How Much The Mandalorian & Grogu Cost To Make And What It Needs To Be A Box Office Success

The Mandalorian and Grogu is set to release in theaters this week. The latest Star Wars movie is scheduled for a May 22 debut, which is in line with the Memorial Day holiday in the United States. This is traditionally one of the more lucrative box office weekends of the year, which puts the new Jon Favreau-directed film in pole position to reap the rewards.

Comparisons are naturally being made to Solo: A Star Wars Story, the only other film set in a galaxy far, far away to release outside the month of December. Solo was the first Star Wars film to not turn a profit, adding pressure on The Mandalorian and Grogu to deliver for Lucasfilm and Disney.

ScreenRant's Mandalorian & Grogu Movie StoryHub

Current tracking gives hope that The Mandalorian and Grogu will surpass Solo: A Star Wars Story, but it must also be noted that the latter had a significantly higher budget than the new film. As a result, The Mandalorian and Grogu doesn’t need to make as much in the way of box office returns in order to make a profit.

Ultimately, whether The Mandalorian and Grogu will be deemed a success depends on a number of factors, but given that tracking numbers have consistently risen in the last few weeks, there’s plenty of hope that the new film will go down in Star Wars franchise history as a win for Disney.

The Mandalorian And Grogu’s Budget Is Reportedly $165 Million

Pedro Pascal's Din Djarin and Grogu riding a speeder bike through a cave while getting shot at in The Mandalorian and Grogu

The Mandalorian and Grogu was significantly cheaper to make than other Star Wars films. Favreau’s new film reportedly cost around $160 million to produce, a significantly lower amount than other Star Wars films under Disney. The Rise of Skywalker, for example, had a total budget of over $500 million, more than three times the amount of The Mandalorian and Grogu.

The box office intake of other sequel trilogy films tells a similar story. The Last Jedi had a gross budget of just over $400 million, but took in over $1.3 billion at the worldwide box office. That made it more successful than Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, which released a year prior and made $1 billion at the box office. However, no Star Wars movie has made as much as The Force Awakens.

The JJ Abrams-directed film, which launched the Disney era of the franchise, came in with over $2 billion at the box office. The film broke a variety of records as a result, including the biggest opening weekend of all time (later to be dethroned by Avengers: Infinity War). The Star Wars franchise hasn’t hit those heights since, and The Mandalorian and Grogu would have to massively exceed expectations to match that.

Solo: A Star Wars Story, meanwhile, cost even more. Some reports suggest that Solo’s production budget ballooned to over $800 million as a result of massive reshoots and behind the scenes troubles, which also included a change in the director’s chair late on in filming. Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, who recently directed the critically acclaimed Project Hail Mary, were replaced by Ron Howard after creative clashes on set.

All of these Star Wars films have had huge marketing campaigns as well. The Mandalorian and Grogu is no different, with promotional tie-ins existing everywhere, including a collaboration with Burger King to make a Mando bounty hunter meal. This kind of advertising will inevitably increase the budget for the new film, but the hope of Disney and Lucasfilm is that the marketing will be successful enough to bring in more audiences which, in turn, will increase the total box office revenue.

How Much The Mandalorian And Grogu Needs To Earn To Be A Success

Din Djarin & Grogu standing in front of a speeder in The Mandalorian & Grogu

When taking into account the production budget of The Mandalorian and Grogu as well as the cost of its promotional campaign, what the new film needs to be considered a success becomes a little clearer. The production budget is relatively modest, which means that The Mandalorian and Grogu likely needs to make around $400 million and above to turn a profit.

While this may not sound like a significant number for a Star Wars film, the story of The Mandalorian and Grogu should also be taken into account. This isn’t a Skywalker Saga film, nor does it have the same sort of stakes or relevance to the rest of the galaxy. With the new film, writer/director Jon Favreau is telling a story that is contained, meaning it doesn’t have the galaxy-altering effects of The Last Jedi or The Rise of Skywalker, for example.

As the Star Wars franchise has been absent from theaters for nearly seven years, what arguably matters most to Lucasfilm and Disney isn’t the size of the box office gross in comparison with other films in the series. Instead, what’s most important will be the worldwide intake compared to the budget.

At this moment in time, it’s more important for the studio to have Star Wars return to theaters with a film that makes a profit as opposed to the size of the profit. That could arguably come later, such as in next year’s Star Wars: Starfighter, which looks like it will have bigger stakes and scale. Starfighter will also feature lightsaber duels, which The Mandalorian and Grogu doesn’t have, and that may move the needle for next year’s Star Wars movie a little more.

Regardless, The Mandalorian and Grogu also has one other huge thing going for it that can help with its box office: the relative lack of competition. When Solo: A Star Wars Story came out in 2018, it released one month after Avengers: Infinity War and just one week after Deadpool II, both of which provided too stiff of competition for Solo to overcome.

The Mandalorian and Grogu, however, doesn’t have to compete with a Marvel movie. Masters of the Universe, Steven Spielberg’s Disclosure Day, and Toy Story 5 all release in June, giving The Mandalorian and Grogu a clear run at the box office before another big blockbuster film enters the equation.