History Main / PresumedFlop

* ''Film/ANightmareOnElmStreet5TheDreamChild'': While the movie has been constantly referred to as a box office bomb and is the second lowest grossing Elm Street movie, (New Nightmare is the lowest grossing movie of the series) the movie actually did do well in theaters. In fact, according to Creator/RobertEnglund, Elm Street 5 was actually a hit. The movie was mainly seen as a disappointment numbers wise only because New Line was expecting it to do as well if not better then [[Film/ANightmareOnElmStreet4TheDreamMaster the previous movie]] which at the time was the most profitable movie of the series.

* It is commonly assumed that Anime/DragonBallZKai did not perform well in Japan due to initially ending with the Cell Saga; however, the series itself did quite well on TV in its home country, with an average rating of 9.4% [[labelnote:note]]For reference, most anime in Japan during the day score between 2% and 3%, with more popular titles like One Piece and Pretty Cure reaching 4% to 5%. Only super popular titles like Sazae-san and Chibi Maruko-chan even come close to 9% to 10%. Late-night anime tends to have around 1%, but those titles rely more on Blu-Ray and merchandise sales than TV ratings to measure popularity[[/labelnote]] and frequently making the top 10 on "most watched anime" lists during its run. Production on Kai ended due to various other factors:
** The series' merchandise failed to make the expected profits for Bandai.
** All remastering of the video footage was outsourced to a company called Q-TEC,which combined with having to bring back most of the japanese voice cast (aside from those who have died or retired) to record the new voice track, resulted in high production costs.

** And most importantly, Manga/{{Toriko}} was already being scheduled to take Dragon Ball Kai's timeslot, meaning there was no place in Fuji TV to air more Kai episodes.
** That said, Kai's strong international performance convinced Toei to produce the Buu Saga under the title "Dragon Ball Kai: The Final Chapters", which would eventually also air in Japan on Fuji TV due to Toriko's cancellation freeing up the timeslot that Kai used during it's original run.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{The Hunchback of Notre Dame|Disney}}'' is notably for being the only Disney cartoon to get a MediaNotes/GoldenRaspberryAward nomination -- cementing its reputation as the animation studio's biggest failure of the decade. However, despite the bafflement caused by some MisaimedMarketing hiding the movie's darker themes, it still made over $300 million. In fact, the Razzie nom was exactly "Worst Movie to Gross Over $100 Million", a quantity ''Hunchback'' barely scraped domestically, and which follow-up ''WesternAnimation/{{Hercules}}'' ended up a million short.

* ''Film/JennifersBody'' is treated as a CreatorKiller for writer Creator/DiabloCody and a StarDerailingRole for star Creator/MeganFox. It did earn a critical thrashing for MisaimedMarketing overtly focused on sex appeal and only later became VindicatedByHistory, but while its box office take was underwhelming, it was ultimately profitable with $31 million, nearly twice its $16 million budget.

* It is commonly assumed that Anime/DragonBallZKai did not perform well in Japan due to initially ending with the Cell Saga; however, the series itself did quite well on TV in its home country, with an average rating of 9.4% and frequently making the top 10 on "most watched anime" lists during its run. Production on Kai ended due to various other factors:

** All remastering of the video footage was outsourced to a company called Q-TEC, resulting in high production costs.

** And most importantly, Manga/Toriko was already being scheduled to take Dragon Ball Kai's timeslot, meaning there was no place in Fuji TV to air more Kai episodes.
That said, Kai's strong international performance convinced Toei to produce the Buu Saga under the title "Dragon Ball Kai: The Final Chapters", which would eventually also air in Japan on Fuji TV due to Toriko's cancellation freeing up the timeslot that Kai used during it's original run.

* It is commonly assumed that Anime/DragonBallZKai didn't performed well in Japan due to ending at the Cell saga and the Buu saga not being produced until years years due to the international success. However, the series itself did pretty well on TV in its home country, with an average rating of 9.4% and constantly being on the top 10 most watched anime. Production being stopped was due to other factors: The merchandise failed to make the expected profits for Bandai, the the high productions costs (all the remastering of the video was outsourced to a company called Q-TEC, which wasn't cheap), the Japan earthquake and tsunami of 2011 which forced episode 98 to be home video exclusive due to its original airing being pre-empted by news covering the event, the infamous Kenji Yamamoto plagiarism scandal that forced to stop recall home video releases and halt all international broadcast to replace the soundtrack, and most importantly, Toriko already being schedule take Dragon Ball Kai timeslot, which meant that there was no place in Fuji TV to air more Kai episodes. Due to all this, Toei decided the end production of Dragon Ball Kai until it's strong international performance convice them to produce the Buu Saga under the title "Dragon Ball Kai: The Final Chapters" which, ironically, will also air in Japan on Fuji TV due to Toriko's cancellation freeing the same timeslot that Kai was using during it's original run.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Megamind}}'': Its fandom often refers to the film as "underrated" or believe it's a CultClassic due to the fact it didn't get any spinoffs or sequels until [[SequelGap fourteen years later]] (barring the additional short film and video game spinoffs that were typical of ''every'' [=DreamWorks=] film at the time). While other [=DreamWorks=] franchises dwarf it in popularity, ''Megamind'' actually did quite well during its theatrical run, making back nearly three times its budget.

* Fan of the ''Film/SpyKids'' films sometimes assume that ''Film/SpyKids3DGameOver'' flopped at the box office, due to its story being widely viewed as a step down from the first two movies (to say nothing of its extremely dated CGI effects), which is sometimes assumed to be part of the reason why there wasn't another sequel for 8 years. To the contrary, ''Game Over'' actually had the '''highest''' box office haul of the original three movies: it made more than $197 million on a production budget of around $38 million.

* ''Film/{{Americathon}}'' fits the pattern of a lot of irreverent Hollywood comedies from the 1979-80 period: savaged by critics, then later gaining a cult following from [[VindicatedByCable cable airings]], so it's natural to assume it bombed at the box office, but it was actually a modest hit, making back three times its budget.

# The work broke even, or was maybe actually a modest success, but the company behind it was upset that it did not make ''enough'' money. This is especially likely to happen if it's natural to compare the work to a smash success -- a modest success looks underwhelming if it was the follow-up to a huge hit or was playing FollowingTheLeader to a huge hit.

* ''Film/StarTrekTheMotionPicture'' has sometimes been dismissed as a flop in retrospective owing to its divisive reception, high budget and famously TroubledProduction. The movie was very much profitable at $139 million worldwide against a 44 million budget, although Creator/{{Paramount}}'s management, still reeling from said production, pressured the producer of the [[Film/StarTrekIITheWrathOfKhan sequel]] to make it a considerably more economical film.

* The 1968 Creator/{{NBC}} MadeForTVMovie adaptation of ''Literature/{{Heidi}}'' is infamous for the network cutting off the end of a close [[UsefulNotes/AmericanFootball pro football game]] to start its premiere broadcast on time, an incident that led to the adoption of UsefulNotes/SportsPreemption rules. Because of its role in the controversy, there's a perception that ''Heidi'' itself was a ratings fiasco, but it was actually the #1-rated network show of the week, having been hugely hyped as one of the most expensive productions in in the history of television up to that point.

* ''Film/BatmanAndRobin'', widely considered one of the worst big-budget films ever made, and a GenreKiller for comic book adaptations until ''{{Film/Blade}}'' and ''Film/XMen1'' went DarkerAndEdgier, was actually a box office success. While it underperformed domestically, its ultimate worldwide gross was $238 million. It's often claimed that its failure dented the careers of Creator/AliciaSilverstone, Creator/ChrisODonnell and Creator/UmaThurman. Alicia Silverstone was still appearing in notable roles well into the 2000s, merely choosing smaller projects because she disliked the intense media scrutiny she was getting at the age of eighteen[[note]]The [[StarDerailingRole real damage to her career]] came from ''Film/ExcessBaggage'' (where she was both producer and got top billing), which was released 2 months after ''Batman & Robin'' and unlike that film ''Excess Baggage'' absolutely '''did''' bomb and actually got an even worse thrashing from critics[[/note]]. Chris O'Donnell likewise still headlined three more films, and his four year hiatus was out of a desire to raise a family. And Uma Thurman did not, according to pop culture, only score CareerResurrection with ''Film/KillBill''; while ''Film/TheAvengers1998'' was a bomb, that same year she was in an acclaimed adaptation of ''Literature/LesMiserables'', and later was up for the role of Eowyn in ''Film/TheLordOfTheRings'' precisely because the execs wanted a Hollywood star in a cast full of unknowns and character actors (only declining due to her pregnancy).

* ''Film/DickTracy'' is often said to have bombed at the box office in 1990, only to become a CultClassic in the years after its release. [[http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=dicktracy.htm In truth]], it made back double its budget in the United States, and ''triple'' when you factor in the rest of the world--making it the highest grossing film of Creator/WarrenBeatty's career. But while it wasn't exactly a dud, it ''did'' perform well below Creator/{{Disney}}'s expectations: due to the character's iconic status, the studio had high hopes that the film would be a blockbuster on par with Creator/WarnerBros' ''[[Film/Batman1989 Batman]]'' from the previous year, possibly allowing them to launch a franchise. Accordingly, the film had a ''massive'' marketing campaign, which ended up costing more than the film itself, and enormously inflated its budget in real terms. This, combined with a [[ScrewedByTheLawyers decades-long legal battle]] between Beatty and the Tribune Co. over the film rights to the original comic strip, [[StillbornFranchise put the kibosh on any immediate follow-ups]].

* For some reason, many people seem to be under the impression that ''Film/DickTracy'' bombed at the box office, when [[http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=dicktracy.htm in fact it made double its budget back in America, and triple when you factor in the rest of the world.]] In fact, it was actually the highest grossing film of Creator/WarrenBeatty's career. However, a combination of performing under Disney's expectations (Disney had hoped that ''Dick Tracy'' would be a hit on the same level as the previous year's ''Film/Batman1989'', and initiated an ''immense'' marketing campaign accordingly, which ended up costing more than the movie itself cost to produce and enormously inflated its budget in real terms) and a decades-long battle over the rights between Beatty and the Tribune Co. [[StillbornFranchise put the kibosh on any immediate follow-ups]].