“Should studios be worried [about the weak summer box office]? I think they should be, a little. It’s probably not a complete coincidence that the year’s biggest surprise hit, The Lego Movie, is a self-aware fable predicting an eventual revolt by a captive audience that’s tired of being told that everything is awesome when everything isn’t. Accordingly, this summer provided a jolting reminder that there are some things even unstoppable systematized marketing can’t overcome: American moviegoers tend to get bored with a franchise by the fourth installment (Transformers), there is such a thing as rebooting too soon (Amazing Spider-Man 2), stars can lose their star power (Blended, Edge of Tomorrow), audiences can smell a cheap knockoff a mile away (Into the Storm), a sense of same-iness can turn a seemingly guaranteed home run into a mere triple (X-Men: Days of Future Past), and sometimes an idea is exactly as bad as it sounds (Clint Eastwood’s Jersey Boys). Yes, huge overseas grosses pulled a number of domestic shortfallers into very solid profit, but nobody believes that level of international enthusiasm is going to last forever. Historically, audiences in other countries tend to tire of the same stuff that Americans do; they just do it two or three years (or one sequel) later. On the bright side, the greater-than-predicted success of Maleficent, Lucy, and The Fault in Our Stars suggests that there might possibly be some money to be made in pursuing a demographic that … what’s it called … not “men,” but … I’m blanking. Forget I mentioned it.”

-- Mark Harris, “Hollywood’s Horrid Summer: Why the Box Office Has Been Worse Than It Looks (and Won’t Get Better Soon),” on the Grantland site. BTW: If we are tiring of being told that everything is awesome when it isn't? That's really, really good. See this.

Whistling past the graveyard? “Amazing Spider-Man 2” grossed half of what “Spider-Man” grossed in 2002. Adjust for the inflation and it's one-third.