Why Expendables 4 Bombed At The Box Office

Who remembers "The Expendables?" This little action film franchise starring Sylvester Stallone caught on quickly with audiences in the early 2010s, to the point where it was going toe-to-toe with juggernauts like "Fast and Furious" and "Mission: Impossible" for a couple of years. That is, until the blockbuster saga went dormant after the release of "The Expendables 3" in 2014. Now, nearly an entire decade later, the next movie in the series is finally here in the form of "The Expendables 4" — but it's not necessarily finding much success.

"The Expendables 4" has proven to be one of the worst box office bombs of 2023. According to The Numbers, the film had a domestic gross of roughly $8.3 million in its opening weekend, roughly just half of what it was projected to make (via Deadline). Combined with its international gross, "The Expendables 4" has opened to roughly $19 million worldwide, a rather pitiful statistic compared to its reported budget of nearly $100 million.

Previous "Expendables" movies have seen success, so some fans may be wondering what exactly happened here. As it stands, it's quite likely that the commercial failure of "The Expendables 4" has been a result of a toxic cocktail of various negative factors, including its critical reception and advertising.

Let's address the elephant in the room straight away: the performance of "The Expendables 4" has almost certainly suffered in major part due to its extremely poor reception among critics. The film scored a bad Rotten Tomatoes record, hitting a rating of just 15% on the Tomatometer out of 84 reviews. That number places it among some of the worst-rated films of 2023, such as "Fool's Paradise" and "Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey."

Many critics have singled out "The Expendables 4" for having a barebones plot, poor performances from the cast, and lackluster action sequences cluttered with low-quality CGI. In its review, Looper's sister site /Film gave the movie a score of 3/10. "The characters are inhuman, the premise is absurd, and the plot is idiotic," reviewer Witney Seibold wrote. "This is a Saturday Morning cartoon with booze, f-bombs, and a mild libido. It's staggeringly stupid."

While poor critical reception doesn't always equate to a bad box office gross, it's fair to say that the negative buzz surrounding "The Expendables 4" didn't do the film any favors when it came to getting audiences in seats. Some positive reception among critics would have also helped the movie compensate for some of the other factors affecting its performance, including the next one on this list.

There may be some readers out there to whom this very article is the first indication they've seen that a new "Expendables" movie has even been released. Per Deadline, "The Expendables 4" saw a fairly paltry advertising budget of just $20 million in the run-up to its debut. As such, it's quite likely that the film has completely flown under the radar for many casual consumers who may otherwise be interested in seeing it.

Deadline further suggested that the lack of advertising surrounding "The Expendables 4" was actually a conscious effort on the part of the film's distributor Lionsgate, as the company surmised that the movie was not going to be received well. "When Lionsgate sees a stinker on paper, they're not going to promote and scream a movie from the cliffs like 'John Wick' or 'Hunger Games,'" author Anthony D'Alessandro wrote.

To further complicate matters, the road to the premiere of "The Expendables 4" took place amid the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike and the WGA strike. That means that cast and crew members involved with these unions could not promote their projects during the strikes, as doing so would constitute crossing the picket line. Thus, "The Expendable 4" saw its release in September with a decided lack of fanfare.

If there was ever something that could be remotely considered a zeitgeist surrounding "The Expendables," it happened in the early 2010s. Back when these movies first released, they built on each previous entry in quick succession with zanier, more action-packed plots and eye-popping cast additions. That's why the nine-year wait for "The Expendables 4" after the franchise's third entry has made it feel a little bit like it's late to the party.

The landscape of Hollywood looks quite different compared to the last time "The Expendables" reared its head. Streaming has changed the way people watch movies, and companies need to work harder than ever to provide convincing reasons to actually head to the theater. Rival franchises like "Fast and Furious" and "Mission: Impossible" have grown even bigger, filling the vacuum left by movies like the early "Expendables" films. Audience tastes have shifted, too. With concepts like superhero movie fatigue and sequel/reboot exhaustion growing ever more pertinent, the tolerance for a clunky action movie revival is at an all-time low.

To say that "The Expendables" never had a chance at seeing success after such a long stint away from theater screens isn't quite right. However, if the franchise really wanted to stand out in the modern day, it needed to grow past what it once was and deliver something compelling. Instead, "The Expendables 4" has seemingly slid in the opposite direction, arguably failing to match even the spectacle and fun factor of its predecessor if critics are to be believed.

If there's one thing big blockbuster action movies are known for, it's their uncanny knack for landing casts filled with recognizable talent from throughout Hollywood. "The Expendables 4" isn't a complete slouch on this front, as it unites returning franchise actors like Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, and Dolph Lundgren with new additions like 50 Cent and Megan Fox. However, it's tough to deny that its cast list pales in comparison to the star-studded line-ups of previous entries, which included massive names like Harrison Ford, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Chuck Norris.

There's nothing inherently wrong with having a movie cast that isn't completely stuffed with massive A-list celebrities. However, "The Expendables" has a legacy of doing just that, and the star power behind this fourth entry in the series feels comparatively weak compared to what has come before. With few actors to draw general audiences in on name recognition alone, the film isn't as popular as it could have been with a more stacked cast reminiscent of the originals.

Some would-be viewers may have also been put off by a certain shift in dynamic among returning stars for "The Expendables 4." While Stallone's character of Barney Ross has historically been the face of the franchise and its enduring lead, pre-release information on the movie made it apparent that he was taking a backseat for this latest entry and passing the starring role over to Jason Statham's Lee Christmas. That's a change that may have rubbed at least a few fans the wrong way.

There are a lot of problems with "The Expendables 4" that contributed to its box office failure, but solely placing the blame on the movie itself and its surrounding circumstances would unfairly ignore the difficult path that "The Expendables 3" set up for it nearly a decade ago.

For those less familiar with the history of the franchise, "The Expendables 4" is not the first critical stinker in the saga. At the time of its release in 2014, "The Expendables 3" was similarly panned by critics for failing to live up to the expectations set by the first two movies. It stands to reason that some fans who felt burned by "The Expendables 3" may have written off "The Expendables 4" just by virtue of the quality of its predecessor.

One also has to account for the fact that being the fourth movie in a franchise can be a bit of a tough sell. Some would-be viewers may be under the impression that watching previous entries in the series is required to understand what's happening in this sequel. Then, there's the simple fact that sequels are risky commercial territory for just about any franchise. Some sequels fare better than the original in terms of box office performance, but others can't manage the same level of retention. "The Expendables 3" already had a lower box office gross than "The Expendables 2" (via Box Office Mojo). Essentially, "The Expendables 4" is just following that downward trend.