Wild Robot Animates Box Office Triumph Over Transformers One

The Wild Robot and Transformers One are on two different paths at the box office and their fates show off how strange the theater environment for animation has become. By all accounts, director Chris Sanders’ new Dreamworks movie is poised to win the box office crown this weekend with a surprising $11.5 million day. Sadly for Transformers One, it looks like the gorgeous prequel might not even come in second. Both of these animated features have been reviewed well with positive word of mouth. What has caused the reception to be so stark at the ticket booth? It might just come down to the new Transformers premiering too close to Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. That’s a sad moment for a movie that’s actually better than a majority of live-action robot flicks.

Over on the Dreamworks side of things, their decision to hold The Wild Robot off until after Transformers One had that first week to roll-out seems smart now. Projections for this weekend are slated at $35 million for the new animated feature. Lupita Nyong’o’s latest project has managed to evade both the name recognition from their animated competition and the nostalgia at play with Beetlejuice. (Don’t look now, the Oscar-winner is putting together quite a 2024 with her performance as Roz in The Wild Robot and the tense horror of A Quiet Place: Day One.) It’s clear from the responses to the actress’s latest movie, something in Nyong’o’s performance struck an emotional chord. During an event that ComicBook attended earlier this year, she talked about bringing emotion to Roz as the robot grows throughout the film.

“One of the things that makes robots and artificial intelligence different from human beings is the very fact that they don’t have emotion. Everything is programmed,” Nyongo shared. “And here we are telling a story about a robot that starts off in a very, very sophisticated, structured program. Then because of the demands of the wilderness, she has to adapt to a more organic sense of being. And still, by the end, we are moved by her and she seems to have developed something akin to emotion.” 

Transformers One Trying To Be More Than Meets The Eye

For the latest installment in Paramount’s long-running franchise, this is all a bit of a conundrum. By all accounts, Transformers One is the best movie in this series since at least Bumblebee. Critics and fans agree that the animated feature immediately stands out from it’s live-action cousins due to a great story that’s surprisingly mature for this franchise. Transformers One also raised a lot of eyebrows for it’s use of Chris Hemsworth and Brian Tyree Henry as Optimus Prime and Megatron before they were icons. However, that choice has been fine too.

Seeing a fresher take on the concept not pick up steam at the box office has to be a bummer for Paramount. Especially when the word of mouth and critical reviews are so good. Our critic for ComicBook, Evan Valentine, argues that Transformers One is the best entry in this franchise since the animated movie in the 1980s. 

“Transformers One has an exceptionally strong story in relating the friendship between Orion and D-16. Their personalities bounce off one another well, not just thanks to the writing, but also thanks to the voice talents of Chris Hemsworth and Brian Tyree Henry, respectively,” Valentine argues. “It’s a tough act to follow in terms of taking up the role of Optimus, due to Peter Cullen’s legendary performance, but I was quite surprised with Hemsworth’s work here, both injecting his own identity while making for a worthy fill-in for Optimus’ usual go-to voice actor. The same can definitely be said for Henry’s work as D-16 as the formerly innocent robot starts venturing to the dark side while never feeling like a different character from what we see. 

“The fall from grace for Megatron and the rise to heroism for Optimus feels entirely organic, making for a compelling story that is tragic in how these best friends lose their bonds with one another and create armies that participate in a never-ending war,” he adds. “There are exact moments in the movie’s run time where you, as a viewer, can see the “birth” of both Optimus Prime and Megatron and both feel earned thanks to a strong set-up.”  

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