20 Biggest Summer Box Office Bombs Of All Time

Budget: $163 million (marketing: $150 million)

Box office: $174.8 million

Loss: $120+ million

Jon Favreau’s Iron Man may have breezed past Speed Racer in the bean counters’ final analysis in 2008, but his 2011 comic book adaptation Cowboys & Aliens suffered an unexpected hammering at the hands of the diminutive Smurfs.

Where Cowboys & Aliens won the battle by shading the opening weekend, the little blue buddies’ first big-screen adventure won the war at a canter, pulling in over $560 million worldwide – more than three times as much as the total take for Favreau’s misguided genre mashup.

Cowboys & Aliens appeared to have everything in its favour, on paper at least: a pair of big names in Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig, a director with proven blockbuster chops, a hefty budget and a bracing high concept. Unfortunately these promising elements amounted to a dour, forgettable experience that failed to connect with its intended audience and posted losses in excess of $120 million.