It was mostly all about KPop Demon Hunters — which earned around $19.2 million via Saturday and Sunday showings — as summer otherwise ended with a whimper. The original animated musical fantasy became Netflix’s most-watched original movie at around the same time it was topping the weekend domestic box office. Chrissi Michael, content strategist by day and box office nerd by night, is here to dissect the circumstances. Jeremy Fuster was returning to LA from a vacation and lacked the courage to attempt podcasting mid-air, so it’s just Scott Mendelson, Lisa Laman and the special guest.

Along with a deep dive into what Netflix’s momentary and situational theatrical triumph does and doesn’t mean for theaters, streaming, we briefly discussed the summer that was. Among the topics included a lack of big movies aimed at women and girls (cough-KPop Demon Hunters-cough) and how the sheer familiarity of the various brands and franchises being revisited resulted in a ceiling on even successful revivals. We discussed the extent to which Superman appealed to the general population in a way Fantastic Four did not, while discussing the discrepancy between online handwringing over Materialists (and, already, Supergirl) versus the film’s unmitigatedly successful theatrical reception.

Get full access to The Outside Scoop at scottmendelson.substack.com/subscribe