Pixar’s latest movie, Elio, seems to be continuing an unfortunate trend for the animation giant in the post-pandemic years. This new story from Pixar centers around the тιтular child who fulfills his dream of meeting aliens after he is abducted and mistaken for the ambᴀssador of Earth. However, like other non-sequels recently made by Pixar, 2025’s Elio has had a rough time attracting a big enough audience to movie theaters to break even.

The new film has set a record low for the studio with its disappointing opening weekend gross. This initial low turnout seems to signify Elio‘s future as another box office bomb for Pixar, especially considering the movie’s mᴀssive budget. However, there is still hope for the critically acclaimed Elio, as its positive reviews could make it a theatrical success later on, just like one of Pixar’s previous sleeper hits.

Elio Debuted With Pixar’s Worst Opening Weekend In History

The Previous Record Holder Was The First Toy Story

Elio‘s opening weekend is a new low for Pixar. This new animated sci-fi movie reportedly made just over $21 million total in its first weekend (via Box Office Mojo). This marks the lowest-grossing opening weekend in Pixar’s 30-plus-year history of producing feature films. The previous record holder was 1995’s Toy Story, the studio’s first feature-length animated movie, which made $29.1 million upon its debut.

Despite Pixar’s notoriety as one of the most innovative and acclaimed film production studios ever, it’s disheartening to see its latest movie have a worse opening weekend than a film released before the studio became a household name. This raises questions about whether Pixar can continue to succeed in making movies not based on previous projects, such as Toy Story or Inside Out.

Elio’s Positive Reviews Can Help With Word-of-Mouth

That’s What Happened With Elemental

Despite having a less-than-desirable opening weekend, Elio can still succeed in theaters over time, having generated very positive buzz. This Pixar movie is now Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, having gained an 84% rating from critics and a 91% rating from audiences. Although Elio is one of the lower-ranking Pixar films on Rotten Tomatoes, it still boasts a very high score, placing it above Monsters University and below Onward.

These impressive reviews should help Elio create enough encouraging word of mouth to drive more people into theaters. This will enable the movie to bring in more and more revenue during its theatrical run, recouping its reported $150 million budget and achieving a decent profit (via Variety).

Elio’s Box Office May Have An Elemental Scenario

Elemental Had A Huge Comeback After Its Poor Debut

There is a good chance that Elio can bounce back in theaters after its lackluster opening weekend, as was the case with Pixar’s previous original film, Elemental. This 2023 movie achieved glowing reviews and broke even after earning over $496 million in theaters, despite making only $29.6 million on its opening weekend (via Box Office Mojo).

Although Elemental was a new Pixar story that didn’t initially make a lot of money, its eventual success proved that there is still room for original animated stories to succeed in theaters. It may be rare for such an expensive movie to come back around based solely on word of mouth. But since Pixar did it before with Elemental, it can do it again with Elio.

It is clear that Pixar is having more trouble getting audiences to come see its original films than it did in its earlier years. Like with most new stories in Hollywood, not enough audiences seem to be getting on board with watching Pixar’s new movie while it’s still in theaters. Nevertheless, if history repeats itself with Elio during its theatrical run, Pixar’s latest project could still draw in a large audience, surpᴀss its poor opening weekend, and generate a profit for the studio, much like Elemental did not long ago.

Source: Variety, Box Office Mojo