The Borderlands film, which comes out this week, is getting some uh...
not amazing reviews. It currently is sitting at a wildly low 3% on Rotten Tomatoes, and we here at IGN gave it a 3/10 . Borderlands the franchise is created and owned by Gearbox, which was itself just acquired by Take-Two.
And Take-Two (through its 2K label) is one of the many companies producing the film, along with Gearbox. So when I chatted with Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick today ahead of the company's Q1 earnings call, I asked him about the critical reception. Will the film's success or failure impact Take-Two in any meaningful way? The answer, per Zelnick, is no.
Financially, this film won't make a dent. But he also urged to "give the film a chance" despite the negative critical reception. Here's his response: "Let's give the film a chance.
A lot of people worked really hard on it. The underlying intellectual property is phenomenal, the cast is amazing, I think the look and feel is really terrific. So let's see what audiences have to say.
But to answer your question, no, the performance of the film wouldn't have a financial impact on us or on the franchise one way or another." I went on to ask Zelnick about his opinion on video game films in general, a subject he's spoken about often. He reiterated his answer from the past, which seems not to have changed.
Take-Two is "really selective" about what games it turns into films, and he says that the company doesn't want its imprint on anthing unless it's "s.