2024’s Borderlands movie was not a big success at the box office, bringing in just $33 million and garnering a cool critical reception as well. Despite the movie’s lack of performance critically and commercially, Gearbox boss Randy Pitchford isn’t giving up on future transmedia opportunities.
Speaking to The Gamer, Pitchford said he would be open to the idea of another stab at it if the right team of people and ideas come together at the right moment.
“My attitude is, if there are great creators, artists, entertainers that have something to say and they think they can only do it with Borderlands, and they can demonstrate that they can do it, I want to enable that. We don’t always succeed, but we’ve got to keep swinging,” he said.
Pitchford went on to say that one of the most famous and beloved bands of all time, The Beatles, didn’t hit a home run with every song they wrote–at least for Pitchford’s ear.
“I love the Beatles, and there’s lots of Beatles music, [and] I just absolutely can’t listen to some of it. I think it’s unlistenable. Should we say, ‘You know what? You made an unlistenable song […], therefore, make no more music.’ That’s not the attitude, you know, keep making music,” he said.
Also in the interview, Pitchford said the Borderlands movie would not have been improved had he been the director. In fact, Pitchford said the movie would have been “way worse” had he made it.
“I promise you, if I directed that movie, it’d be a disaster,” he said.
The Borderlands movie was a flop, but that didn’t impact Gearbox–at least in terms of financials–because movie studio Lionsgate funded it. Variety reported that the movie cost $120 million to make, with “tens of millions” more spent on marketing. Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer didn’t mince words when discussing how poorly the movie did for the company.
“Nearly everything that could go wrong did go wrong,” Feltheimer said. “It sat on the shelf for too long during the pandemic, and reshoots and rising interest rates took it outside the safety zone of our usual strict financial models.”
The Borderlands movie came up short despite being based on an established franchise with a passionate fandom, a huge cast of big names like Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, and Jamie Lee Curtis, along with the backing of a major Hollywood movie studio with Lionsgate. For her part, Blanchett said she agreed to be in the Borderlands movie to get herself out of the house during Covid.
As for the game series, Borderlands 4 launches on September 12 for PC, Xbox Series X|S, and PS5, before landing on PS5 in October. For more, check out the Borderlands 4 global release times.
