While 2025 has already had a number of cinematic hits, one film that is, disappointingly, struggling at the box office is the continuation of one of the biggest American animated franchises, The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie. The film has received great reviews since its release, from both critics and audiences, but, unfortunately for The Day the Earth Blew Up, reviews haven’t been enough to keep the film afloat when it comes to box office numbers.
From the beginning to The Day the Earth Blew Up‘s ending, it is a great ride that offers plenty of solid, classic Looney Tunes action and feels like it has brought the franchise back to its roots. The film is a spinoff of the Looney Tunes Cartoons series on Max, which is another solid project in the long-running franchise. Yet Warner Bros. has made it abundantly clear that they don’t see the Looney Tunes series as a priority and effectively kneecapped the new film before it was even released.
The Day The Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie Is Excellent, But It Isn’t Making Any Money
The Film’s Great Reviews Aren’t Translating To Enough Sales
So far, The Day the Earth Blew Up has been received excellently, earning a pretty great 86% critic score on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, alongside an audience score of 88%. This is a great pair of stats, showing that the film is an enjoyable ride for general audiences as well as hitting all the right notes that critics are looking for. However, after its first week of release, the movie only made $6.8 million at the worldwide box office, against its production budget of $15 million (via Box Office Mojo).
However, The Day the Earth Blew Up could absolutely pick up steam in the upcoming weeks thanks to its reviews, so all is not lost for the movie.
While this is a flop of a box office return, it certainly isn’t the worst the film could do, especially considering its production history. The film was originally produced for HBO Max, but Warner Bros. later decided to shop it around to various other distributors, and it was eventually picked up by Ketchup Entertainment, who clearly weren’t able to produce much of a marketing campaign. However, The Day the Earth Blew Up could absolutely pick up steam in the upcoming weeks thanks to its reviews, so all is not lost for the movie.
The Day The Earth Blew Up Is A Victim Of Warner Bros. Treatment Of The Looney Tunes
Warner Bros. Has Mishandled The Property For Years Now
The Day the Earth Blew Up‘s current predicament is directly related to how Warner Bros. has been treating the property over the last few years. The Looney Tunes in general have felt like an afterthought for the company; very few projects are made with these characters, and those that are produced have very little money and attention put into them, putting them at an immediate disadvantage.
The last major Looney Tunes project was Space Jam: A New Legacy, which wasn’t entirely focused on the classic characters. Recently was the situation surrounding the canceled Coyote vs. Acme movie, which Warner Bros fully produced, before deciding at the final moment to shelve the project to try and get a tax write-off as opposed to trying to make a profit off the movie’s release.
WB clearly views Looney Tunes as a disposable brand, putting no effort into the legacy of these characters nor projects about them, and that means that The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie was going to face an uphill battle, despite the fact that WB weren’t even the ones to market it.
