There are few things more enjoyable than rubbernecking on a movie disaster. Granted, it’s probably not much fun for the people involved in making the thing, but for the rest of us, watching a film crash and burn critically and commercially is rarely anything less than delicious. So sadists everywhere were delivered manna from bad movie heaven this week with Sony’s latest Spider-Man spin-off, Madame Web, a box office bomb so devastating Christopher Nolan has probably already optioned the rights for its retelling.
This one had it all: a remarkably naff trailer that everyone cackled at and made memes of; a bizarre press tour where the star constantly trashed the film she was supposed to be promoting; a disastrous box office opening weekend; wall-to-wall critical garrottings; and juicy trade mag “what went wrong” pieces full of scathing insider details. (“You could actually watch advance purchase sales declining in real time as buyers were refunding their tickets.”)
