8 Most Recent Box Office Bombs That Wasted Millions of Hollywood's Money

2024 was a record-breaker with all those major and pretty unexpected box office flops that not long before were believed to become solid award season frontrunners.

This might not be the case for Marvel’s Madame Web or Kraven the Hunter that were doomed to fail dramatically, but some other anticipated releases like Todd Phillips’ Joker: Folie Á Deux or Coppola’s Megalopolis were at least expected to make it even of their impressive multi million budget — a mission that failed way too quickly.

This year, however, there’s already a new collection of box office bombs, with some of those in fact becoming critical darlings back in the day. Here are some of the movies that cost Hollywood everything and, well, for nothing.

‘The Apprentice’

• On Rotten Tomatoes, The Apprentice holds scores of 83% and 84% from critics and viewers
• On IMDb, the movie is rated 7.1/10

Even though Ali Abbasi’s biopic about Donald Trump made it to the Oscars and earned both Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong their respective nominations, the movie’s failure in the box office was just as dramatic as its lead character.

With a budget of $16 million, The Apprentice grossed $17 million, following its attempts to boost the marketing campaign which, well, also failed due to all the controversies that surround Trump’s name.

‘Better Man’

• On Rotten Tomatoes, Better Man keeps scores of 89% and 90% from critics and audiences
• On IMDb, the movie rates 7.6/10

A pretty weird reimagining of the life and career of British pop star Robbie Williams, in the movie introduced as an anthropomorphic chimpanzee, impressed both critics and viewers, but somehow didn’t get that much attention in the theatres.

Better Man’s distributing studios spent a whopping amount of $110 million on turning Williams into a primate, ending up with $22 million grossed across the globe.

The movie’s director Michael Gracey once admitted that he would want Better Man to resonate with the audiences despite its failure in the box office, though we still don’t know how.

‘Nickel Boys’

• On Rotten Tomatoes, Nickel Boys has scores of 91% and 75% from critics and viewers
• On IMDb, the movie’s rating is 7/10

Shot from the first-person point of view, Nickel Boys has become one of the most astounding and at the same time most overlooked frontrunners for the Oscars this year.

The movie didn’t get the award in either of its two nominations, also failing dramatically in the box office and grossing $3 million against its budget of $23 million.

Even the Oscars nominees’ announcement back in January didn’t boost Nickel Boys’ theatrical run much, with the movie adding just several more thousand dollars to its piggy-bank afterwards.

‘Wolf Man’

• On Rotten Tomatoes, Wolf Man holds scores of 49% and 55% from critics and audiences
• On IMDb, the movie rates 5.6/10

A reboot of the Wolf Man franchise, the movie that stars Julia Garner in the leading role became the result of a trust that Universal gained in director Leigh Whannell after the overwhelming success of the latter’s 2020 sci-fi horror The Invisible Man.

As it turned out, the expectations were way too high for the movie’s bar, with Wolf Man grossing around $35 million against its budget of $25 million and eventually landing on streaming just three weeks after premiering in theatres worldwide.

‘Juror #2’

• On Rotten Tomatoes, Juror #2 holds scores of 93% and 91% from critics and viewers
• On IMDb, the movie’s rating is 7/10

It might be that Clint Eastwood’s legal thriller drama with an all-star leading cast wasn’t that much of a new thing in the history of the genre, but the movie didn’t draw many viewers to the theatres anyway.

Even though Warner Bros. Pictures didn’t report anything about Juror #2’s official numbers, the film is believed to have grossed $25 million against its budget of $35 million.

‘In the Lost Lands’

• On Rotten Tomatoes, In the Lost Lands keeps scores of 25% and 48% from critics and audiences
• On IMDb, the movie is rated 4.6/10

An adaptation of George Martin’s short fantasy novel of the same name, In the Lost Lands was teased by the author himself as one of the most exciting releases this year, but it turned out to be the contrary of that.

Paul W. S. Anderson’s movie was probably this year’s biggest box office bomb so far, grossing around $6 million worldwide against the budget of $55 million.

‘Black Bag’

• On Rotten Tomatoes, Black Bag keeps scores of 96% and 70% from critics and viewers
• On IMDb, the movie’s rating is 6.8/10

Despite being praised as Steven Soderbergh’s highest-rated movie to-date, Black Bag didn’t have results as impressive in the box office, grossing $41 million after the studios spent around $60 million on the film’s production.

“This is the kind of film I made my career on. And if a mid-level budget, star-driven movie can’t seem to get people over the age of 25 years old to come out to theatres – if that’s truly a dead zone – then that’s not a good thing for movies. What’s gonna happen to the person behind me who wants to make this kind of film?” Soderbergh complained in an interview with The Independent.

‘Mickey 17’

• On Rotten Tomatoes, Mickey 17 has scores of 77% and 73% from critics and audiences
• On IMDb, the movie is rated 6.8/10

Things have become complicated for Bong Joon Ho’s long-awaited sci-fi comedy long before it actually got to the screens.

The movie that stars Robert Pattinson in a double role wasted around $120 million of Warner Bros. Pictures’ budget, eventually finishing its theatrical run with only $132 million earned.

Whether it’s for several premiere delays that Mickey 17 had to experience or for some other reason, it might be that the audiences somehow lost the interest in the film which at the time even seemed to never make it to the screens after all.