20 years ago, Marvel’s misguided film was a box office hit

(Welcome to Tales from the box officeour column examining box office miracles, disasters, and everything in between, plus what we can learn from them.)

Marvel wasn’t always the powerhouse it is now. Even years after “Blade” and “X-Men” were hugely successful, it took a while for the industry to catch up and start regularly turning Marvel Comics characters into successful theatrical franchises. when Iron Man hit theaters in 2008 and began the Marvel Cinematic Universe as we know itEverything changed. But in the early 2000s, there was a kind of Wild West vibe going. At that time, some real clunkers made their way into the world. “Elektra” is at or near the top (or maybe the bottom) of that list.

The film was released in early 2005 by 20th Century Fox, and served as a prequel to the film The 2003 film Daredevil starring Ben Affleck, which was at best a modest financial success. Although it is a critical disaster. However, that was enough for officials at Fox to move forward with a solo film centered around Jennifer Garner’s titular killer. It proved to be a very bad decision, and one that helped show every other studio trying to get into the superhero gold rush exactly what it is. no to do.

In this week’s Tales from the Box Office, we take a look at “Elektra” for its 20th anniversary. We’ll find out how the film came to be, how Jennifer Garner had to be involved in it, what happened once it hit theaters, what happened in the wake of its release, and what lessons can we learn from it? Years later. Let’s dig in, shall we?

“Elektra” as we know it revolves around Elektra Natchios (Garner), who comes back to life after her death at the hands of Bullseye (Colin Farrell) in Daredevil. The deadly assassin is brought back to life by the Hand, an elite group of ninja assassins who trained her. She is then ordered to kill a man and his teenage daughter, who doesn’t sit right with her, prompting her to engage in hand-to-hand combat.

Marvel and Hollywood have been trying to make an “Elektra” movie as far back as the 1980s thanks to Frank Miller’s success as the character in the comics. In a 1992 article in diverseOliver Stone (“Platoon”) once looked to make a feature film called “Electra Assassin” which was never made. This means that the idea predates the 2003 Daredevil movie.

However, the idea of ​​doing a spin-off related to a film that was a critical failure and not much financial success was a strange choice. It also doesn’t help that the stars haven’t been kind to her over the years. Speaking in 2013, Affleck described Daredevil as the only film he regretted making:

“The only movie I actually regret is Daredevil.” It just kills me, I love that story, that character, and the fact that it developed the way it did sticks with me.

As for Garner, she didn’t seem too keen on the idea either. Her ex-boyfriend, Michael Vartan, said: “I heard (Electra) was terrible. (Jennifer) called me and told me she was terrible.” SF portal In January 2005. “She had to do it because of Daredevil.” “It was in her contract.”

In fact, stars often sign multi-movie deals when they sign a contract for a potential franchise. So, whether Garner thought “Elektra” was a good idea or not is irrelevant. In order not to violate the said contract, she was forced to do the film. This is not a good way to start a large production like this, but Fox felt it was the right way to go. So he went.

Why would Fox want to force Garner into this? At that time, she was in the midst of her participation in the famous series “Alias.” Created by JJ Abrams long before his feature directorial debut “Mission: Impossible III”, The show was a huge success and Garner was at the peak of her powers. But she was also still under contract for that series as well, which made things complicated.

Rob Bowman (Reign of Fire) has been tapped to direct Elektra, with a cast including the likes of Terrence Stamp (Stick), Kirsten Prout (Abby Miller) and Will Yun Lee (Kirigi). To put it mildly, Fox didn’t make it easy for the director. In an October 2005 interview with IGNBowman explained that he and his crew were on a very tight schedule centered around Garner’s limited availability:

“The process of making this film was extremely stressful. Jennifer showed up within days of the first day of shooting, and I returned to work with her just days after Alias ​​was finished.” It was a very stressful prep process, but that was the nature of the beast, and we had to start filming when Jennifer finished “Alias” and we had to let her go at the end of her hiatus, so that drove everything.

Bowman was working to a tight schedule and a relatively limited budget, said to be in the range of $43 million (although some estimates peg it at $60 million). Even adjusting for inflation, this is the bare minimum for a comic book movie. This would put him in Similar scope to 2019’s “Joker”, although it wasn’t nearly as profitable. As Bowman explained in that same interview, the whole endeavor was somewhat hectic:

“I got it done. I would go back to the studio and watch a cut. I would give them notes. I would get in my car and drive to Burbank to get the color and I would give them notes. I would go to the lab to print and give them notes, and it was because of the short-form nature of the publication, and we wanted to get to a certain release date, and you had to Doing what you have to do does.”

Fox decided to essentially dump “Elektra” in early January, a month known to not be a prime month for big releases. This narrative has changed a bit in recent years, but overall, Crowd-pleasing hits like Liam Neeson’s “Taken.” They were the exception rather than the rule for January releases at the time. This does not bode well.

To make matters worse, critics were extremely harsh towards the film. It still ranks as one of the worst reviewed Marvel films of all time With the likes of Josh Trank’s “Fantastic Four” from 2015. To date, “Electra” has an abysmal 11% approval rating. On rotten tomatoes. So, when the film opened in theaters on January 14, 2005, almost everything was working against it.

In its opening weekend, the Marvel spin-off barely cracked the top five for the weekend with a $12.8 million opening. “Coach Carter” took first place, while Warner Bros.’ The oft-forgotten “Racing Stripes” ranked higher in fourth place. plus, “Meet the Fockers” was still in the middle of its $522 million haul. It got worse rather quickly, as Bowman’s film fell off a cliff in its second weekend before falling nicely out of the top 10 by the end of its third week.

In the end, “Elektra” finished its theatrical run with $24.4 million domestically to go on to earn a, but still terrible, $32.5 million overseas, for a grand total of $56.9 million worldwide. In other words, that was roughly 32% of the $179 million that Daredevil made nearly two years ago. The whole thing was a train wreck.

Even with a bomb as big as “Elektra,” Fox was willing to pour some relatively significant resources into a DVD release. Although the physical media market is far from dead, it is a shadow of what it was in the early 2000s. To that end, Bowman was allowed to do a very important director’s cut on the DVD, which he talked about in the same IGN interview:

“The studio let me re-edit the thing without any discussion from them. I sat in a room with my editor and cut it the way I wanted it. On top of that, beyond just re-coloring it and making it look as rich as I could, I also wanted to make it “Dedicated to home entertainment, because that’s a different presentation.”

The DVD also includes an excluded cameo by Affleck’s Daredevil, of which no cuts were made from the film. However, the director’s cut of “Elektra” is an improvement, but it’s only had one so far. It will be a full decade before we get a truly proper introduction to the character Elodie Yung has been cast as Elektra in Season 2 of Netflix’s Daredevil. Keep in mind that this has been a constant in the MCU era; That’s not to say that bad comic book adaptations weren’t happening yet, but they were fewer and far between.

As for Garner, her version of the character eventually got a redemption round as well. Garner returns as Elektra 2024’s Deadpool & Wolverine, which became the highest-grossing R-rated film of all time With over $1.3 billion in worldwide box office to her name. While this role couldn’t go back in time and make Garner’s solo film better, it certainly helped provide some closure.

Even before Hollywood’s cinematic universes were thriving, Fox saw the potential for multiple superheroes to appear in each other’s films and then use those films to produce other films. The problem? It doesn’t really work when the film you use to build that project wasn’t very good — or entirely successful — in the first place. “Daredevil” was nothing but kind of a hit. It would have been better to leave her well alone.

Making “Elektra” seemed like a fool’s errand from the beginning. From the lead actor being forced to make the film to the rushed production, none of this was coming from a creative place. This is not a recipe for success. Part of the reason for this Sam Raimi’s “Spider-Man” was a huge hit in 2002 is that it embraced the essence of the titular character and was carefully crafted. It wasn’t made simply because “the public wants superhero movies.” There is more to it than that. And still more, two decades later.

Maybe it’s more forgiving than something like 2004 “Blade: Trinity” turned out to be a mess. The previous two “Blade” films were huge hits, so it’s only natural that New Line Cinema would produce another. It’s less understandable, however, when the studio tries to squeeze blood out of the stone, with the stone being “reckless” in this case. With superhero movies facing an uncertain future in 2025, Hollywood would do well not to repeat the sins of the past in its quest for box office success.

All due respect, but Electra was a sinner with bad intentions. Bad things happen when studios get involved in projects like this. Just look at Sony’s evil “Spider-Man” movies, especially “Madame Web” and “Kraven the Hunter.” 20 years later, these things still happen. This ill-fated Marvel spin-off should serve as a cautionary tale.