The year has already been a roller coaster ride, and not just at the box office. Focusing in on the state of movies for now, the last few months have been defined as being alarmingly weak at the box office, save for one unlikely savior. The month of March was particularly marked with some alarming box office results. In a month that has usually seen a strong performer or two taking advantage of those Spring Break crowds, this year’s March for the first time since Covid had failed to deliver a film that made over $100 million domestic. This same time last year, we had two films reach that mark with Dune: Part Two (2024) and Godzilla vs. Kong: The New Empire (2024). But this year, we had two of the costliest flops to to hit the screens in quite a while. Warner Brothers’ ambitious sci-fi epic from auteur director Bong Joon-ho, Mickey 17 (2025) fizzled out pretty quickly beyond it’s opening weekend, and failed to recoup even a quarter of it’s original $100 million+ budget. Then there was Disney’s Snow White (2025) which is going to be an even bigger financial loser for it’s studio, as Disney may finally be seeing it’s audience lose interest in their live action remake phase. Couple this with an under-performance from Marvel, with their recent film Captain America: Brave New World (2025) only barely reaching break even and a slew of other box office non-starters, 2025 is definitely starting off on the wrong footing. But then came one of the most unexpected turnarounds in recent memory. After three months of box office woes, suddenly theaters have been coming alive again with the surprising success of The Minecraft Movie (2025). How the film is able to generate the box office it had had even with mostly negative reviews is certainly a mystery. Some of it may be a Rocky Horror like phenomenon with audiences attending the films just for the trashiness of it all and to have the experience of seeing the movie with a rowdy crowd. Whether people actually like it or not (and I certainly don’t) the good thing is that Minecraft is helping the movie theater industry weather what has been otherwise a bad start to the year.
Now of course it is time to look to the future and see what will be the movie that we’ll all be talking about in the Summer months ahead. While the Spring has been a tough time at the box office so far, there are a lot of positive signs on the horizon that this Summer will fare a lot better. Like in the years past, I will be going through this Summer’s most interesting coming attractions, and tell you which ones are the must sees, the ones that have me worried, and the ones that I think should be skipped. Keep in mind, these previews are based on my own thoughts about the effectiveness of the marketing as well as the buzz that each one is generating before their respective releases. My predictions don’t always pan out, and sometimes I may miss the mark and either overestimate or underestimate a movie. The only thing I wish to make happen with these previews is to draw attention to the movies that are on the horizon in the hope that it helps all of you be informed about what to expect at the movies this upcoming season. So, with all that said, let’s take a look at the Movies of Summer 2025
MUST SEES:
THE FANTASTIC FOUR: FIRST STEPS (JULY 25)
It’s a given every summer that when Marvel has a new movie coming out, people are going to want to pay attention. After taking most of last year off with only one single theatrical release, Deadpool & Wolverine (2024), Marvel is back to it’s more ambitious release schedule of multiple films per year. They had a hard time with Captain America: Brave New World this February, but that was a film long plagued by production problems. This film and the other Summer release which I’ll spotlight later have not had as difficult a development and are actually arriving with a lot of positive buzz. Of the remaining Marvel movies, it’s this one that looks to be something really interesting. Marvel has attempted to bring comic books “first family” to the big screen twice before, and it hasn’t worked out yet. 2015’s Fant4stic was an especially miserable failure. This time around, it does look like Marvel is making an effort to get this one right and do justice to the iconic characters of the Fantastic Four. It’s interesting that they are starting their new version of the Fantastic Four in a different universe than the regular MCU. While it’s an interesting call story wise, it does offer the creative team to make some bold choices in the world building. The retro-futuristic world that they live in is visually very stunning; mixing high sci-fi with mid-century design. Another positive sign is the comic book accurate look of Ben Grimm, aka The Thing. Before, he was either an actor buried under a ton of prosthetic make-up, or in Fant4stic’s case, a terribly animated CGI monstrosity. Here, his appearance is very close to how he looks in the comic books, while at the same time allowing for expressive features that help bring his personality out much better. It helps that Emmy winning character actor Ebon Moss-Bachrach is also doing a great job of embodying the character. Indeed, all of the Four members look right for the part, including Joseph Quinn as the Human Torch, Vanessa Kirby as The Invisible Woman, and Pedro Pascal as Mr. Fantastic. The fact that they’ll also be dealing with a galactic threat the size of the celestial earth-devouring Galactus should also make this quite the spectacle. It took a while for Marvel Studios to finally get the rights back to bring the Fantastic Four into the MCU. Let’s hope the third time is the charm for these four.
SUPERMAN (JULY 11)
While Marvel is preparing it’s summer roll out of highly anticipated titles, it’s rival studio DC is about to begin a new era. Under the supervision of director James Gunn, we are about to see a relaunch of the DC Universe, and who better to get things started than the man of steel himself, Superman. The Snyderverse Superman, played by Henry Cavill, always felt like he got the short end in the DCEU, as director Zack Snyder seemed much more interested in the Batman side of DC’s catalog. For this new version, James Gunn himself is taking on the responsibility of launching Superman’s new era, and that seems to be especially a good sign for the future of the character. One of the best things about James Gunn as a filmmaker is that he puts a lot of value in comic book tropes, and in particular, he embraces the sillier side that helps to make them so much fun. He displayed that perfectly with his Guardian of the Galaxy trilogy at Marvel, and managed to carry that over to DC with his excellent The Suicide Squad (2021) and Peacemaker series. What seems to be especially exciting about his new take on Superman is that he’s not wasting any time in building the world around him. No more rehashing Superman’s already well tread back story. For this movie, the DC Universe is already fully formed, and we are just jumping right in. It’s probably smart, because the problem with the Snyderverse was that they were attempting to build everything up from scratch while at the same time speed running through all of the key story-lines, preventing anything from actually coalescing into a complete whole. Here Superman (played by newcomer David Corenswet) shares this world with a lot more super heroes, including a Green Lantern, Hawkgirl, and a few other in what looks like to be a big screen adaptation of the All-Star Superman comics. Oh, and Krypto the super dog is also making his live action debut as well. In contrast with the Snyderverse, the main goal of Gunn’s take on Superman is to return to the sense of fun that we had with the old Richard Donner/ Christopher Reeve classic, which is probably why there are hints of John Williams’ iconic score in the trailer. Here’s hoping that James Gunn puts the DCU on a strong footing and brings about a bright new future with one of the greatest super heroes of all time.
THUNDERBOLTS* (MAY 2)
While James Gunn is getting his universe up and running over at DC, Marvel is preparing to introduce it’s own take on the Suicide Squad. When the Avengers are unavailable, who does humanity turn to is the question being posed by this movie. The answer is a grouping of misfits and outcasts with something to prove. The team assembled for this version of the Thunderbolts are some of the characters that we’ve been introduced to along the way in the post Endgame MCU, many of whom have done something wrong in the past. The team consists of former black widow Yelena (Florence Pugh), Red Guardian (David Harbour), phase shifting criminal Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), assassin Taskmaster (Olga Kurylenko), and disgraced Captain America turned U.S. Agent John Walker (Wyatt Russell), all under the supervision of CIA chief Valentina Allegra de Fontaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus). The idea of assembling these tarnished figures together and hoping they have it within them to save the world is an appealing one to base a movie around, and certainly new ground for Marvel to cover in their movies. I’m interested in seeing how these more hard edged characters work off each other, and the chance at redemption could lead to some very interesting character building. We’ve gotten to meet these characters in various other films; now we’ll see how they function when they are in the spotlight. I am especially excited to see David Harbour’s Red Guardian here, since he’s been one of the best new characters that Marvel has introduced in the last couple years, and he and Florence Pugh’s Yelena were easily the best parts of what was an otherwise forgettable Black Widow (2021) movie. Bringing in Marvel veteran Sebastian Stan as his popular character the Winter Soldier should also offer up some fun character interactivity too. But it will also be interesting to see how they fare against an enemy as powerful as Sentry (Lewis Pullman) in this story. And what is the mystery behind the asterix in the title that they’ve been teasing about in the marketing. These may not be A-list Marvel characters, but as we’ve seen with the Guardians of the Galaxy movies, the B and C list characters can make a movie a lot of fun when they have their own opportunity to shine.
MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – THE FINAL RECKONING (MAY 23)
In 1996, the first Mission: Impossible movie premiered with it’s star Tom Cruise in top action hero form. Nearly 30 years and eight movies later, Tom Cruise is still delivering heart pounding action on a grand scale with this long running series. But, with this new film, there seems to be a drive to the end of the road. This was originally supposed to be Part II to the previous film, Dead Reckoning Part I (2023), but the filmmakers decided this movie should stand on it’s own, because it may not be the end of the franchise completely, but it’s quite possible that this will be the end for the character of Ethan Hunt. There’s a finality that’s being presented in this trailer, showcasing all of the events that have led up to now, showing that it’s all been leading to this. It’s understandable that Tom Cruise may want to step back from doing these movies now considering that he’s well into his sixties and probably can’t pull off the same amazing stunts anymore, though let’s face it, he’s lasted far longer than most in this business. The only question is, how big of a bang does he want to go out on. The previous movies had Cruise climbing the outside of the world’s tallest building, hang onto the side of a real plane in the air, piloting a helicopter solo, and in the last film riding off of a cliff on a motorcycle. Every Mission: Impossible movie has had at least one stand out scene with Tom Cruise really putting himself into the action rather than using a stunt double. We see some hints of what we might get in this movie, but how well will they stand against all the rest. You would think that Tom Cruise wants to save the best for last. Regardless, these movies are always a ton of fun to watch and here’s hoping that this movie at least measures up to all of the movies that have come before it. The cast that he’s assembled through all the previous movies are all here, plus a few new faces. I’m especially happy to see Ving Rhames still there because apart from Cruise, he’s the only actor to have appeared in all eight movies. Whether this is the end, or the beginning of a new era, it will be a hard act to follow for Tom Cruise. The Mission: Impossible franchise has been his own personal baby for decades and ever the showman, he’ll definitely want us to say goodbye in a grand finale.
ELIO (JUNE 20)
You can always rely on Pixar Animation to deliver some good-nature fun in the middle of the Summer season. This film was originally supposed to come out last Summer, but was pushed back due to the post-Strike reshuffling of the schedule. The delay may have worked out in it’s favor, because a year ago, the Pixar brand was not exactly on the strongest footing. Lightyear (2002) under-performed in theaters, and Elemental (2023) started off poorly before managing to recoup thanks to word of mouth. Releasing Elio right after this, an original story without a whole lot of per-existing interest from audiences at a time when the Pixar brand couldn’t help to lift it up, would have been a disaster for the already beleaguered studio. Thankfully, the highly anticipated sequel Inside Out 2 (2024) took its Summer slot instead and gave Pixar a much needed win at the box office. With a worldwide gross of over $1.5 billion, Inside Out shattered records and re-affirmed that Pixar indeed could still deliver at the box office. This more positive environment should help Elio out. It almost certainly won’t perform as huge as Inside Out 2, but it should have a pretty healthy run that will be on par with most of Pixar’s best movies. It all depends on how well audiences respond to the story. What they seem to be going for with this new film is a coming of age story with a child who can’t seem to make friends on Earth, so he instead tries to find his place off planet. The character of Elio himself looks like he’s going to be a lot of fun to watch, especially when he begins to interact with all of the various alien species. Pixar seems to perform at it’s best when it deals with the emotions of growing up and discovering one’s place in the world. This is trope that has proved to work well for them in the past with movies like Coco (2017), Luca (2021) and Turning Red (2022). We’ll see if Elio is able to live up to the other films. It definitely looks like it’s going to be a visual feast as well, but of course that’s to be expected from Pixar. It also marks the first solo directorial effort from Coco co-director Adrian Molina, so we know that it’s going to come from a filmmaker capable of making a movie that balances genuine emotion with a lot of fun mixed in. Let’s hope that this renewed strength in the Pixar brand keeps going with this film and beyond.
MOVIES THAT HAVE ME WORRIED:
LILO & STITCH (MAY 23)
If there is one thing that seems to not be as safe a bet at the box office as it used to, it’s live action remakes of classic animated films. Disney, which has been leading the charge with these types of movies, enjoyed some major box office success in the past decade remaking all of the major films in their animated canon. Some like Beauty and the Beast (2017) and The Lion King (2019) even made the studio well over a billion dollars each. But that box office domination seems to have lessened over time. The Little Mermaid (2023) performed well domestically, but struggled internationally. The Lion King prequel Mufasa (2024) also struggled to perform as well as it’s predecessor. But what has especially thrown cold water on the remake craze at Disney is the disastrous performance of Snow White (2025), which has fallen rapidly off of the box office charts and will likely lose Disney money in the long run. So, we may be seeing this very divisive trend possibly coming to an end. Although, that does depend on the remaining remakes that are still in the pipeline. This summer we are getting a remake of Disney’s late Renaissance era classic Lilo & Stitch (2002), which definitely has a lot to prove in the wake of Snow White. The one thing that is in this film’s favor is that it makes a lot more sense remaking this film in live action compared to Snow White. The original Lilo was one of Disney’s more earthbound films, even with all of the sci-fi elements, so it doesn’t take a whole lot to breath it into life in live action. You don’t need to make lavish sets and costumes; all this movie needs to do is film on location in Hawaii and try to match the vibe of the original film as best it can. And it does feel like the movie is managing to find that balance. The CGI Stitch “live action” model does look very adorable, and original film director Chris Sanders returns to do the voice. Even more importantly, the film seems like it found the right child actor to play Lilo with newcomer Maia Kaeloha. The one thing that this movie needs to prove more than anything, and some that most of these remakes fail to accomplish, is justify it’s existence. It has to stand up on it’s own in contrast with the original, and hopefully it can do that and be just as charming as well.
HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON (JUNE 13)
Speaking of live action remakes of animated classics, Dreamworks is getting in on the action now. Considering that Dreamworks hasn’t been around as long as Disney and hasn’t built up the same amount of classic films over that same time, it’s easy to see why they haven’t been jumping on the bandwagon themselves. But that ends this Summer as they release their first live action remake through their parent studio Universal. The original How to Train Your Dragon (2010) is undeniably one of the best films that Dreamworks Animation has ever made; probably the best. And compared with most of the other Dreamworks movies, this one makes a whole lot more sense than others. You don’t see a lot of sense trying to do Shrek (2001) in live action. Dragon was a film that did strive for a bit of grittiness and life like texture to it’s story and world. More than anything, translating the world of the original movie into live action, with it’s very Viking like aesthetic, seems very natural and the remake definitely feels like it’s doing a very one to one translation. The film even has one of the original voice actors returning, with Gerard Butler reprising his role as King Stoick. There’s just one thing that might end up hurting the film in the end, which are the dragons themselves. The problem is that they still look too cartoonish, and it kind of breaks the life like aesthetic that this film is going for. Toothless, the main dragon in this film, just looks like the same exact model as the character in the original film, just with a different skin texture. It might have helped to have changed up the look of the character just a bit more. Honestly, Disney seems to have matched that better in their Lilo & Stitch remake, as their Stitch does look like he fits better in live action. Maybe the dragon’s animation might work better in the context of the film, but again, it has to justify it’s existence in contrast with the original. The original film had an epic quality that is hard to replicate, and if they are just doing the same movie over again, it may not work out well because audiences already fell in love with the original. We’ll have to see if this Dragon can indeed soar on it’s own.
28 YEARS LATER (JUNE 20)
For the most part, there are a lot of exciting things about this movie. It reunites the original creative team behind the original, Danny Boyle directing from a script by Alex Garland. It also puts together an impressive cast, with Jodie Comer, Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Ralph Fiennes. Plus it delivered one of the best movie trailers in recent memory, with a chilling montage of post-apocalyptic carnage underscored by a disturbing 1915 recording of a recitation of Rudyard Kipling’s powerful anti-war poem “Boots.” The one thing that may unfortunately work against the film is that the trailer may have been too good. I don’t know if the movie itself is going to display the same kind of artistic intensity that this trailer has. Kudos to the marketing team that put this one out, because it’s almost a two minute long art piece within itself. The re-team of Boyle and Garland, who last worked together on the original 28 Days Later (2002) over twenty years, should still make this movie a well crafted horror action film. But I feel like the trailer may be misleading us into believing that this movie is going to be something that it isn’t. I imagine that the real film is going to be more of a slow burn leading to some big set pieces. The trailer seems to be preparing us for a much more intense experience. We may still get that, but it’s going to feel very different than what the trailer showed. Also, I’m pretty sure that Kipling poem appears nowhere in the final film; it’s just something that the marketing department thought would be cool to use in the trailer. We’ll see how well this performs once it’s in theaters. It’s a mid Summer horror film, which often has seen a lot of success in past years. My hope is that the movie does live up to the promise of it’s intense marketing campaign. It’s hard to get audiences excited in another zombie movie, which is itself a pretty over-saturated and diluted genre. Perhaps that’s why the trailer had to go as hard as it does; to get us re-interested in this kind of movie again.
THE NAKED GUN (AUGUST 1)
Making this movie would easily be dismissed as sacrilege in most circumstances. The original Abrahams and Zucker classic is one of the funniest comedies ever made and one of the iconic roles that turned Leslie Nielsen into an unlikely comedy legend. But, over time both the Naked Gun franchise and the spoof comedy genre died off, so it’s unusual that a studio would want to pick it up again. The one trying to make an attempt this time is producer Seth MacFarlane of Family Guy and Ted fame. He clearly has a soft spot for Naked Gun and it’s clearly seen in his style of comedy. So, it makes sense for him to be the new shepherd for this series. And to take over the role of Frank Drebin from Leslie Nielsen, it makes sense to go with someone of the same ilk like Liam Neeson. Neeson already has been within Seth MacFarlane’s circle with cameos in movies like A Million Ways to Die in the West (2014) and Ted 2 (2015). The only question is, can this movie still be funny? The spoof genre died out for a reason, because the movies just kept getting less and less funny. It’s hard to tell how well this movie will pull it off, but the trailer certainly shows that it will be trying for a goofy tone. It might work out well, given Liam Neeson’s participation here, but it also might be a horrible mess too. I’ll give the movie this, that O.J. Simpson joke in the trailer is legit very funny. At least the movie is actually acknowledging the elephant in the room there. Seth MacFarlane’s team probably understands that there is a lot to prove here, and they clearly have a reverence for the original and will try to do it justice here. It certainly won’t be anywhere near as inspired as the original film, but if it can still make most of us laugh, than that’s a plus. The worst thing they could do is make a Naked Gun movie without a single joke that works, and at least from the trailer we see that at least one joke does land. I worry that we’ll get the former, but I do hope that we’ll at least get something fun and enjoyable
MOVIES TO SKIP:
JURASSIC WORLD: REBIRTH (JULY 2)
Fool me once is how the phrase goes. Jurassic Park was a one of a kind masterpiece that still holds up over 30 years later. Since then, the franchise has failed time and again to recapture the magic of that original. Even Spielberg could do it with The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), which is easily his worst film. Jurassic World (2015) came closest to getting there with a fresh new take on the concept, showing us the park in a fully open to the public capacity, but the two sequels that have come after have squandered any of that good will by getting progressively dumber with each outing. It seems that Universal Pictures is looking to soft re-boot the franchise again by starting fresh with a new cast. Gone are the stars of the last three movies, Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard, and instead we get Scarlett Johansson, Jonathan Bailey and Mahershala Ali. While the cast may be new, the same old action scenes look to be more of the familiar. The premise of scientists and explorers putting themselves in harms way for the sake of studying these dinosaurs seems to be overplayed at this point. What happened to the more intriguing concept of dinosaurs being let loose into our world that was established a few movies ago. That seems to have gone nowhere and based on this movie, which chooses to show dinosaurs yet again confined to a remote island, the past continuity of the franchise really doesn’t seem to matter at all. This movie is just more cash grabbing by the studio, wringing out every cent they can get from a franchise that has been fruitful for them in the past, but is continually running out of ideas. For this franchise to survive beyond this, it’s better if the studio looks beyond formula and stop just trying to make the same movie over and over again.
FREAKIER FRIDAY (AUGUST 8)
I understand why Disney would be choosing to make this sequel now. Lindsay Lohan seems to have gotten her life back together after a few years of scandal and hard living and is seeing a career rebound thanks to her well received holiday movies on Netflix. And Jamie Lee Curtis is riding high after her Oscar win for the movie Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022). And they both genuinely want to work together again on something. Unfortunately, like many other sequels made decades after the fact, this movie is just merely doing the same plot over again, only they are including a new generation. Chalk this movie up to being not a film for me. I didn’t much care for the original either, nor the even more original film from the 70’s starring a young Jodie Foster that it was a remake of. The only thing this movie may have going for it is the report between Lohan and Curtis. They clearly are invested in doing this film. But, the era in which this kind of movie could work seems like it has passed. Another body swap comedy is a hard sell, even to a new generation. I think it would have served better for Curtis and Lohan to re-team in a movie that was more original. Fans of the original film may like this one, but as we’ve seen with recent Disney live action legacy sequels like Hocus Pocus 2 (2022) and Disenchanted (2022), it’s hard to pick things back up after a twenty year gap. Not only have you aged up, but so has your audience, and the newer generation may not hold it in the same regard. We’ll see if this sequel manages to keep things freaky all these years later.
SMURFS (JULY 18)
And here we have a movie that already just spells disaster. When the trailer puts it in your face that “Rihanna is Smurfette,” you know that there is nothing else noteworthy to sell about this movie. It’s not even the first time that there has been an attempt to jumpstart a Smurfs film franchise. There was the live action adaptation from the early 2010’s and then the all animated one from 2017. Is there anything they are doing differently for this new one. Doesn’t look like it. All that they seem to have done is add a different, Spider-verse style filter on the CGI Smurf models to make them look more hand drawn, and that seems to be it. Otherwise it’s all the lame jokes that we’ve seen before. Remember how they would replace a curse word with the word “smurf” to make it feel more edgy while still keeping it G-rated. That’s pretty much what they are doing again. Hopefully this movie ends up like the ones before and just fades into obscurity, but then again that may just lead to more re-boots again in the future.
So, there you have my outlook on the upcoming Summer movie season. This will be an interesting Summer to observe at the movies, because it will be the first true season that’s unaffected by the strikes of 2023. All of the re-shuffling of the schedule in the wake of the labor walk-outs has resolved, mostly in the last calendar year, so this will be the first Summer in a while that feels like it used to. Or at least that’s the hope. The thing that still lingers over the industry is the uncertainty in the economy due to the tariffs and trade war going on. One of Hollywood’s big worries is that the lucrative Chinese market may get cut off, which has been essential towards helping the studios recoup financially with their massive, some would say over-budgeted tentpoles. China has been moving away from Hollywood in recent years and favoring more of their own domestic cinema instead, but if the trade war makes them even less inclined to play American made films in their country, that could have a devastating effect on the movie business here. We’ll have to see how things turn out. Can domestic box office be enough in an economy that is becoming less stable? It does give Hollywood some hope that Minecraft is performing as well as it is right now, and we’ll see if that translates over the course of the rest of the summer. There will be the usual standards like Marvel, Pixar and DC, but there are a bunch more films out there that I didn’t mention that could also be big surprises. It’s going to be an interesting couple of months, and the hope is that outside influences won’t spoil too much of the fun we’ll have at the movies. I certainly am going to try to have as much fun as I can, and I’ll continue to share my thoughts on these movies in the meantime. So, have a great Summer season at the movies and let cinema be the thing that helps to lift your spirit through troubled times.