When a movie makes a billion dollars you can probably guess what Hollywood’s next course of action will be. Some studios have consistent billion dollar hits over and over like Disney, Pixar, Lucas and Marvel, which are coincidentally all under the Walt Disney Studios banner.
But it’s studios like Sony, Paramount, Warner Bros., DreamWorks, MGM and countless other big time production companies who will salivate when they achieve a billion dollar film status. Of course, they’ll want to make more.
And here’s a Hollywood shocker; although the filmmakers claimed this billion-dollar movie was going to be a one-off, there’s a sequel already in the works.
So far there have been seven billion dollar movies in 2019 at the worldwide box office that include “Joker,” “Aladdin,” “Toy Story 4,” “Captain Marvel,” “Spider-Man: Far from Home,” “The Lion King” and the biggest movie of all time “Avengers: Endgame.”
There are seven so far but “Frozen II” and “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker” are both poised to easily break the billion-dollar threshold even if “Star Wars” The Rise of Skywalker” will technically cross over early next year.
But as of right now, the Walt Disney Company has five of those seven billion-dollar movies with “Endgame,” “The Lion King,” “Captain Marvel,” “Toy Story 4,” and “Aladdin.” Disney shares the profits of “Spider-Man: Far from Home” with the Sony Pictures Company, and Warner Bros. made “Joker.” And both “Frozen II” and “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker” are both under the Disney umbrella too.
That leaves one billion dollar movie of the major studios and that’s “Joker.”
Todd Philips was asked whether there would be sequels to “Joker” on the promotional tour and his answer was always a resounding no.
But nobody, not a single person, thought “Joker” would come anywhere near the billion-dollar mark, especially given the fact it’s a Rated-R movie. It officially passed “Deadpool” and “Deadpool 2” a little over a month ago at the box-office making it the highest grossing Rated-R movie ever.
And now the filmmakers and the studio are having second thoughts about doing sequels. Why not? It made that much money. Why wouldn’t you?
New reports suggest that director Todd Phillips is currently in talks and is likely to reteam with Joaquin Phoenix who played the titular role and is a strong contender for the Best Actor Oscar race.
The Hollywood Reporter noted, “The unexpected bounty also is generating a huge payday for Phillips, 48. Sources say the director will earn close to $100 million when the dust has settled (he deferred his upfront salary in exchange for a bigger slice of the adjusted gross). In fact, the deal is similar to one he struck with Warners before the first Hangover movie, which went on to earn a surprise $467.5 million worldwide in 2009 off a $35 million budget (the trilogy took in $1.42 billion).”
Now they are thinking of doing a slate of DC comics origin stories.
But “The Batman” is already full steam ahead with Robert Pattinson to star in the titular role alongside Colin Farrell, Paul Dano, Andy Serkis, Jeffrey Wright and possibly Matthew McConaughey.
Warner Bros. hasn’t had a billion dollar movie like “Joker” since “Aquaman” but before that it was Christopher Nolan’s “Dark Knight” trilogy.
When money talks there will be sequels.