Not Quite Box Office: ‘Invisible Man’ Tops Fandango As ‘Bad Boys 3’ And ‘Sonic’ Come To VOD

The year's best studio release, and the year's two biggest global hits, will all make for ideal at-home entertainment for a quarantined nation.

The problem with comparing the various online streaming platforms is that the results, in terms of ranking, is different for each of them. Jumanji: The Next Level is still topping over at Google Play, but Vin Diesel’s Bloodshot (available to buy for $20) is tops over at Amazon and The Invisible Man (available to rent for $20) is still tops for the second weekend in a row over at FandangoNow. Moreover, these rankings can change at a moment’s notice. Heck, by the time I publish this, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (now available to rent) and Bad Boys for Life and Sonic the Hedgehog (both now available to buy) may be moving up the charts.

Nonetheless, over at FandangoNow, eight of the ten top titles (Invisible Man, Onward, Bloodshot, Birds of Prey, I Still Believe, The Way Back, Dolittle and The Hunt) are very recent (or outright early) priced-to-buy theatrical offerings. The exceptions are Jumanji: The Next Level and 1917, the latter of which just entered the “you can rent it for $5” stage last week. Today sees the “electronic sell-through” debuts of Bad Boys for Life and Sonic The Hedgehog, while this Friday sees the early “priced to buy” debuts of Focus Features’ acclaimed indie Never Rarely Sometimes Always and STX’s Brahms: The Boy 2 (priced to buy for just $10, mimicking The Gentlemen going early for just $13).

The Invisible Man is doing very well in its premature post-theatrical afterlife. Alas, even with studios getting more of that rental/purchase price than they would a ticket sale (which is usually 50/50), it’s not like anyone over at Universal or Blumhouse is happy that they had to yank a successful theatrical release out of theaters in two weeks. The Leigh Whannell-directed and Elisabeth Moss-starring film had earned $124.5 million worldwide, with plenty of overseas territories yet to come. Unlike most of the pre-shutdown releases, The Hunt, Bloodshot, Onward and The Way Back, Blumhouse’s acclaimed (it’s arguably the best movie of the year) and buzzy The Invisible Man was a hit that was metaphorically cut down in its prime.

Oh, and with $425 million worldwide and $204 million domestic, Sony’s Bad Boys for Life is the year’s biggest global and domestic earning. The Will Smith/Martin Lawrence action comedy was the first “new” January release (not counting Oscar expansions) to pass $200 million domestic, and it’s one of the bigger January grosses ever even accounting for inflation. Speaking of Oscar expansions, Universal and DreamWorks’ 1917’s joins Hidden Figures ($169 million in 2016/2017), La La Land ($151 million in 2016/2017) and The Revenant ($183 million in 2015/2016) as the biggest Oscar season expansions in recent years. It’s no American Sniper ($350 million in 2014/2015), but it certainly played, with $157 million domestic, like an early-2000’s Oscar title.

Sonic the Hedgehog was also a, sorry, runaway hit, earning $146 million domestic (the biggest video game movie ever, sans inflation, in North America) and $306 million worldwide. While Paramount’s $85 million flick was an unmitigated smash, the pandemic and related theater closures prevented a total above the inflation-adjusted cumes of Mortal Kombat ($70 million in 1995/$156 million adjusted) and Pokemon: The First Movie ($85 million in 1999/$155 million adjusted). Moreover, a delayed (for now) China release may have meant the difference between being one of the biggest video game movies ever worldwide (currently just below Resident Evil: The Final Chapter’s $312 million cume) and being alongside Rampage ($428 million), Detective Pikachu ($431 million) and Warcraft ($438 million).

Speaking of China, had their lock down happened just weeks later, the top movies of the year would probably be made up of several huge Chinese releases which were all delayed from their New Year’s frame debuts. Once China’s theaters re-open and start playing more than just past blockbuster from China and North America, the “biggest earners of the year” list may look very different. But until the likes of The Rescue, Detective Chinatown 3 (Detective Chinatown 2 earned $585 million in early 2018) and Jiang Ziya (a sequel to the terrific and $720 million-plus grossing animated action fantasy Ne Zha) show up in Chinese theaters, Bad Boys For Life will be the year’s biggest blockbuster.