According to an article in Deadline, the Brad Pitt-starring action film Bullet Train, about the world’s top assassins trapped together aboard the titular vehicular conveyance heading from Tokyo to Kyoto, has seen its opening date pushed back a week from July 29 to Aug. 5.
The official reason given by the studio was that it wanted Bullet Train to be the last big action event film of the summer. But the fact is, it’s a big-budget action film opening the Summer of Superheroes, following two-billion-dollar openings in a row from DC’s The Batman and Marvel’s Doctor Strange: In The Multiverse of Madness.
Thor: Love and Thunder is slated to be Marvel’s second event film of the summer, crossing over James Gunn’s blockbuster franchise Guardians of the Galaxy into Thor’s. And the trend with comic book films is not just opening big but continuing to dominate the box office for weeks after. Add to that the fact that DC’s League of Super-Pets is also scheduled to open on July 29. While not expected to be the runaway smash that Thor, Strange, and Batman were, it is expected to draw a big crowd of genre film fans who want something to bring the kids to.
While late summer is generally seen as a soft season for blockbuster action films, the studio Sony Pictures clearly expects Bullet Train to be more competitive on a weekend against the openings of the Owen Wilson comedy Secret Headquarters and the Jo Koy-starring Easter Sunday, a movie that Stephen Spielberg pitched to the comedian.
