Summer 2025 shocked viewers as blockbusters and motion pictures hit the movie theatres. This summer, as Elly Ash ‘26 notes, blockbusters ranged with a “wide variety.” From sci-fi to action to comedy, they kept the theatres busy and accumulated 3.88 billion dollars of domestic box office, which makes up 60.3 percent of the 2025 annual box office as of September.
Despite the season’s general success, this summer failed to escape the downward trend of summer office boxes in the post-pandemic years. The season missed the predicted benchmark of $4 billion domestically and fell 11% short of 2023 summer office boxes, the only outlier of the post-pandemic trend–thanks to the Barbenheimer combination that summer.
Also, unlike any other summer in recent memory—except for when the pandemic disrupted cinemas—this summer saw no billion-dollar blockbuster. Furthermore, this summer, no Hollywood movie crossed the $600 million line in box office, or even $500 million for that matter. The underperformance marks an unprecedentedly lackluster summer for cinemas in terms of commercial success.
There’s no doubt, however, that the season kicked off strong with Lilo and Stitch earning a whopping $1 billion at the box office. That weekend, with Mission: Impossible–The Final Reckoning opening opposite the Disney live-action movie, made a historical Memorial Day weekend record. The optimism remained in the industry through June, with F1 and the live action How to Train Your Dragon, and July with the much anticipated Jurassic World: Rebirth.
Then, August hit and box office plummeted. Largely, the late summer box office depended on The Fantastic Four: First Step, but with its “repetitive” plot, as Anais Bricout ‘26 reported, the Marvel movie quickly lost its momentum. The movie regained its groove two weeks later, after the season ended, earning solid reviews and being ranked fourth among domestic box offices this summer.
Bricout’s movie experience this summer also mirrored the rollercoaster of the season’s box office. She had a “very varied experience.” For someone who “likes the experience of summer movies coming out in the summer–like Call Me By Your Name,” she found that some movies this summer “were really out of place. Some movies were just fine; others [she] really liked.”
Moreover, for Milton Academy movie-goers, the summer did bring a few movie highlights, and F1 topped the popularity chart. Following a formerly retired F1 driver and his journey [to save] his team from bankruptcy, the movie earned high reviews from Nini Lu ‘29, a Formula 1 fan, who described the movie “sensational.” The movie also featured a couple “heartbreaking” scenes, according to Anders Yu ‘28. He spotlighted one such scene, where “the [protagonist’s] teammate suffers from a near fatal crash that jeopardizes the [team’s] fate. Jiayi Wu ‘27, who “doesn’t like F1 [races] at all," also rated the movie an “8 out of 10.” “The soundtrack was fire,” she added, “especially in the cinema.”
The live action adaption of How to Train Your Dragon marked another highlight for Milton students. The movie focusing on the teenage Viking and his tumultuous friendship with Toothless, his dragon, caught Milton students with its easygoing plot and its loyalty to the original 2013 animation. “The iconic and heartwarming scene of Hiccup successfully building a connection with Toothless was for sure [memorable],” Yoyo Qiu ‘27 revealed. Meanwhile another classic scene stood out to Lu. “I really liked when [the protagonist] and his [love interest], Astrid, rode on top of Toothless as they soared across the sky. It was a beautiful scene.”
Milton students also stated their anticipation for the industry as fall approaches. Lu has been excited for ZOOTOPIA 2, whereas Wu has been looking forward to The Devil Wears Prada 2. Liz Harris ‘28 also remarked that she is “very excited for the Cupables Trilogy to be finished and the My Fault: London Counterpart to be continued.” Ash, all the while, is eager to see Dune Part 3. Yet, no matter what the sequel is, students all hope that the “sequel lives up to the first part,” according to Lu. Although hopes might be low with statistics showing most sequels living under the original’s shadow, given the array of upcoming movies this fall, we might be surprised.