First, I'm sorry for making a few editorials lately, but I've stumbled across this and had to share because I think there is something to it. Scott Mendelson of Forbes.com wrote a piece about how Batman v Superman may benefit greatly by moving up a month to April. He gives compelling arguments with box office numbers to back up his claim.
He brought it up because of Captain America: The Winter Soldier's overall success compared to Amazing Spider-Man 2. I think it is safe to say that Captain America 2 was a much better movie critically speaking. Far better. However, both currently are fairly close in box office earnings. His claim is that there is a pattern of summer kick-off movies stealing the spot-light from presumed summer box office champions. Just to highlight some big ones:
1996 - Twister vs. Mission: Impossible
1998 - Deep Impact vs. Godzilla
1999 - Matrix vs. Star Wars Episode 1
2002 - Spider-Man vs. Star Wars Episode 2
2008 - Iron Man vs. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
*Indiana Jones was supposed to rule that summer, of course The Dark Knight ended up killing everything, but the point is Iron Man really took the spot light away from Indiana Jones. Interesting thing about The Dark Knight though....
2012 - Avengers vs. The Dark Knight Rises
*Both of these films were criticially praised and both made heaps of money. NOBODY anticipated the Avengers doing so well and there was no way in hell Rises was going to match that. Avengers is the clear winner coming out of that summer.
When reading his arguments for each of these, it makes sense. Batman v Superman could do amazing if it moved to April.
What if it sucks? It has three or four weeks to (most likely) dominate the box office until Cap 3 comes out. If it opens the same day as Cap 3, it will definitely win the first weekend, but bad word of mouth will cause it to lose ground the next weekend and beyond. Let's not forget all the other 100 movies coming out that summer.
What if its awesome? It has three or four weeks to dominate the box office and may very well take some from Cap 3. Granted, it won't beat Cap 3 when it would eventually open, but it will take a chunk from it. If opened on the same day, both movies suffer, but Cap 3 has the least to lose honestly.
That is assuming Cap 3 is going to be amazing which I'm sure it will be. If Cap 3 sucks, well, that's another story. Check the link out and see for yourself. It is quite interesting.
