Along with Dune: Part Two, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is the best blockbuster of the year so far. Granted it’s not quite as good as its forerunner Mad Max: Fury Road, but then that’s one of the best blockbusters of the last 20 years, so no shame there. As prequels (a notoriously tricky medium to get right) go, Furiosa is a belter, capturing the same giddy rush as its predecessor. Both audiences and critics, by and large, have responded enthusiastically to its antic charms.
Unfortunately, though, all that counts for naught. You see, Furiosa underperformed at the box office in its opening weekend and is therefore destined to forever be regarded as an irredeemable failure. Sorry, I don’t make the rules. In fact, I’m not really sure who does. The box office is a mysterious creature, inscrutable and prone to capriciousness. In Hollywood it is worshipped like a god by execs, analysts and – of course – us journalists, who view it as the ultimate arbiter of a film’s success or failure.
