Predicting The Success Of The Next 10 Major Comic Book Movies

Predicted Rotten Tomatoes Score: 58% Predicted Box Office: $520m

Despite the success of Deadpool and Logan, in recent years the main X-Men series has been dangerously close to coasting on autopilot, and even with seven months to go until the release date there are still a huge number of question marks surrounding the upcoming twelfth (!) installment of the long-running franchise.

For one, untried screenwriter and producer Simon Kinberg makes his directorial debut working with a reported budget of $200m, which is a huge risk despite his familiarity with the brand. The initial release date was also pushed back by three months reportedly due to more extensive than usual reshoots, with fuel only being added to the fire thanks to Dark Phoenix having virtually no presence at all at this year's San Diego Comic-Con.

Perhaps most obviously of all, the movie is essentially retelling a storyline that was already botched on the big screen just a decade ago in The Last Stand, which is regarded by many as the worst entry in the main series. Sophie Turner was painfully wooden in her first outing as Jean Grey, and putting her in the title role this time round unfortunately has the potential to backfire spectacularly.

After the creative highs of First Class and Days of Future Past, Apocalypse was a huge step back for the franchise, earning over $200m less at the box office than its predecessor and scoring the worst reviews for any installment since X-Men Origins: Wolverine.

A Valentine's Day release did work wonders for Deadpool, but there's no chance that Dark Phoenix comes close to that movie's $783.1m haul. The average box office total across the entire X-Men filmography is $520.7m, which seems like a much more realistic target, albeit one that could be greatly affected by which way the reviews are skewed.