This year, the Glicked mash-up feels confected. Like Barbenheimer, it generated memes and fan art in the US where the two films opened on the same day.
Here, they opened a week apart so “Glicked” – shoot me – made no sense.
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Ridley Scott’s long-time-coming sequel, Gladiator II, had already taken $9.6 million in its opening week before Jon M. Chu’s stage musical adaption, Wicked, opened with $10.3 million last weekend. (Gladiator II reached $13.8 million on its second weekend.)
For comparison, Barbie opened much hotter than Wicked with $19.6 million and Oppenheimer was just behind Gladiator II with $9.4 million on their opening weekends.
Cinemas need a boost again but, while strong films, the two latest have nowhere near the cultural impact of Barbie and Oppenheimer – both bold, risky originals.
“You can’t capture lightning in a bottle twice,” Shawn Robbins, director of analytics at Fandango, told NBC News.
“The thing’s never going to repeat itself the same way, but it certainly became part of the conversation to an extent … more studios can look at this as another successful blueprint for how to release two big counterprogramming movies at the same time.”
The ‘icked’ other half of the year’s worst portmanteau word: Cynthia Erivo (left) and Ariana Grande in Wicked. Credit: Universal
That’s debatable. If studios can get clear air for a big new movie, they will happily take the lack of competition.
So, let’s shut down any attempt at “Padderatu” when Paddington In Peru and Nosferatu open on New Year’s Day.
Or “Bridgemerica” – even worse, “CaptainJones” – when Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy and Captain America: Brave New World open simultaneously in February.
To quote Mean Girls, a film that was a hit two decades ago based just on its quality, “stop trying to make fetch happen”.
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