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China Has Been Ignoring Hollywood Movies. Why ‘Alien: Romulus’ Is an Exception
'Alien: Romulus' is the rare Hollywood success at the Chinese box office, a market where local films are now dominant.
Box office analysts point to several reasons for the unexpectedly promising performance of “Alien: Romulus,” including positive reviews and word-of-mouth — with strong scores on local rating systems Maoyan (8.9 out of 10), Taopiaopiao (9.1 out of 10) and Douban (7.5 out of 10). And although “Romulus” extends a franchise that began 45 years ago with Ridley Scott’s 1979 monster adventure “Alien,” Rosen believes the newest entry benefitted from the fact that audiences don’t need to have seen every prior installment to make sense of the latest action with xenomorphs. Some of the decisions were political (“Top Gun: Maverick” was seen as unwelcome U.S. propaganda and not given an import permit) while others were due to grievances with Marvel(Disney’s “Eternals” and “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” and Sony’s “Spider-Man: No Way Home” didn’t get in either).
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