Flop.

It is a term that gets thrown around a lot in the world of movies. At times it is really a matter of opinion. Others it is painfully apparent as to whether a film has flopped. Sadly, 2023 saw more than its share of flops.

Truthfully, even some of the better movies of the year could be considered a flop this year because of the way the box office seems to be going. I know that there will be some films on my Top 30 films list of the year that would be considered a flop. It has been a tough year.

Even the juggernaut of film companies, Disney, has lost its share of money on movies this year. If it can happen to Disney, it can happen to anyone.

The excess of streaming services can be blamed for some of these flops. Who wants to go to the theater when they can just wait a few months and see the film on Disney + or on Max?

The John Carter Memorial Award is given to the film chosen by EYG as the biggest flop of the year. This year was a tough decision.

Past years had some tough choices too.

John Carter Memorial Award

Previous winners:  John Carter, Alice Through the Looking Glass, The Lone Ranger, A Million Ways to Die in the West, Expendables 3, Jem and the Holograms, Pan, Rock the Casbah, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, Robin Hood (2018), Mortal Engines, Playmobil: The Movie, The Rhythm Section, Reminiscence, Strange World  

This year had plenty of runners-up.

Dis-Honorable mention: One of the reasons that these films are considered flops is the size of the budget. Some of these movies just spent too much money and had no chance of making it back. One example was the fifth film in the Indiana Jones franchise, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, which was a decent movie, but it seemed as if no one was going to go see it. Certainly not enough to make up a budget of reportedly 294.7 million dollars, not counting marketing. Another film with a budget too high was the first official flop of the MCU, The Marvels. I liked that movie a lot, but it did not make it to $100 million domestically. Killers of the Flower Moon also did not make much money domestically with a considerably larger budget than this type of film usually has. Shazam: Fury of the Gods did not succeed on building on a successful first film. Disney’s latest film Wish should have done much better business than it did, just showing that Disney is struggling to put together that classic animated hit. Big George Foreman only made $5.7 million worldwide on a $32 million dollar budget. I did not see it either. Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part One was one of the best films of the year, but it just did not make much moolah.

Of all of these, though, there is one that should have been way more successful and should have been a lynchpin of the films this summer. 

Winner: The Flash  

This was a huge DC Comics film, featuring one of the top characters of the company. The Flash had a nine year TV show preceding this. And yet, it was as if everything was playing against The Flash for Warner Brothers. Starting with the craziness of its star’s life over the last couple of years. Ezra Miller made headlines with his behavior and it reflected poorly on The Flash. Though not the sole reason for this film’s downfall, it did play a part. Secondly, the film was not very good. It had some parts that were solid, but a film that saw the return of Michael Keaton as Batman should never have had this much trouble. Third, everyone knew that this was a film that was staggering to the end as the whole DCEU was being revamped into the DCU by James Gunn and this film would not go on. 

I’ve always liked the Flash. He is one of my top DC characters. This was, at best for me, okay and I could see the numerous problems with it. I never would have guessed that it would only make $55 million opening weekend. 

That makes this the John Carter Memorial Award winner for 2023.