As much as Hollywood tries to tell you otherwise, not every successful movie needs to mark the beginning of a franchise, never mind a shared universe. While there was more than enough to love about Matthew Vaughn’s Kingsman: The Secret Service to justify extra installments, planning a full-scale multimedia mythology was the wrong move.
Coming out of nowhere to end up as one of the biggest sleeper hits of 2015, the filmmaker’s R-rated and extravagantly violent homage to spy cinema earned over $400 million at the box office, so it was no surprise when a sequel was announced. While The Golden Circle fared almost identically in terms of ticket sales, the quality took a drastic downturn.
Undeterred, Vaughn and his production company outlined plans for even more sequels, spin-offs, and TV shows, with Kingsman being positioned as one of the industry’s marquee espionage properties. That being said, the wheels started to fall off when prequel The King’s Man was delayed for two years, just to end up as the lowest-grossing and worst-reviewed of the three.
Taron Egerton’s third and final outing in The Blue Blood remains lodged firmly in development hell, while any talk of small screen offshoots and additional extensions of the IP have gone radio silent. The first salvo remains a deliriously demented delight, though, and one that’s rocketed right to the very top of the streaming ranks.
Per FlixPatrol, The Secret Service has gunned down the number one spot on HBO Max among subscribers in the United States, even if it’s never a great look for any saga to comfortably peak with its very first entry.
