Rachel Zegler’s ‘The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes’ Predicted To Have Franchise Worst Opening Weekend
John F. Trent
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The upcoming prequel film The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is predicted to have the franchise’s worst opening weekend.
Rachel Zegler as Lucy Gray Baird and Tom Blyth as Coriolanus Snow in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Photo Credit: Murray Close
Box Office Pro recently shared their long-range predictions for the Rachel Zegler film predicting the film will gross between $35 million and $45 million in its domestic opening weekend.
The outlet also predicted the film would only gross between $90 million and $142 million in its entire run at the domestic box office.
Rachel Zegler as Lucy Gray Baird and Tom Blyth as Coriolanus Snow in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Photo Credit: Murray Close
The previous worst opening weekend in the Hunger Games franchise was 2015’s The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2. The film grossed a total of $102.6 million in its opening weekend. It went on to earn $281.7 million in its domestic run.
The original The Hunger Games film had an opening weekend of $152.5 million back in 2012. It went on to gross $408 million at the domestic box office.
The sequel, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire had the biggest opening weekend in franchise history with a $158 million haul in 2013. It went on to gross a total of $424.6 million at the domestic box office.
Finally, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 had an opening weekend of $121.8 million. It grossed a total of $337.1 million domestically.
Viola Davis as Dr Volumnia Gaul in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Photo Credit: Murray Close
Production budgets for the previous four films have ranged between $80 million for the first film to $160 million for Mockingjay Part 2. Catching Fire had a budget of $130 million and Mockingjay Part 1 had a $125 million budget.
If you take the original film’s production budget of $80 million. The movie would likely need to gross around $200 million worldwide. Looking at the low end total estimates for the film’s domestic box office, it’s possible the film does not break even if you add in global totals.
Peter Dinklage as Casca Highbottom in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Photo Credit: Murray Close
The first two Hunger Games film made more domestically than it did internationally. The original film grossed $269.9 million internationally. Catching Fire did $440.2 million internationally.
However, both Mockingjay films did bring in more internationally than domestically. Part 1 did $429.4 million while Part 2 did $364.8 million.
Tom Blyth as Coriolanus Snow and Rachel Zegler as Lucy Gray Baird in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Photo Credit: Murray Close
If you take the trends from both Mockingjay films, which saw just shy of a 30% increase in the international box office compared to the domestic, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes will only bring in $207 million globally.
However, if you take the split from the original film, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes will only bring in around $151 million globally.
Finally, if you look at the split for Catching Fire, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes should bring in $177 million globally.
Josh Andrés Rivera as Sejanus Plinth and Tom Blyth as Coriolanus Snow in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Lionsgate
Looking at the high end prediction of $142 million domestically, the film could gross $326 million globally if it follows a similar split to the Mockingjay films. That would definitely make it profitable if indeed the film only had an $80 million production budget.
If it follows a similar pattern to the original film, the film’s global gross would come in around $237 million. That too would be profitable if you assume an $80 million budget.
It would bring in $280 million if it follows the domestic and international split of Catching Fire. Again, it would be profitable.
Tom Blyth as Coriolanus Snow and Rachel Zegler as Lucy Gray Baird in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Photo Credit: Murray Close
However, if The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes has a budget similar to Mockingjay Part 2, the film needs to rake in at least $400 million. That would mean even if the film hits the high end predictions offered by Box Office Pro it would lose money no matter what scenario.
Even if it has a similar budget to Mockingjay Part 1 it would need to gross $312.5 million to at least break even. A budget similar to Catching Fire would require the film to gross at least $325 million to break even.
If you take the average budget of all four films ($123.7 million), the film would need to gross at least $310 million to break even.
Fionnula Flanagan as Grandma’am, Tom Blyth as Coriolanus Snow and Hunter Schafer as Tigris Snow in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Photo Credit: Murray Close
Thus these box office projections for The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes do not bode well and it looks like not only will this film be the worst performing Hunger Games film in the franchise’s history, but it looks like it will also lose Lionsgate potentially tens of million of dollars.
If the film indeed flops it would mark another flop in actress Rachel Zegler’s short career. Currently, all films the actress have starred in have been box office losers. Those films are West Side Story and Shazam! Fury of the Gods.
The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes arrives in theaters on November 17, 2023.
Tom Blyth as Coriolanus Snow in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Lionsgate
What do you make of these predictions?
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