The Borderlands Film Flops At The Box Office In Its Opening Weekend While Gearbox Head Randy Pitchford Blocks Critics

The Borderlands film is finally here, and from the moment it arrived it looked like everyone wanted it to leave. When the review embargo went up, it achieved a 33% score on Metacritic (it’s currently sitting at 27%).

Things were even worse over at Rotten Tomatoes at it sat at 0% for some time before one positive review bumped it to 3% (at time of writing it sits at 9%).

Bad reviews don’t necessarily mean a bad box office weekend though, right? Well, they did in this case, as reports show that the film had a failure of an opening weekend.

Domestically the film only brought in $8.8 million while internationally it hit even less at $7.7 million. All together a global box office launch of $16.5 million doesn’t exactly match up with its reported $115 million budget.

Variety called the box office numbers “embarrassing,” while also noting that Borderlands was in fourth place at the box office behind Twisters, a movie that had already been in theatres for nearly a month.

All of this criticism and bad press has particularly impacted one person more than most, with Gearbox head Randy Pitchford seemingly taking the situation worse than anyone else.

In what looked like an attempt to spin the narrative of bad reviews, on Twitter Pitchford said that he was taking it as “You like what my friends and I do with our Borderlands video games even more than you like what some of the biggest and best cast and crew of film makers on the planet have done. I’m super flattered!”

Pitchford had also begun blocking those who were criticizing the film, whether or not they were doing it directly to him. He apologized for some of this saying that he “accidentally blocked at least three good accounts – including at least one person I like and have actually met in person! I’m so sorry! Sincerely! If I mistakenly blocked you… No excuses. Let me know if I screwed up so I can fix it.”

He added “I usually don’t block criticism. I’ve always profited from it and I’ve never been in short supply 🙂 Cheers and be cool.”

That seemed like it would’ve been the end of it, except Pitchford went on to call out a critic by name, tagging Forbes writer and critic Paul Tassi and accusing him of “being a dick.”

“Oh, except that @PaulTassi guy. It was pointed out to me that I blocked him, too. So far, I think I accidentally blocked three people. Not @PaulTassi – I thought he was being a dick and so him I blocked on purpose. I unblocked him, but I might block him again… Something about that dude’s attitude just feels off to me.

I read some shit he wrote where he seems to act like he knows me and fronts like he knows something he doesn’t and that doesn’t rub me right… bad vibes. But I don’t know him at all and only know what he writes on twitter, so who knows.

The internet can be a mess sometimes. It’s strange to be someone other people seem to want to think about and talk about and I know he’s super obsessed with the stuff me and my company make and I know he’s a dude who is making a living talking shit, so good for him. I not in the mood to want to fuck up his money, so have at it, my dude. Be cool.”

Weird as this response may read, this still wasn’t the end of it because after discovering that Tassi also publishes fiction, Pitchford said he was considering buying Tassi’s book in an attempt to “build a bridge,” saying that he only blocked Tassi because he believed Tassi was trying to “hurt me and hurt something I love.”

“I’m going to try and build a bridge here ‘cause I’m an idiot. Dude isn’t just a critic. Dude is out here making stuff – adding to the world. I respect that. I blocked him because I thought he was trying to hurt me and hurt something I love.”

Commenters were quick to call out Pitchford and say that no one was trying to hurt him, they were all just offering criticism. Pitchford claimed that he knows the difference, and that he loves feedback, while clarifying that people can “sometimes” step over the line beyond constructive feedback.

In other comments Pitchford claimed that he didn’t block Tassi for his review of the Borderlands film on Forbes, and reiterated that he believed Tassi was trying to hurt him and something he loved.

Ultimately this is the internet, no one needs to explain why they blocked anyone. ‘Bad vibes’ are more than enough of a reason, but it can’t help but ring out as odd for Pitchford to not only block critics who were giving honest feedback in good faith, but for him to call one out by name in the accusatory manor he did.

Tassi for his part responded to Pitchford’s tweet about buying his book, saying “Hey man. I’m just a critic, a reporter, I tweet a lot, not trying to “hurt” anyone. I genuinely do like Borderlands even if I’m harsh about the adaption (in part because of that) If you wanted to read HK, cool, but def start with the first one!”

Source – [Variety, Randy Pitchford on Twitter, Paul Tassi on Twitter, Forbes]