Ryan Reynolds is a huge name in Hollywood these days. In 2024, he celebrated a massive success with the third installment of Deadpool. But even before that, he appeared in countless films. A sci-fi movie with Jeff Bridges is mostly forgotten today and was a big flop – despite its star-studded cast.
Which movie are we talking about? Ryan Reynolds’s career began in 1991 with the series Hillside. Even before the success of Deadpool in 2016, he had roles in comic adaptations. In Blade Trinity, he fought alongside Blade and in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, he portrayed an early, rather hated version of Deadpool.
Three years before his solo Deadpool film, another comic adaptation was released with R.I.P.D.. The best comparison for the film would be Men in Black, only instead of aliens, it’s undead humans who illegally remain on Earth, even though they should actually move on. With Ryan Reynolds and Jeff Bridges, it also had a young-old dynamic, just like in Men in Black.
Universal apparently saw a lot of potential in the film, as the budget amounted to 130 million US dollars. Unfortunately, audiences did not find the film that interesting. It flopped at the box office and is considered mostly forgotten today.
The 130-Million-Dollar Flop
How did R.I.P.D. fare? Due to high costs, R.I.P.D. needed to take in a lot of money. In most cases, a film is considered a success when it earns double its production costs. R.I.P.D. couldn’t even recoup its actual budget.
If you look at the numbers on Box Office Mojo, you will see that the film only grossed just under 78 million US dollars. That’s nowhere near the budget.
What could have been the reason? Jeff Bridges is a well-known and good actor, but he has never truly been a box office draw. Ryan Reynolds at that time was also not yet the guaranteed hit-maker he might be today. Deadpool came three years later, and Reynolds flopped with Green Lantern in 2011.
On the same day, Red 2 was released in US theaters. This film targets a similar audience, and Pacific Rim, which also came out in July, added more competition for the favor of moviegoers.
Furthermore, it’s worth mentioning that the title of the film R.I.P.D
sounds quite cumbersome and doesn’t stick in the mind as easily as other movie titles.
The reviews were also poor. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a dismal critic score of 13% from 103 reviews. Among audiences, it achieves 38% from over 50,000 reviews.
There was even a sequel. Although the film was a major flop, there was even a sequel that probably hardly anyone noticed as it was released only on DVD. In 2022, R.I.P.D 2: Rise of the Damned was released and was a prequel. However, it was rather big trash, as no cast members or even the director returned. Another film aimed to build a large universe but flopped already with the first installment: A fantasy film with Tom Cruise was supposed to start a large universe like in Marvel – But it was a flop
