turned into quite a franchise that was represented on the panel.

Two last quick questions for your recommic. Number one. Alien Earth a big project for FX. I know they had some activations down there. Did you sense any organic buzzs for it from fans?

Yeah, I definitely did. You know, partly they did a good job of plastering the side of a hotel with the big imagery from Alien Earth. There was a huge activation, like you mentioned, long lines eighteen plus, so it was definitely a scary activation. But yeah, so I think people are primed and ready for that.

That's a big launch coming up for all of Disney here in a couple of weeks. And then, of course pomic Con is a kind of a weather rain for the genre world. Was there anything that stood up to you in the causeplay? What impressed you?

I would say my favorite costume was I was walking down this and along comes a man carrying some balloons, wearing a blue turtleneck pants, big bushy mustache. It was Melchick from Severance. Whoever was cosplaying as Milchik did such a fantastic job down to the balloons with Adam Scott's face on it and it was brilliant.

I saw.

I saw a lot of severance costumes, a lot of great ones, but that one really stood out.

Mike, thank you so much for your labors in San Diego and for being in demand for those panels. It's a testament to you.

Yeah, I'm glad I got that free old spice.

As we close out today's episode, here's a few things we're watching for. It's going to be a busy week for earnings. Spotify and Electronic Arts report on Tuesday, Meta and Microsoft report on Wednesday, and Thursday brings Comcast, Amazon, and Apple, among others. We're also on twenty four to seven Paramount Skuydance Media watch that merger is heading toward the finish line after overcoming some truly unbelievable obstacles. But it ain't over till it's over. We're keeping watch at