Pitched as "Die Hard meets The Towering Inferno," the Dwayne Johnson-led action movie premiered

to a significantly lower-than-expected financial reception, coming out of its first weekend

in third place at the box office.

As a result, the would-be franchise starter will be lucky to make its money back, much

less spark a new series.

More likely than not, you can forget about a sequel already.

So why is this disaster movie proving to be such a… disastrous movie?

Could the Rock's star be fading?

Is the movie actually that bad?

Let's tally up the numbers and figure out the real reasons Skyscraper couldn't stand

tall at the box office.

What's the damage?

According to a breakdown by The Hollywood Reporter, Skyscraper only managed a domestic

total of $25.5 million in its opening weekend.

The unexpectedly small take falls below Universal's projected opening of $30 million or more.

Against a budget of more than $125 million and a marketing budget of at least half that,

those numbers are a pretty poor showing, one which Box Office Mojo predicts will translate

into a $65 to $75 million domestic total.

Since these projected earnings wouldn't even cover half of Skyscraper's total cost, that

leaves a huge deficit to bridge in the international market, just for the sake of breaking even.

But with only $40.4 million coming in from the movie's global audience on opening weekend,

the chances of even that happening are looking vanishingly small.

I think I've seen this

If Skyscraper feels too familiar to be all that interesting, that's actually partially

by design.

Prior to the movie's release, Johnson described the movie on his social media as "a film that

paid homage and respect to the classic action movies that inspired me and entire generations

- Die Hard to Towering Inferno to The Fugitive."

The thing about those classic action movies is not just that we've seen them before, but

that we've also already seen them all get ripped off.

We've seen Cliffhanger, we've seen Speed, we've seen Daylight - and they all feel a

lot like Skyscraper.

So as much as Johnson and the movie's producers would like to praise Skyscraper as a modern

classic, it's not a quality that feels all that earned.

It doesn't help that Skyscraper comes off as feeling similar to some of Dwayne Johnson's

other recent movies, from San Andreas to Rampage to even The Fate of the Furious.

But that's not this movie's problem - that speaks to issues with the movie's marquee

star.

Over-exposed

Over a 14-month span starting in April 2017, Dwayne Johnson has been a lead star in five

different movies, including Baywatch, Jumanji, and now Skyscraper.

The avalanche of content shows no signs of stopping, but it might already be bringing

in diminishing returns.

In short, Johnson has opened himself up to the possibility of serious overexposure.

With no less than ten movies potentially coming down the pipeline for the actor, you'd have

to be crazy not to think that we're at risk of some serious Rock fatigue.

If it can happen to Star Wars, it can happen to the People's Champion.

Could Skyscraper's failure inspire Johnson to tone down the full-court press?

Maybe.

After all, how is the country ever going to elect him president if everyone's burned out

on his movies?

The competition

Whatever its own faults may be, Skyscraper was also outmatched at the box office by more

critically acclaimed competition.

On one side, there's Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation, another entry in the Adam

Sandler-starring animated series about Dracula and friends.

That family-friendly sequel won the weekend with $45 million, easily trouncing Skyscraper's

debut showing.

In second place, there's Ant-Man and the Wasp, with nearly $29 million.

According to both Rotten Tomatoes scores and Cinemascores, people walked out of these two

movies feeling satisfied, and ready to spread some positive word of mouth.

To its detriment at the box office, Skyscraper is proving more divisive, and without good

word of mouth behind it, things are only going to get worse from here.

Catch it later

So does Skyscraper really deserve this belly-flop of a reception?

Well, yes and no.

Put simply, Skyscraper is not the kind of appointment viewing that makes you want to

schlep out to the cinema, regardless of how bombastic its special effects might be.

Instead, it's the kind of thing you see accidentally, killing time with an in-flight movie while

you're on a plane.

Multiple reviews emphasized the movie's nature as something slight and inessential - enjoyable

enough as a nice diversion, but not good for much else.

In a crowded movie landscape, "good enough" often doesn't cut it - not when other movies

are competing for the same audience.

In these days of razor-thin profit margins, sometimes that's all you need to make a box-office

bomb.