‘Kraven the Hunter’ Bombs With Worst Start for Sony’s Marvel Films

Kraven may be the world’s greatest hunter, but the comic book villain couldn’t manage the climb to the top of the box office charts.

Sony’s “Kraven the Hunter,” a superhero spinoff starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Spider-Man’s notorious foe, launched behind already low expectations, at No. 3 with $11 million from 3,211 theaters. It landed the worst debut for Sony’s Universe of Marvel Characters behind February’s misfire “Madame Web” ($15.3 million), as well as some of the franchise’s lowest-ever marks from critics and audiences with a tragic 15% on Rotten Tomatoes and “C” grade on CinemaScore. That kind of reception signals that, barring a holiday miracle, “Kraven” won’t rebound over the rest of December.

“Kraven the Hunter” is Sony’s third Spider-Man-adjacent adaptation of the year, following October’s “Venom: The Last Dance.” The alien symbiote trilogy, led by Tom Hardy, has proven itself to be critic-proof and commercially successful, although the third and final movie didn’t live up to the box off heights of its predecessors. Sony has otherwise yet to produce a comic book hit from its offshoots led by tertiary Spider-Man baddies. The studio also stumbled in 2022 with “Morbius,” a vampire-inspired thriller with Jared Leto as the fanged villain — another one of Peter Parker’s infamous enemies. These began at a time when superheroes were all the rage at the box office, but ticket sales for too many recent comic book tentpoles have been decidedly Earth-bound.

The long-delayed “Kraven” cost an upward of $110 million to produce (it was greenlit for $90 million but ballooned after last year’s writers and actors strikes), though it was co-financed by TSG. Directed by J.C. Chandor, the R-rated film explores the origins of Sergei Kravinoff, the comic book character’s alter ego, including his rocky relationship with his crime lord father (Russell Crowe) and his quest to become the greatest hunter.

“As the superhero genre has declined over the last five years, ‘Morbius,’ ‘Madame Web’ and ‘Kraven’ have led the race to the bottom,” says David A. Gross, who runs the movie consulting firm Franchise Entertainment Research. “Kraven’s budget was downsized according to the realities of the market, but it’s still too high for this kind of result.”

Also this weekend, the Warner Bros. anime fantasy film “The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim” stumbled in fifth place with $4.6 million from 2,602 cinemas in its opening weekend. It carries a modest budget of $30 million, so any losses during its theatrical run won’t be ruinous for the studio. Plus, box office riches weren’t necessarily the impetus for “War of the Rohirrim,” based on J. R. R. Tolkien characters and set 183 years before the events of Peter Jackson’s “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, getting the greenlight. The animated film was developed and fast-tracked to ensure that New Line Cinema didn’t lose the film adaptation rights for Tolkien’s novels while Jackson and the teams behind the “Lord of the Rings” and “Hobbit” trilogies were working on two new live-action films for 2026 and beyond. The first of those movies, tentatively titled “Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum,” will be directed by and star Andy Serkis.

“War of the Rohirrim,” which has mixed reviews and a tepid “B” on CinemaScore, faltered last weekend in its international box office debut with just $2 million from 31 territories. It expands to 42 additional offshore markets over the weekend.

Despite the two newcomers, Disney’s “Moana 2” retained the No. 1 spot on domestic box office charts for the third consecutive weekend with $26.6 million from 4,000 theaters. The Polynesian-set animated adventure, which was originally commissioned for streaming, has become a theatrical smash with $337.5 million in North America and $717 million globally so far. It’s already the year’s fifth-highest grossing movie domestically and fourth-biggest global release.

Universal’s “Wicked” adaptation earned more than double that of “Kraven” even though the big-budget musical has already been playing in theaters for a month. “Wicked” stayed in second place with a dazzling $22.5 million from 3,689 venues in its fourth weekend of release. The film, starring Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo, has generated $359 million domestically and more than $524 million worldwide to date. It’s the highest-grossing Broadway adaptation in domestic box office history, ahead of 1978’s “Grease” ($188.62 million), as well as the second-biggest worldwide stage-to-screen reimagining after 2008’s “Mamma Mia” ($611 million).

Paramount’s “Gladiator II” landed in the No. 3 spot with $7.8 million in its fourth frame. The quarter-century-in-the-making sequel to Ridley Scott’s Oscar-winning 2000 epic “Gladiator” has earned $145.9 million in North America and more than $398.5 million globally.

Heading into the coveted holiday frame, overall box office revenues are 4.8% behind 2023 and 23% behind 2019, according to Comscore. “Moana 2” and “Glicked” (the portmanteau for the two films with twin release dates and spiritual sequel of “Barbenheimer”) will continue to rule at multiplexes until Christmas time, when Disney’s “The Lion King” prequel “Mufasa,” Paramount’s “Sonic the Hedgehog 3” and A24’s erotic thriller “Babygirl” all open on Dec. 20. A few days later, the Focus Features’ “Nosferatu” remake and Searchlight’s Bob Dylan biopic “A Complete Unknown, starring Timothee Chalamet, land on Dec. 25 to close out the year.

Until then, it’ll be all Moana, Glinda and Elphaba all the time.