Top 10 Worldwide Box Office Films data from IMDB’s Box Office Mojo: [https://www.boxofficemojo.com/year/world/](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/year/world/)
Illustration created in Adobe Illustrator.
I wouldn’t really consider Wicked to be original as it’s basically a prequel to Wizard of Oz.
Maybe I’m stupid but I don’t understand what this is saying. What does the y axis represent?
Imagine paying $20 to see Kindergarten Cop in the theater today..”It’s not a tuu-mah”…lol.
No one wants to take even the slightest risk, so they’ll just continue to milk already successful IP. It’s the way of the shareholder
The movie names up and down the sides add nothing but confusion.
I think the reasoning is movie studios are betting on what’s safe, and sequels are the safest option. In the past if a movie failed, it can recoup some money from rentals and physical media. Now if a movie fails it will be hard to get as much money from streaming. So what is a for sure way to make money on a film with little chance of failure? A sequel.
Other industries have also bent their will to streaming. Music for example, songs are getting shorter because people’s attention spans have diminished and it’s the easiest way to get royalty from a song.
Depressing. But probably says more about the state of studio greenlighting and budgeting than the state of the craft. Hollywood as an artistic community is dead, and Hollywood as revenue generator wants safe investments and sure bets.
In the past, I did a similar look. A little more nuance in the breakdown of film categories, but also a shorter period of time:
Would be interested to see a line graph of average audiance ratings. Do people like originals or remakes/ sequels more?
I’ve assumed its always been hollywood execs seeing dollar signs in their eyes rather than a genuine desire from audiences to remake/ sequel everything possible
This graph is fine except for the random movies on the y axis.
at this rate, every movie in 2035 will be a slightly different remake of wicked
I understand the logic behind the graphics but I cant read the specifics. Whats the relevance of the movie titles on the Y-axis? This makes zero sense to me
Movies aren’t becoming worse so I guess this doesn’t really matter in the end. Besides, the top 10 box office hits doesn’t say much about the movie industry as a whole.
I want more original movies. All the reboots and sequels suck
Wicked is a Sequel, Prequel, Remake and Remix.
Both of my kids are color-deficient seeing, and I think they’d need to sit together to piece together what the fuck is going on!
This chart is not beautiful.
I watched a YouTube think piece (I forget the name unfortunately) that discussed this phenomenon & presented a pretty compelling case:
The reason that Movies have changed is because our viewing habits have changed. Before streaming, people would regularly go to the movie theater or Blockbuster & then pick out what they wanted to watch. They were going to see any movie, not going to see a specific movie. This led to more butts in seats for mid/low budget movies that didn’t have a ton of brand ID or marketing behind it. If your movie flopped at the box office, DVD sales could make the difference (Fight Club).
Now, people only really go to the movies for a special event, otherwise they’ll catch it on the steaming app of their choice. People need to be convinced to go to theater, so marketing has become more important, which means Studios are reaching for recognizable IP, faces, and stories.
It’s easy to say that we want more variety, but ticket sales don’t necessarily back that up.
For a studio today, they think they’re more likely to get a box office return on a handful of $250million movies than they would from a dozen $50million movies & it’s hard to say they’re wrong.
wicked is a sequel/prequel
Given how many of the “original films” are also adaptations from other media, I’d want to see that as its own color.
When you no longer have the long tail of video/dvd sales, the studios have found that they are unwilling to gamble money on movies which are unlikely, or unpredictable, in their ability to recoup their expenses at the box office in the first couple weeks. This means sticking to “tried and true” properties or directors. Its an unfortunate truth of how the industry has been shaped by online streaming platforms.
You see something similar in video games where large studios are unwilling to bet on new IPs or games without an existing IP to attach to them (Cyberpunk, Witcher, Battlefield, Warhammer, Fallout, etc). Games have the benefit of the barrier to entry being much, much lower than a movie though so indie studios can put out more experimental games, but movies struggle in being able to put out feature length films on the cheap.
2008 is when DVD sales really took a nose dive, but they had been trending downward since before then. You can see that almost directly correlated to the 2000s and onward for the industry’s shift in focus away from original films.
I have hated this pattern for years. Seeing original movies downfall while everyone lapped up the sequels, prequels and remakes.
I swear this era (over the last 20 years) will be known for its lack of creativity, except for animated movies, they still pump out great originals
This is so badly made that I can’t really understand it.
![Decline of Original Big Box Office Films (and Rise of the Franchise) [OC]](https://www.europesays.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/x53rcgonktif1-1920x1024.png)
24 comments
Top 10 Worldwide Box Office Films data from IMDB’s Box Office Mojo: [https://www.boxofficemojo.com/year/world/](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/year/world/)
Illustration created in Adobe Illustrator.
I wouldn’t really consider Wicked to be original as it’s basically a prequel to Wizard of Oz.
Maybe I’m stupid but I don’t understand what this is saying. What does the y axis represent?
Imagine paying $20 to see Kindergarten Cop in the theater today..”It’s not a tuu-mah”…lol.
No one wants to take even the slightest risk, so they’ll just continue to milk already successful IP. It’s the way of the shareholder
The movie names up and down the sides add nothing but confusion.
I think the reasoning is movie studios are betting on what’s safe, and sequels are the safest option. In the past if a movie failed, it can recoup some money from rentals and physical media. Now if a movie fails it will be hard to get as much money from streaming. So what is a for sure way to make money on a film with little chance of failure? A sequel.
Other industries have also bent their will to streaming. Music for example, songs are getting shorter because people’s attention spans have diminished and it’s the easiest way to get royalty from a song.
Depressing. But probably says more about the state of studio greenlighting and budgeting than the state of the craft. Hollywood as an artistic community is dead, and Hollywood as revenue generator wants safe investments and sure bets.
In the past, I did a similar look. A little more nuance in the breakdown of film categories, but also a shorter period of time:
https://i.imgur.com/UIlfti1.png
Would be interested to see a line graph of average audiance ratings. Do people like originals or remakes/ sequels more?
I’ve assumed its always been hollywood execs seeing dollar signs in their eyes rather than a genuine desire from audiences to remake/ sequel everything possible
This graph is fine except for the random movies on the y axis.
at this rate, every movie in 2035 will be a slightly different remake of wicked
I understand the logic behind the graphics but I cant read the specifics. Whats the relevance of the movie titles on the Y-axis? This makes zero sense to me
Movies aren’t becoming worse so I guess this doesn’t really matter in the end. Besides, the top 10 box office hits doesn’t say much about the movie industry as a whole.
I want more original movies. All the reboots and sequels suck
Wicked is a Sequel, Prequel, Remake and Remix.
Both of my kids are color-deficient seeing, and I think they’d need to sit together to piece together what the fuck is going on!
This chart is not beautiful.
I watched a YouTube think piece (I forget the name unfortunately) that discussed this phenomenon & presented a pretty compelling case:
The reason that Movies have changed is because our viewing habits have changed. Before streaming, people would regularly go to the movie theater or Blockbuster & then pick out what they wanted to watch. They were going to see any movie, not going to see a specific movie. This led to more butts in seats for mid/low budget movies that didn’t have a ton of brand ID or marketing behind it. If your movie flopped at the box office, DVD sales could make the difference (Fight Club).
Now, people only really go to the movies for a special event, otherwise they’ll catch it on the steaming app of their choice. People need to be convinced to go to theater, so marketing has become more important, which means Studios are reaching for recognizable IP, faces, and stories.
It’s easy to say that we want more variety, but ticket sales don’t necessarily back that up.
For a studio today, they think they’re more likely to get a box office return on a handful of $250million movies than they would from a dozen $50million movies & it’s hard to say they’re wrong.
wicked is a sequel/prequel
Given how many of the “original films” are also adaptations from other media, I’d want to see that as its own color.
When you no longer have the long tail of video/dvd sales, the studios have found that they are unwilling to gamble money on movies which are unlikely, or unpredictable, in their ability to recoup their expenses at the box office in the first couple weeks. This means sticking to “tried and true” properties or directors. Its an unfortunate truth of how the industry has been shaped by online streaming platforms.
You see something similar in video games where large studios are unwilling to bet on new IPs or games without an existing IP to attach to them (Cyberpunk, Witcher, Battlefield, Warhammer, Fallout, etc). Games have the benefit of the barrier to entry being much, much lower than a movie though so indie studios can put out more experimental games, but movies struggle in being able to put out feature length films on the cheap.
2008 is when DVD sales really took a nose dive, but they had been trending downward since before then. You can see that almost directly correlated to the 2000s and onward for the industry’s shift in focus away from original films.
I have hated this pattern for years. Seeing original movies downfall while everyone lapped up the sequels, prequels and remakes.
I swear this era (over the last 20 years) will be known for its lack of creativity, except for animated movies, they still pump out great originals
This is so badly made that I can’t really understand it.
Comments are closed.