Yahoo isn't listing TMNT on their box office grosses anymore (it was already out of the Top 12 last week), but considering it still is hanging on in a few theatres it likely will finish with a $51-$52 million domestic gross, with another $20 million or so internationally as previously stated. The DVD's should add another few million into the coffers, and merchandise figures I haven't looked at yet. Overall I think the film was moderately successful, but certainly not a blockbuster showing. One could say that a moderate success for a franchise that is 20 years old and hadn't been in the theatres for 14 years isn't bad, considering how hostile the box office can be. True, there's been a TV show on the airwaves for the past 4 years, but this film had no connection to it aside for characters, and was more in the canon of the first 3 films.
Promotion, or the lack of it after the initial weekend, was a big issue. Promotion costs money and WB may have been hesitant to spend extra past the first weekend, likely figuring TMNT would lose to MEET THE ROBINSONS anyway. While the TV incarnation, as of 2005 had made $1 billion in merch sales, 4kids noted that the TV property was losing steam as of 2006. 4Kids, naturally, is connected to the WB.
Another problem, I felt, is that I think the writers of the film and some of the execs behind them underestimated the fact that at least half of the audience to the film, if not a slight majority, would probably be older fans of the show, and not the 3-12 crowd (although there were plenty of kids at every viewing or line I went to). While the film was more serious than the last two Turtle films, the actual main plot was very video-gamey and if it had a stronger one, playing up the turmoil more as well as Karai for a loose adaptation of CITY AT WAR, it might have won over more of the older crowd and stuck around better. I enjoyed the film but felt that all the pieces to a 3-4 star film were trapped behind that main plot with stone warriors, immortals, and random monsters. The director had his roots in video games, and it showed. If he gets the chance for a sequal, hopefully he can improve on the flaws of his first.
GHOST RIDER, a film with a harsher rating and a franchise arguably more obscure than the TMNT were, grossed double what they did domestically. 300, a gorey R adaptation of a comic, has surpassed $200 million domestic. It is about time that execs stopped conforming to stereotypes of what "kids want" that has them attach on fluffy, needless details.
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