It’s The End of an Era For Hollywood, 10 Years Earlier Than Expected

Ten years ago, the present state of the movie industry felt impossible.

The highest-grossing movies of 2016 consisted of five superhero movies (2 Marvel, 2 DC, 1 Fox), three animated movies (1 Pixar, 1 Disney, 1 Illumination), a Star Wars spin-off and a Disney remake. To find an original live-action movie, you had to look down to 14th place (Hidden Figures). The franchises ruled, the superhero was king — and it didn’t look like that was going to change any time soon.

Over halfway through 2026, the climate is very different. Five of the domestic Top 10 are non-franchise releases and the only superhero movie is a trend-bucking outlier. At this stage, it’s tempting to declare the New New Hollywood finally upon us.

This New New Hollywood is not the same as the Old New Hollywood. The New Hollywood movement from 1968 to 1981 saw the old studio system of chintzy entertainment with bloated budgets gave way to artistic, auteur-led movies that still define American cinema. In the end, artsy wunderkinds Spielberg and Lucas created movies so popular that audiences lined up around the block for hours, setting a blockbuster template (big spectacle, massive opening, merchandising spin) that remains to this day. But as a movement, it nevertheless changed the industry.

What we’re seeing now is less clear-cut. This is not a shift of power away from the studio system to artists. Right as these changes are taking place, Hollywood is in the process of consolidating further: Disney bought Fox in 2019, Paramount is in the process of merging with Warner Bros, Universal could be for sale. And there are macro factors that play: a global pandemic, a generational shift, streaming reenergizing DTV movies and reshaping post-theatrical distribution.

But from a platform of what audiences want to see — and what ultimately gets made — there’s no denying that right now, we’re seeing a lot of change happening at once.

The Great Box Office Shift

Where Have All The Superheroes Gone?

2026’s domestic box office tells a clear story.

Aside from Spider-Man, there are two animated movies, an epic from a lauded filmmaker, a biopic about a controversial musician, two low-budget horror movies, an original sci-fi, a female-targeted legacy sequel. The only other movie that would conventionally be expected to be in the Top 10 is Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu, and that languishes in bottom place with a US box office cume that barely clears its budget.

Some of this is foreseeable from 2016. Project Hail Mary is in the tradition of Gravity, Interstellar and Arrival. The Devil Wears Prada 2 plays to a seriously underserved audience. Michael is a biopic about a perennially popular figure akin to Bohemian Rhapsody. But for these to be so successful and so unencumbered by competition from caped heroes is striking.

Mainstay franchises are struggling, once sure-fire reboots are receiving a shrug. Supergirl is a superhero box office bomb larger than The Marvels, Masters of the Universe barely crossed $100M worldwide on a $200M budget. In their place, young audiences turned out for the twisted Obsession ($263M domestic, $475M worldwide) and creepy Backrooms ($197M domestic, $394M worldwide).

Some of this is down to basic audience appeal. He-Man has minimal name recognition with under 40s. The Mandalorian plays like a post-Return of the Jedi toy mash-up. Supergirl cribs Guardians of the Galaxy‘s throwback styling. The nostalgia window has shifted from the 1980s to the early 2000s, and the studios haven’t caught up in terms of what to greenlight or how to make it.

There’s also raw quality. Mandalorian and He-Man received decidedly mixed reviews, Supergirl’s were mostly negative. Obsession was a well-reviewed word-of-mouth hit, with box office defying convention by climbing up week-over-week. Backrooms was more front-loaded, but still mostly liked.

Looking at the average Rotten Tomatoes score of the Top 10 domestic movies over the past decade makes a clear case.

2026 has the highest median score and third highest mean. Of course, it’s not as simple as younger audiences prefer horror or modern audiences chase quality.

What’s really happening is two shifts at once. Franchises like Star Wars dominated with divisive creative choices are on the way out to a degree that felt unimaginable previously, but in their place isn’t just a replacement of new wave franchise. While they exist (2000s favorites Shrek, Fockers, The Mummy, Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings and X-Men all have new spins on the way), what’s rising up is a more diverse and interesting mix.

The added lift value of a brand across the board — to review warmth as well as audience anticipation — is going. In its place is stars, directors, concepts, trends.

The Return of the Movie Star

The New Wave Confirmed

Something truly unexpected in 2026 is the return of the prolific movie star. For the past decade, the line between character and actor had become so muddied, with actors opening the biggest movies of all time when in a colorful costumed team-up, and flopping hard when stood alone. I could list dozens, but the most striking has to be how Robert Downey Jr followed up a 10-movie run as Iron Man with Doctor Dolittle.

Even behind the camera, filmmakers were able to flourish in the franchise system, but ended up drowning outside. Most famously, the Russos delivered back-to-back-to-back-to-back hits with Marvel, then had repeated negatively reviewed streaming movies in the half-decade since. This led directly to their return to Marvel.

It took time, but now a clear class has emerged. Across four major releases, five actors are defining the conversation. Some are superheroes, some are franchises, some are A24 indies. All are bolstered by the same cohort of actors. Many of these have been around for a decade or more, but between secret weddings, social media presence and quality of projects, they’re cresting to be major draws.

It’s also worth noting that Ryan Gosling, a charismatic internet fave who was often the value add, never the star, finally unequivocally opened a mega-hit with Project Hail Mary.

The undisputed king, at this stage, is Robert Pattinson. Following a four-movie stint as a brooding, twinkly vampire in Twilight, he pivoted into indie film with a string of variously gonzo and interesting performances: High Life, Good Time, The King. In 2026, he has no less than 4 major movies: The Drama, The Odyssey, Primetime and Dune: Part 3.

On the director side, there’s still that whirlpool of franchises from breakout filmmakers (Curry Barker has been linked to Texas Chainsaw, Zach Cregger is following up Barbarian and Weapons with Resident Evil) but there is a growing cohort of named directors who can open a movie: Christopher Nolan, Ryan Coogler, Greta Gerwig.

This effect cuts across genre and franchise lines, but is truly unequivocal. And the results are there in box office.

Spider-Man Does The Impossible

With a Lot Less

Sony Pictures Releasing

There were two records I expected to hold well into the 2030s: Avengers: Endgame’s $357M opening weekend and The Force Awakens’ $936M all-time domestic total. They were zeitgeist-dominating must-sees with years of careful build-up. For a movie to come close would require similar franchise maneuvering. Indeed, Spider-Man: No Way Home managed just $260M opening and $814M total, respectively.

I certainly never expected to see them broken by a movie that, comparatively, commanded none of the contextual or narrative heft of the first Star Wars sequel trilogy movie or the culmination of a 22-movie story. But that’s exactly what Spider-Man: Brand New Day did.

Now, Spider-Man: Brand New Day is part of the wider MCU, but the poor performance of bombs Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and Captain America: Brave New World or underperformers Thunderbolts and Fantastic Four show that universe connections are now a predominantly negative factor. Today, if a film requires viewers to have seen or read prior entries, audiences will skip it regardless of reviews.

And Spidey is a very standalone movie. Several Marvel characters cameo, but they exist entirely in service of the plot, with no need to catch up on Shang-Chi’s post credits scene or multiple seasons of Netflix TV. There’s minimal setup from previous movies (you only need to know that nobody remembers Peter Parker is Spider-Man and that Aunt May is dead), and the future teases are vaguely non-committal.

It’s easy to conclude Marvel is back, and no doubt Kevin Feige is more hopeful for Avengers: Doomsday in December. But in reality this is something more specific. Spider-Man smashed Endgame’s opening ($360M) and is putting the heat on The Force Awakens ($481M total after one week) due to a compounding of the character’s intrinsic appeal, starring likable stars, and the gap between releases (Holland’s previous entry, No Way Home released back in 2021).

Depending on how the team-up goes, we may be on a track where superhero movies in their MCU form go away, leaving just the top-level survivors of the genre: Spider-Man, Batman, X-Men and Deadpool, depending on Ryan Reynolds’ involvement.

The Risk of Premium Formats

Universal Pictures

If I have one pause, it’s the secret sauce that has been core to the marketing of The Odyssey that elevated half of the Top 10: premium formats.

Christopher Nolan is an IMAX evangelist, positioning its giant square screen as the most immersive way to watch movies. Alongside it now sits Dolby (enhanced projection and sound), ScreenX (the movie projected on three sides of the auditorium) and 4DX (moving chairs and phsyical interactions). When Disney lost IMAX for Doomsday to Dune: Part 3, they launched “Infinity Vision” as a premium format labeling.

Premium formats accounted for 20% of The Odyssey’s opening and 15% of the year total, up 10% on 2019. It’s a bigger portion of that top 10.

When you normalize by tickets sold, the story has some key differences.

Here, Toy Story 5 outflanks Spider-Man, Michael tops The Odyssey, Star Wars falls out of the Top 10 and the gap between the bottom and top 5 is smaller than the grosses suggest.

There’s no disputing the baseline enthusiasm for Spidey or Odysseus, but their total ticket sales are much closer to their near rivals (so far) than the box office numbers suggest. Seeing The Odyssey the way Christopher Nolan intended is presented as artistic appreciation, but it is also a financial one.

This is on the face of it a very 2020s play, the deeper eventizing of entertainment in a social media-friendly package. But it’s also very Old Hollywood. In the dying days of that era, a glut of formats were used to better sell epic movies: Cinerama, Todd-AO, general roadshow versions. These were similarly upcharge and marked the industry tying to eke more out of the dwindling consumer base. More recently, 3D was applied to every movie at a premium to the consumer.

There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with pushing a certain format, and there are clear costs involved shoot or coverting to each. But this is a somewhat illusory box office bump that masks the truth.

Is New New Hollywood Real?

Whether this is a shift like we saw with Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate in 1968, or merely a conflation of more conventional Nolan, Holland/Zendaya and horror love alongside an implosion of 1980s nostalgia hinges very much on the decisions made from here.

But it’s certainly the most positive indication of an audience-led shift that could mark a fresh start. The industry is very turbulent, but I’m more optimistic now than at any time in the past decade.