Summary

• Horizon: An American Saga directed by Kevin Costner is anticipated as a box office hit due to his loyal fan following.
• Movies like The Crow with Bill Skarsgård may not find modern box office success due to vague appeal and oversaturated market.
• The highly anticipated sequel MaXXXine in the modern horror genre is expected to be a box office hit with innovative storytelling.

The 2024 box office has yet to see its first $1 billion movie as of June. A dip in the total box office was anticipated for 2024, especially after the oversaturated slate of theatrical releases of 2023 that saw Barbie become the highest-grossing movie of the year with a worldwide total of $1.446 billion. Some films, many of them sequels, are anticipated to be the top performers of 2024, including Despicable Me 4, Inside Out 2, Deadpool & Wolverine, Mufasa: The Lion King, and Joker: Folie à Deux. As far as new original standalone movies that have yet to be released in 2024, there are very few options with high box office potential.

2024 will likely be ed as the year of sequels, with surprising box office flop Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.

10 Horizon: An American Saga Will Be A Box Office Hit

Releases on June 28

The Kevin Costner Western Horizon: An American Saga will likely be a box office hit. Based on Costner's large and loyal following thanks to his standout performance on Paramount's Yellowstone, his fans will likely show up in numbers at theaters when the first installment of his Horizon franchise finally gets released. Horizon: An American Saga marks the first directorial effort by Costner since 2003's Open Range and his fourth overall following his 1990 Oscar-winner Dances with Wolves. Considering how much of Costner's personal funding went into the creation of his landmark western franchise, Horizon's box office will likely be fueled by for the actor in general. Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 2 releases on August 16, 2024 and would be even more surprising if it outperforms Horizon - Chapter 1.

9 Bill Skarsgård’s The Crow Will Be A Box Office Flop

Releases on August 23

The Crow was a box office hit when it was released in 1994, earning $94 million against a $23 million budget. The 2024 remake, which has been likened more to a reimagining, will star Bill Skarsgård and FKA twigs but will likely not be as much of a box office success as the original film, especially considering the current state of the modern box office. The film may be too ambiguous or niche to generate a wide response from audiences, paired with the fact that there's no ostensible reason why viewers in this day and age would be compelled to see The Crow in theaters as opposed to waiting for it to inevitably reach a streaming platform. The Crow's budget is reportedly $50 million, meaning it would need to make roughly $110 million worldwide to turn a profit, a figure that both Argylle and Mean Girls were not even able to hit.

8 Mia Goth's MaXXXine Will Be A Box Office Hit

Releases on July 5

MaXXXine is the third installment of Ti West's modern horror franchise, which includes the celebrated A24 films X and Pearl. The film looks to up the scale of the entire story's universe and makes its premise more compelling by having it set in 1980s Hollywood rather than on a remote ranch. Both X and Pearl were remarkably made for just $1 million, although MaXXXine will likely have a higher budget considering its enhanced set pieces and the addition of cast such as Elizabeth Debicki, Michelle Monaghan, Giancarlo Esposito, Lily Collins, and pop star Halsey. As A24 continues to rise into the mainstream with box office hits such as Civil War and Everything, Everywhere, All At Once, MaXXXine could easily become one of its highest-grossing productions.

7 Kevin Hart’s Borderlands Will Be A Box Office Flop

Releases on August 9

Borderlands is a critically acclaimed video game series that on the surface seems like an interesting choice to adapt into a feature film. Although 2024's Fallout has proven that expansive video games with a cult following can generate mass appeal, Borderlands may not find the same type of success at the box office. It does have the advantage of featuring an all-star cast that includes Kevin Hart, Jack Black, Jamie Lee Curtis, and, of all people, Cate Blanchett. The first two actors could inspire fans of Jumanji to see the late summer blockbuster in theaters but similar to The Crow, the ambiguous nature of the franchise and the story may not be enough to attract viewers to see the film as soon as it's released. The critical reception could change this, however, since Eli Roth wrote the script and directed it.

6 Josh Hartnett's Trap Will Be A Box Office Hit

Releases on August 2

If there's one thing that's still certain at the modern box office, it's that M. Night Shyamalan movies continue to be profitable, even ones with poor critical reception. 2023's Knock at the Cabin made $54 million against a budget of $20 million, while 2021's Old made $90 million worldwide against a budget of $18 million. 2019's Glass, which received a Rotten Tomatoes score of just 37%, made an astonishing $247 million against a budget of only $20 million. Trap will likely follow suit, or else it will become one of M. Night Shyamalan's rare box office misfires. It seems incredibly unlikely that Trap would flop, considering its lead actor Josh Hartnett starred in last year's Best Picture winner Oppenheimer and hasn't played a leading role in a horror movie since 2007's 30 Days of Night.

5 Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Will Be A Box Office Flop

Releases on September 6

The long-awaited sequel to 1988's Beetlejuice will see the return of Michael Keaton as the iconic character under the direction of Tim Burton. The biggest question mark about the Beetlejuice sequel, aptly titled Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, is whether fans of the original film will provide enough of a draw at the box office some 36 years after the release of the first film. This is another one of those cases in which the box office will likely be heavily influenced by the critical reception, even though that seems to be less and less of a driving factor in this day and age. The original Beetlejuice was mostly celebrated by critics, earning an impressive 86% on Rotten Tomatoes. If the sequel pulls too many of the same old tricks from the first without compellingly innovating the franchise, then Beetlejuice 2 could be another surprising flop in 2024.

4 Smile 2 Will Be A Box Office Hit

Releases on October 18

The first Smile was a massive box office success, grossing $217.4 million against a budget of $17 million. Following the same line of thinking as Trap and MaXXXine, inexpensive horror movies have been some of the most profitable movies in recent years, and throughout history for that matter. With all of the innovation coming out of the horror genre nowadays, it should be no surprise that a Smile follow-up will repeat its box office success in 2024. Smile's unforgettable marketing campaign featured paid actors to creepily smile on broadcasts of live national sporting events, which was a brilliant form of advertising the film. Fans should expect to see the same type of iconic marketing as the Halloween season approaches, which should result in Smile 2 being one of the highest-grossing horrors of the year.

3 Ariana Grande’s Wicked Will Be A Box Office Flop

Expected November 27

Wicked will finally make its debut on the silver screen in 2024 which theoretically should draw massive numbers to theaters. The fantasy musical is based on one of the most popular musicals ever made and features an ensemble cast of Ariana Grande, Cynthia Erivo, Jonathan Bailey, Michelle Yeoh, and Jeff Goldblum. What's more, 2023's Wonka, another musical remake of sorts, far exceeded box office expectations and became the seventh highest-grossing movie of the year with a staggering total of $632 million. All this and more provide solid evidence for why Wicked should be a box office hit. Wicked's "Achilles heel", however, may just be its director, John M. Chu, whose last film In The Heights, also a musical, was a box office bomb, grossing only $45 million despite great reviews.

2 Venom: The Last Dance Will Be A Box Office Hit

Expected October 25

The past two Venom movies have been massive box office successes, with the original 2018 film grossing a staggering $856 million, which remarkably made it the seventh highest-grossing movie of the year in what would become a historic year at the box office. With Tom Hardy returning for Venom: The Last Dance, the third and potentially final installment of the celebrated franchise should be another box office hit and could even outperform the $501 million worldwide total of 2021's Venom: Let There Be Carnage. The franchise has essentially defied the odds of what makes a box office hit, with the first movie earning just a 30% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes and the sequel earning a score of 57%. Regardless of the critic score of Venom 3, it should be one of the most portable movies of the year.

1 Glen Powell’s Twisters Will Be A Box Office Flop

Releases on July 19

Twisters has a real chance of halting the skyrocketing momentum of its leading man Glen Powell, who has become one of the most in-demand actors in Hollywood since becoming internationally known as Hangman in 2022's landmark blockbuster Top Gun: Maverick. Powell demonstrated his star power alongside Sydney Sweeney in the surprise box office hit Anyone But You and recently flexed his muscles as a versatile actor in Richard Linklater's Hit Man. Twisters marks Powell's first major blockbuster since Maverick and first ever in a leading role, unless you include 2022's Devotion which he starred in alongside Jonathan Majors. Twisters is technically not a sequel to the 1996 box office hit Twister, since the two films don't share any characters. It will, however, be a test of Powell's true power as a leading man and may become another surprise box office flop of 2024 if its story doesn't hold up to its action sequences.