To start, let's present some facts:
The Expendables made $34,825,135 in its opening weekend. So far it has a total gross of slightly less than $100,000,000. The opening weekend number may not seem extremely high at first, and to be completely honest it isn't. Especially when compared to the top opening weekend of all time, which belongs to The Dark Knight, bringing in a whopping $158,411,483. Of course, to compare this movie to such colossal a giant is extremely unfair. So, let's look at a few similar titles:
The Bourne Ultimatum $69,283,690
The Bourne Supremacy $52,521,865
I, Robot $52,179,887
Bad Boys II $46,522,560
Mission: Impossible $45,436,830
Terminator Salvation $42,558,390
All of these figures presented are just from the opening weekends. These are all pretty high as well, so it can be said that The Expendables had a pretty average opening weekend.
But let's be honest, 35 million dollars is still a lot of fucking money.
So why exactly does Hollywood expect people to go see action movies, regardless of the plot (or lack thereof) and sometimes overbearing amount of explosions?
The complicated answer:
RottenTomatoes gives The Expendables a 40% rating, or two stars. Yet, this hasn't stopped the movie from making $100,000,000. There have been a slew of negative reviews stating that the movie is just "too much action" and "not enough plot," etc.
However, audiences are completely willing to watch some movies and just let their mind stop working for two hours. It is very easy to walk into a movie theater, forget the outside world, and just let everything in that movie take you to another realm. It is completely safe to say that the "action movie" is a tried-and-true formula, especially in the American markets. I mean, let's face it: people like to see shit getting blown up.
The Simple Answer:
Hollywood expects you to go see these movies because they know you will, and so do you.
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I will be taking the next two days off for mental health reasons, so my daily posting will be postponed until The Monday post (which normally goes up sometime Sunday night.)
I will still be reading the comments, and remember I am always looking for suggestions for Free Topic Friday!
