With the announcement that the live-action Legend of Zelda movie will be releasing March 26th, 2027, it’s become apparent that two titans will be going head-to-head—not only in the same month, but just one week apart.
Yes, the highly successful Sonic the Hedgehog film series will be getting a fourth installment on March 19th, 2027. Mathematicians will notice that’s just one week before the release of Nintendo’s high-budget, Avi Arad-produced Legend of Zelda movie.
Video Game Movie Performance
While the Sonic movies have been highly successful, with the third film (2024) grossing almost 500 million dollars worldwide at the box office, the second (2022) grossing just over 400 million, and the original (2020) grossing over 300 million, Nintendo’s history at the box office isn’t too bad either.
In fact, The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023) grossed over 1.3 billion dollars at the box office. Yes, that means the film outperformed all three Sonic movies combined. I guess Nintendoes what Seg-don’t? (Shut up).
However, the other (kinda) Nintendo movie, Detective Pikachu (2019), “only” grossed 433 million dollars worldwide, about on the level of the second and third Sonic movies. This is kind of surprising considering just how popular Pokemon is. However, both of these movie series are live-action. Sonic and Pokemon were competing against Mario, an animated movie.
Live-Action vs. Animated Video Game Movies
The Legend of Zelda film will be live-action, not animated, which means it’s possible that it could gross the same as Detective Pikachu and Sonic, and not approach Super Mario Bros.-level success.
Other live-action video game movies, like 2021’s Mortal Kombat, haven’t done as well. Mortal Kombat only made 84 million worldwide, while 2018’s Tomb Raider did better with 274 million worldwide. Sony’s Uncharted film in 2022 starring Tom Holland grossed over 400 million, which puts it right in line with the Sonic movies.
Outside of Mario, there’s actually not that many animated video game movies to compare with the live-action ones. There’s Angry Birds (2016), which grossed over 350 million worldwide, but little else.
Wreck-it-Ralph (2012), which is kind of like a Donkey Kong adaptation (but not really), grossed nearly 500 million dollars worldwide. The 2018 sequel did even better with 530 million dollars.
Okay, so with this limited data, it seems like animated video game movies do perform better than live-action video game movies. The Super Mario Bros. Movie, however, is doing most of the heavy lifting in this assumption.
Since both Zelda and Sonic are live-action, Sonic 4 may do okay against the new Zelda movie. After all, this is the fourth installment in a successful series that grosses more money each installment, with the third film being the highest-grossing live-action video game movie ever made. It wouldn’t be outrageous to assume the fourth Sonic movie will gross around 500 million dollars at the worldwide box office.
Zelda’s Box Office Forecast
So…what will Zelda make at the box office?
You might assume Zelda will do better than Sonic because it’s more popular, but actually if you add up all the Sonic video game sales, they’ve sold 12 million more copies than the Zelda games. While we as Nintendo fans think Zelda is extremely popular, it’s not actually in the Top 10 best-selling video game franchises. Mario, however, is at the top, which likely accounts for its 1.3 billion result at the box office.
It also helps that Mario appeals to all ages, whereas Zelda tends to appeal to a slightly older audience. For that reason, as well as the fact it’s live-action, I don’t think Zelda will do as well as the Mario movie. However, if the film is great, there’s always the chance it could outperform due to word of mouth.
The Warcraft movie, a live-action adaptation of the popular Blizzard PC game, did relatively well with 439 million dollars at the worldwide box office. However, you’ll notice that since its 2016 release, the film never received a sequel. That’s because, while it is the fourth-best performing video game movie ever made, it still wasn’t enough to convince Blizzard that it was successful. They wanted to do Lord of the Rings (2002-2004) style numbers, and I assume Nintendo is trying to repeat the same success as Lord of the Rings as well.
The Lord of the Triforce
Hell, they’re even filming the Zelda movie in New Zealand and hoping for it to become a trilogy, just like the Peter Jackson-directed films. They also got Wes Ball, the director of The Maze Runner (2014) and Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes (2024), to direct the Zelda movie. While he’s not Peter Jackson, he seems fairly capable of emulating that kind of film.
Take a look at the synopsis:
‘The Legend of Zelda’ follows Link, a young warrior destined to protect the magical kingdom of Hyrule from the forces of darkness. The land is under threat from Ganon, a ruthless warlord who seeks the Triforce—an ancient relic said to grant limitless power. To stop him, Link must embark on a perilous journey, battling monstrous creatures, exploring treacherous dungeons, and solving intricate puzzles to uncover sacred artifacts that can aid him in his quest.
Zelda movie synopsis
If you didn’t know anything about the Zelda series, you’d probably think that the Triforce sounds a lot like the ring in Lord of the Rings.
The Lord of the Rings films grossed about 1 billion dollars each worldwide, not adjusting for inflation. I would be shocked if Nintendo wasn’t hoping for the Zelda movie to do just as well or better.
It’s possible, if the film is amazing, the movie could do those numbers. But just based on franchise recognition, I don’t think it’s likely. If that were true, Warcraft would have at least doubled its numbers.
Sonic vs. Zelda: Whoever Wins, We Win
In the end, I believe Zelda will probably do better than Warcraft, and if it’s lucky it might just beat Sonic 4. Whereas Sonic has the benefit of being more family-friendly, as well as being a known quantity in the film industry, Zelda does have freshness going for it, as well as Nintendo overseeing the production just as they did with the Super Mario Bros. Movie. It’s possible lightning could strike twice, even though they are two wildly different movies.
2027 Box Office Prediction
If I had to make a guess based on the information we have today, I’d say Zelda will make between 550 and 600 million dollars worldwide, and the fourth Sonic film will do just under that with around 520 to 540 million dollars worldwide.
What do you think? Which film will win at the box office? Will Nintendo or Sega move their movies so they don’t compete? And what do you make of the live-action Zelda movie? Let me know in the comments below.
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Source: Box Office Mojo (box office data)