Kraven the Hunter was supposed to open in theaters on January 13, 2023, and was later pushed to October of that same year before shifting to this past August and, after yet another delay, next month.
That's done little to instil faith in fans who are already over Sony's Spider-Man Universe and early box office projections for the movie aren't looking good.
As 2024's third R-Rated superhero movie after Deadpool & Wolverine and Joker: Folie à Deux, Kraven the Hunter promises to be a little different from the likes of Madame Web and Morbius in terms of tone. However, with an estimated $20 million - $25 million debut, it looks set to sit right between those two box office bombs.
Madame Web debuted with $15.3 million back in February, while Morbius earned a slightly more impressive $39 million before its earnings plummeted in the weeks that followed.
While it's still very early days, Box Office Pro believes, "there’s a very real chance that Kraven‘s entire domestic run could fail to exceed even the opening weekend take of October 2024’s Venom: The Last Dance ($51M domestic opening, $128.8 domestic total after four weeks), the lowest-grossing of Sony’s three Venom films."
There is some good news, however, as Kraven the Hunter will likely manage to beat Warner Bros.' animated The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim (which is tracking to open somewhere between $8 million - $15 million).
This news comes just one day after Kraven the Hunter director J.C. Chandor implored fans to give his Sony/Marvel movie a chance.
"Some of the fans out there, a lot of the fans, were upset with certain decisions and certain outcomes [of Sony’s Spider-Man Universe]," the filmmaker acknowledged. "People have got to give us a chance and come out and support this film, and literally try to wash away some of the other stuff that’s happened. Give our film a chance."
You can read the rest of his comments in full here.
The issue is that the fans Chandor refers to above want to see Spider-Man battle Kraven, not an origin story which takes massive liberties with the comics in an effort to transform this villain into some sort of gangster-hunting anti-hero.
Kraven the Hunter is the action-packed, R-rated, standalone story of how one of Marvel’s most iconic villains came to be. The cast is led by Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Ariana DeBose, Fred Hechinger, Alessandro Nivola, Christopher Abbott, and Russell Crowe.
Kraven the Hunter arrives in theaters on December 13.