no days of future past confirmed this was a prequel not a reboot
First class had a huge contradiction to previous cmen including when Charles became wheelchair bound and discussion online were exactly the same as bumblebee: is it a reboot or prequel!?
But when future past brought back the cmen 3 cast it solidified itself as a prequel
The ending for future past allows the franchise to continue making young cmen style prequels but with the assumption that they will eventually grow up to be the original selves; the ending also allowed sequels to take place with the original cast ie Logan (5 years after dofp)
It’s like despite all the debate for bumblebee, imagine a bumblebee sequel included a time travelling Shi’a labeef as Sam....

 

Bumblebee has made $412M worldwide so far! I think the final gross will be around $470M.

 

Domestic: Bumblebee grossed an estimated $4.66M over the 3-day weekend. Current 4-day weekend estimate is $5.68M. Estimated total gross through Monday is $116.96M.
China: Bumblebee has grossed $136.44M for 17 days. Should reach $140M on TUE & $150M on SAT or SUN. $160M lifetime gross is going to happen.

Source: Gavin Feng on Twitter, BoxOfficeReport.com on Twitter

 

Yep this movie has definitely flopped and should die quietly  

Actually I'm very happy to hear it's doing so well because Bumblebee is the movie we need right now and the one we deserve right now

 

I could have sworn there was a public announcement made a few days ago, saying it was profitable.

 

Actually, we don't know that. Definitely is a pretty serious word to use when you don't have anything to back it up. We might think they're stupid, but we don't run the business, we don't see the ugly numbers that they do. Just because it looks profitable to us, doesn't mean it actually is. There's so much that goes into a movie that our measly $10.00 movie ticket and $30.00 4k disc purchase doesn't even come close to putting a dent in it. There are so many people and services and efforts to contend with that it's staggering. There's a reason people like independent cinema, it tends to shed all of that, but it also rarely finds an audience or a voice. Imagine how difficult it is when you work inside the studio system...

Star Trek is a perfect example of a massively popular franchise being destroyed by one disastrous film. Star Trek (09) and Star Trek Into Darkness, combined, made more than all of the previous 10 films did. (I'm not kidding. Look up their box office takes and add them together. Those two movies made more than the other 10 combined.) Heck, the first one made more on its own than most of the previous 10.

Star Trek Beyond was so ill received that it was a financial flop and then some. It didn't even really break even, especially since Paramount owed HuaHua Media their money back. Because of this financial loss, Paramount more or less begged and pleaded with both Chrises (Pine and Hemsworth) to take a massive pay cut to make the 4th one happen and they both rightfully balked at it because the movies make enough to afford their rate of pay (which hasn't changed since they started the franchise and it was already a low rate by comparison and Paramount wanted to cut THAT even more) and they both walked.

It's now effectively killed the franchise, it's been shelved indefinitely and all pre-production has been canceled. This has been confirmed by a Paramount source to one of the news sites. The director has been given a new production to work on and all of the cast has been let go to work on other projects. It's dead in the water, all because of one film.

You should be mad at the people behind TLK, they're the ones who put us in this predicament, they sunk the ship, it's not Paramount's fault and they wouldn't be foolish or stupid to let the series die if Bumblebee ends up being a financial disaster. If anything, blame Paramount for blowing through the years without effort and expecting the money to keep rolling in. That's where they screwed up.

TLK is still causing problems and they're still bleeding money because of it. I honestly think Bay sunk the ship on purpose so he could get out of working on them. He couldn't say no to the money and it had become his baby somewhat and the thought of someone else doing his job was too much for him to walk away until he got tired of it beyond where he was even willing to go and he decided to put holes in it big enough to sink the ship and he succeeded. Problem is, I don't think even he realized how far he went until it was all said and done.

He doesn't really need to worry or care, though. He still has his career and he's still somewhat bankable and even if he never works again, he's worth a HALF A BILLION DOLLARS, he'll most likely never be broke again. He will never have to work again, he chooses to. Unfortunately, the people in these movies and behind the scenes aren't so lucky.

He singlehandedly ruined the Transformers franchise with terrible decisions and catering to the lowest common denominator. People excuse it all away but there is no justifiable reason for Bumblebee to piss on someone, Sam's mom to talk about masturbation in a film about Transformers. There isn't, there never will be and I don't care if people like those scenes or find them funny for some reason (I used to, sadly), there's no justification for them being in such a movie. Explaining away garbage like that is crazy.

It started in 2007 and slowly progressed into the issues we have today. TLK was just the final straw for the camel's back and the franchise collapsed. Had Bumblebee been released and they worked in more adult humor as the series grew, which is still not necessary, it might've made a bit more sense as it all matured, but to start out with such garbage and then end up with something like Bumblebee at the end is proof that it was destined to be a failure in the end.

I'm tired of making things more palatable for the public and the mass audience, it's what's ruined great things many a time. Perhaps society should come up the ladder out of the scum, a bit. There's nothing wrong with bettering one's self, learning to be a better human being is never a bad thing. We've celebrated staying horrible for far too long and these movies are visual proof of that.

It's because of utterly terrible choices over the years and expecting others to bail them out once they hit the wall. Problem is, China DOES have the money, but they also have the say as well. You can't have your hand out expecting someone else to foot the bill if you're not going to do the work. I truly believe it all started with Iron Man and that era. They figured with Transformers, Star Trek and Marvel movies in their mitts, they were unstoppable until Marvel was bought out by Disney and Disney decided to do it all themselves. G.I. Joe also flopped and the other TF movies weren't well received and instead of a course correction, they doubled down on a bad bet and bet it all. Problem is? The house always wins and Paramount never learned to count cards.

Hollywood may not have the chance to have a say as to whether or not it's given up. If it continually fails, there's nothing to be done with it except put it to rest and be glad (sort of) for what we had and move on. I'm hoping Bumblebee is successful and they continue down his movie's path and not back to Bay, but if it dies, then we ended on a good note and we had an okay run.

 

Good Money.
Good Critics.
What are you waiting to say that this is a reboot?

The Michael Bay universe it's done.They missed the best characters and put humans above them.

This is a new opportunity to use these great characters again to give them a better role in the next films.

 

I think the key difference is that Warner Brothers was in a better position to take a hit than Paramount.

Just compare the domestic top three for each studio over the past 5 years that have wrapped up. 2017 Warner Brothers has spots 3, 7, and 10, while Paramount had spots 25, 30, and 48. 2016 Warner Brothers has spots 8, 9, and 12, while Paramount has spots 16, 29, and 37. 2015 Warner Brothers had spots 20, 21, and 29, while Paramount had spots 11, 18, and 22. 2014 Warner Brothers has spots 1, 5, and 13, while Paramount has spots 7, 15, and 16. 2013 Warner Brothers has spots 5, 6, and 8, while Paramount has spots 11, 13, and 23.

Also I think comic book fans are figuring if Warner Brothers ever in too bad of a spot they could always pull out one of the events the comics have used over the years to reboot. Transformers doesn't so much reboot as they just stop making one cartoon to make another cartoon or the Transformers comic books move from one company to another. Well and it's been a while since Paramount did an honest to goodness reboot.

 

HAHAHAHA
EAT SHIT SOLO

 

It's funny (and a bit sad) that a prequel about a Transformers kid-appeal character was so much better and so much more profitable than a prequel about arguably pop-culture's most iconic character (Han Solo). I wish Solo was half as entertaining as Bumblebee.

 

The difference in domestic vs. foreign take is an interesting comparison though.

 

It's really hillarious sometimes but keeping in mind this is the movie business I guess nothing is too unusual.It can change just like that from pop-culture icon to a movie no one wants to touch or the other way around.There are a lot of unforseen developments like a lot of things in this world..you can't do the math if you don't know all the factors.Sometimes you have to take it the way it is...it may be a surprise.

 

So after some flak from the trolls it looks like my estimate of $450m+ WW was spot on. Also looks like we still have a chance to squeak by domestic take of TLK if it can leg it out for another 3 weeks. If this thing hits $500m WW that’s a pretty big cash mountain of profits for Paramount.

 

China theatres only give 25% of the box office receipts to foreign movie companies. It makes sense to do deals with Alibaba/Tencent for China's release because I imagine they get a higher cut of the profits since they're Chinese companies. So Paramount gets 60m from Tencent for the china distribution rights to bumblebee, where they would have only gotten 60m if it grossed 240m in China anyways. It might just be a good business decision rather than needing help. Also Paramount is relieved of needing to market/advertise the movie in China.

 

That would be the case for Paramount and Universal (through Legendary that is owned by Wanda Group) but I hardly see Fox doing it. I always thought TSG entertainment that frequently finances with Fox was a Chinese company (Tai Seng Guan or something) but its apparently The Seelig Group.

EDIT: Just got this from Wiki after posting "In November 2015, Bona Film Group, a Chinese film studio, invested $235 million in TSG."

Well, ok yup. Looks like that's that.

 

Wasn't it closer to 40%. Because if 25% is the case doesn't that mean the movie has barely broken even?

 

by tonight it might be 420 million and hasnt even opened in Japan. I guess the guy trolling the thread saying its a flop wont be around much now.

 

No, they'll be back, just to say how we are reading the numbers wrong and it's a total failure and they need to bring Michael Bay back.

 

Yeah I wonder what happened to that guy? His name rymed with carbot glider irc.

 

I can't remember, I just remember someone who looked foul but felt fairly biased in favour of returning to Michael Bay's style.