As memes continue to mount about the movie, Morbius has topped video-on-demand charts weeks after its second box office flop. Jared Leto led the cast of the latest installment in Sony's Spider-Man Universe alongside Matt Smith, Adria Arjona, Jared Harris, Al Madrigal and Tyrese Gibson. Morbius marks the first live-action portrayal of the iconic Spider-Man villain and explores his origin story as a scientist suffering from a rare blood disease who afflicts himself with transgenic vampirism in the hopes of curing it, granting him superhuman abilities and no traditional vampire weaknesses, save for a thirst for blood.
Much like Venom before it, Morbius struggled to make its way to the big screen years before the SSU with multiple solo projects and a cut cameo from Blade all being attempted that failed to come to fruition. Following various COVID-related and re-editing delays, Morbius finally hit theaters this past April to widespread critical disdain for its dated script, lackluster visual effects, tame performances and confused universe connections. Morbius would also underwhelm at the box office, grossing just over $163 million against its $75 million budget, though the film may finally be finding life.
To kick off the week, Fandango has released the numbers for its weekend VOD charts on VUDU and revealed that Morbius has come out victorious this past weekend. The SSU film beat out the likes of Uncharted, The Bad Guys, The Batman and Everything Everywhere All at Once to become the highest-grossing film on VOD charts from June 13-19. Morbius topping the VOD charts comes two weeks after Sony re-released the film in theaters, where it flopped for a second time at the box office.
Given its disastrous reception and lackluster box office returns, Morbius quickly became the target of social media memes within weeks of its release. Memes set their sights on everything from Matt Smith's cringeworthy dance sequence after his transformation to a villainous bloodsucker to the largely empty theaters in its opening weekend, as well as Wikipedia pages falsely updated to show that the film is the highest-grossing of all-time. Jared Leto himself elected to get in on the fun as he posted a video reading a fake script for a sequel to the movie entitled Morbius 2: It's Morbin' Time based on the "morbin' time" meme that's dominated social media.
Sony initially sought to get in on the Morbius meme trend by re-releasing the film in theaters earlier this month, hoping to draw morbidly curious viewers or those looking for a so-bad-it's-good time, but it ultimately backfired, only grossing $300k and quickly being pulled after one weekend. Given this failed re-release, it's interesting to see Morbius top VOD charts, leaving many to wonder if a successful home media run will carry the film to a sequel. Only time will tell as audiences flock to on-demand platforms to rent or buy Morbius in the coming weeks.
