‘Bloodshot’ Apparently Did Well Enough To Warrant A Sequel
By George Robbins
There are now plenty of superhero movie that exist in the world thanks to the combined efforts of both the MCU and the DC Extended Universe, or DCEU. Without either of those two shared universes, the way that superhero movies play out would be far different than what we know of them today. There is a sort of formula that is followed by superhero movies as a whole and there isn’t much that can be done to change that fact as this formula has pretty much been cemented at this point. Every single superhero movie has a somewhat similar plot to the previous ones at this point so most of what we go to see when we see hero films revolves around the acting seen on screen in the film. This isn’t exactly the case when we talk about the Vin Diesel led superhero movie ‘Bloodshot.’
The character of ‘Bloodshot’ is sort of unique compared to other hero films which have been released over the past few years. Unlike the other films to release within recent memory, Bloodshot as a character does not belong in the category of being either a DCEU or MCU film and stands on its own. As a character, Bloodshot still comes from a comic book universe, it is just that we can’t really lump all comic book superheroes together on screen. Each character belongs to their respective comic book company and there isn’t really much else that defines that company other than Bloodshot. With that in mind, the comic book company responsible for ‘Bloodshot,’ Valiant, is responsible for producing countless comic book characters over the years that comic fans have loved. Even to this day, Valiant continues going strong knowing that they have created characters that the mainstream audience might not immediately enjoy, but there are plenty of people out there who do enjoy them.
The character of ‘Bloodshot’ is one of their more recognizable characters in their repertoire and they wanted to make a movie that would end up bringing that character to the general public. This wasn’t the first time a non-mainstream comic book character was given the limelight in a film as ‘Spawn’ is another strong example. There is certainly love for these characters but there may not be enough to warrant movies being made about them because they won’t end up making all that much money in the end. No one knew what to expect when they saw that ‘Bloodshot’ was being made into a movie and thus people sat back and watched even after the movie released to see if there would be crowds going to see it. As it turns out, not many people outside of the comic book sphere of influence really know the character all that much and therefore the movie bombed once it hit theaters.
There was not a single bit of help in the fact that the pandemic began not long after the movie released in theaters which meant theaters had to shut down. After theaters shut down, no new movies could release to theaters and the ones that were already out could not stay in theaters since their doors were shut to the public. Therefore, any movies that were already in theaters immediately, within a couple of weeks, ended up going to digital release, including the newly released ‘Bloodshot.’ The movie was already not doing so well while it was in theaters and things most certainly did not get any better after it was released digitally. The movie only brought in about $37 million at the box office which ended up being below budget and the movie received mixed reviews all-around. All-in-all the movie ended up being a flop in pretty much every sense, but they still plan on making a sequel apparently.
So if the movie proved to be a flop, why then would they go and try to make a sequel that could, and most likely will, end up being a flop in the end? The answer lies in the movie’s move over to the on-demand digital platform after theaters shut down as it apparently did fairly well after the transition. After it was released onto Amazon Prime, it quickly became the most-watched video on Prime over its first three days of release which is not something to take lightly. Given that so many other films were forced to release after the pandemic began, ‘Bloodshot’ taking the top spot most certainly shows that there was something about the movie people liked and the studio took notice. DMG founder and CEO Dan Mintz has recently admitted that there were plans in place to bring back Vin Diesel and make him into the Valiant comics super-soldier once again. So we will apparently be getting another film about the character, so let’s see if it does better than the first film.