More than anything else in Hollywood, money talks. Critical reviews don't necessarily count for much if everybody and their mother goes to see a given film. After all, show business is, first and foremost, a business. Success almost always leads to sequels these days, and it looks like the financial success of The Angry Birds Movie means that we will see a second installment flap its way into theaters very soon.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Rovio Entertainment has every intention of bringing audiences a sequel to The Angry Birds Movie -- which hit theaters this May. Of course, it all comes down to money. The Angry Birds Movie earned roughly $347 million against a $73 million budget, with $107.5 million of that total gross coming from the domestic box office. That's a pretty solid return for a movie inspired by a phone app. Beyond that, many details related to the upcoming sequel remain very firmly under wraps. Rovio Entertainment seems pretty intent on playing The Angry Birds Movie sequel pretty close to the vest for the time being, but we have a feeling that it will once again (as it pretty much always has) involve a conflict between the birds and the pigs.
As previously mentioned, box office performance holds far more weight than a film's critical response when it comes to whether or not a sequel gets made. The Angry Birds movie definitely won't win any Oscars -- it currently holds a 43% on Rotten Tomatoes -- but its profitability makes a sequel a no-brainer for Rovio Entertainment in the long run. It didn't become a phenomenon like Finding Dory, but The Angry Birds Movie still proved that animation was one of the safest bets for entertainment in 2016.
The Angry Birds Movie, like most strong animated features, chose a very simple premise and stuck closely to it. Expanding on the overall shtick of the wildly popular mobile video game franchise, the film offered up a story about a very cynical bird named Red (Jason Sudeikis) who must band together with the fellow birds on his home island to ward off a group of green pigs that suddenly arrive one day under mysterious circumstances. It's an accessible narrative for a wide audience, and the film even featured a very respectable voice cast including: Jason Sudeikis, Josh Gad, Peter Dinklage, and Bill Hader.
Check out the trailer for the film below, just in case you missed it in theaters earlier this year:
It's wasn't the most highbrow form of entertainment, but it capitalized on strong brand recognition and made a big enough impression on audiences to warrant a sequel. We most certainly weren't surprised to learn about a follow-up, given the fact that The Angry Birds Movie -- like so many other contemporary films -- even featured a mid-credits sequence that specifically laid the groundwork for a possible sequel to materialize at some point. Rovio knew they had a potential franchise on their hands from the beginning.
CinemaBlend will bring you any and all relevant details related to the upcoming sequel to The Angry Birds Movie as more information becomes available to us. The Angry Birds Movie is currently available on Digital HD, Blu-Ray, and DVD; make sure to check it out!
