We try to work out what movies will be the biggest hits in 2023.
Before we get into our purely guestimated 10 biggest box office hits of 2023, we need to call out some of the dark horses that could come out of nowhere and absolutely demolish this list.
Movies like Barbie, The Little Mermaid, Dune Part Two, The Marvels, 65, Wonka, Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse, John Wick Chapter 4, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, Haunted Mansion, Gran Turismo, Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, Elemental, Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves, Shazam: Fury of the Gods, or The Meg 2 could all go gangbusters upon their big screen releases.
Having said that, and fully willing to happily be proven wrong come December 2023, here are our guesses at the 10 biggest cinematic hits of the new year, starting with…
#10 – OPPENHEIMER (July 21)
Director Christopher Nolan has amassed an INSANE cast – Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt, Robert Downey Jr., Matt Damon, Rami Malek, Florence Pugh, Josh Hartnett, and Kenneth Branagh among them – for this biopic of the man who helped to create the atomic bomb.
But this feels like it will be more in line with Dunkirk ($527 million) than Inception ($837 million), so to that end…
Guestimated Box Office: $600 million
#9 – THE EXORCIST (October 13)
The first in a planned trilogy of new Exorcist movies, which remained the highest grossing adult horror movie of all time… until the 2017 release of IT: Chapter One ($702 million).
It is coming from the same creative time behind the recent Halloween trilogy, and will bring back original star Ellen Burstyn as Chris MacNeill, asked to assist in a reportedly similar case of demonic possession.
Guestimated Box Office: $700 million
#8 – ANT-MAN AND THE WASP: QUANTUMANIA (February 17)
2015’s Ant-Man banked $519 million, while 2018’s Ant-Man and the Wasp scored $623 million. Properly introducing an Avengers-level threat, as well as the MCU’s new big bad Kang (Jonathan Majors) should give this an appropriate bump.
Guestimated Box Office: $750 million
#7 – THE FLASH (June 23)
We hate to say it, but pure morbid fascination will probably give this movie a big push. Yes, the big-screen return of Michael Keaton as Batman, as well as the reported return of Michael Shannon as Zod and Ben Affleck as his version of Batman… there are a lot of different interest points here.
But mostly, considering the recent DC shake-ups, it will be interesting to see how (or if) this movie will impact the future of that comic book movie universe.
Guestimated Box Office: $800 million
#6 – INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY (June 30)
Back in 2008, the now-widely-disliked Kingdom of the Crystal Skull banked a very impressive $791 million. Considering this outing is being pretty much officially touted as Harrison Ford’s final outing as Indy – as well as potentially setting up his franchise replacement – and it is coming from the director of Logan (very good) and Le Mans ’66 (also very good), odds are this one will do even better.
Guestimated Box Office: $850 million
#5 – THE SUPER MARIO BROS. MOVIE (March 31)
Never underestimate Mario. As the first movie that Nintendo has allowed to be made of their property since that awful live-action adaptation in 1993, this animated version – complete with an absolutely stacked voice cast, and coming from the creators of Despicable Me and Sing – feels like a much better fit.
Guestimated Box Office: $1 billion
#4 – AQUAMAN AND THE LOST CITY (December 29)
People forget that the first Aquaman movie was an absolute SMASH at the box office, making almost $1.15 billion worldwide. Again, with the fuzziness over the future of the DC, it is tough to tell where this sequel will fall into the grand scheme of things. But it is taking that juicy December release date in between semi-annual Avatar sequels.
Guestimated Box Office: $1.2 billion
#3 – GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL.3 (May 5)
There wasn’t a huge box office leap between Vol.1 ($773 million) and Vol.2 ($864 million), but it has been a full six years since the last standalone Guardians movie, not including that Christmas special. Also, knowing in advance that this will be our final trip with these particular Guardians will likely get fans arriving in droves to say their goodbyes.
Guestimated Box Office: $1.3 billion
#2 – MISSION IMPOSSIBLE: DEAD RECKONING PART ONE (July 14)
Mission: Impossible – Fallout made $792 million at the box office, so this would be a major leap, but it has everything going for it. Between the post-Top Gun Maverick career jump that Tom Cruise is enjoying, to this being the first part of his two-part farewell to the franchise, and the genius promotion of the movie including “the biggest stunt in cinema history“… This could go HUGE.
Guestimated Box Office: $1.4 billion
#1 – FAST X (May 19)
Another first-part-of-a-two-part-ending (Fast 11 is due to arrive in early 2024), this will also have fans turning up to begin waving goodbye. Even in the height of the pandemic, Fast 9 managed to bank $726 million at the box office, while both Fast & Furious 7 and Fast & Furious 8 made well over a billion each. The addition of Jason Momoa and Brie Larson to the already filled-to-the-rafters cast, not to mention the will they/won’t they return of Dwayne Johnson… yeah, this is going to be massive.
Guestimated Box Office: $1.5 billion
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