GTA 6 and Star Wars Will Be the Ultimate Barbenheimer of Games vs. Movies, But the Winner Is Already Clear

When The Mandalorian and Grogu is released adjacent twelvemonth connected May 22, 2026 – the archetypal caller Star Wars movie to deed theaters successful six and a fractional years – and past Grand Theft Auto VI hits 4 days aboriginal connected May 26, 2026 – the archetypal caller GTA crippled successful 12 and a fractional years – which 1 bash you deliberation is going to beryllium the bigger deal? And which is going to beryllium aforesaid old/same old?

On insubstantial astatine least, these should beryllium 2 of the biggest popular civilization events of the twelvemonth – the Barbenheimer of 2026. A caller Star Wars movie? A caller GTA title!? Grand Theft Watto!!? And portion we tin warrant that GTA 6 volition beryllium immense – it’s already immense – The Mandalorian and his small person are really acold little of a definite thing.

It reminds maine of erstwhile I was a kid and I told my Noni that I would devour pizza each time if I could. And I meant it! She was like, no, you’d get sick of it eventually. But man, pizza each time sounds amazing! You cognize what though? Noni was 100% right. Pizza each time is really truly freaking gross, and it’s atrocious for you, and it’s atrocious for the radical selling the pizza successful the agelong tally due to the fact that yet I’m conscionable going to not privation to adjacent deliberation astir pizza again for a long, agelong time.

And this is wherever we’re astatine with Star Wars close now: It’s pizza each day, implicit and implicit again. But GTA… the anticipation for a caller GTA crippled has been gathering for years. And successful immoderate ways, that precise anticipation is simply a large portion of the allure of the franchise arsenic well. It’s thing Lucasfilm and Disney would bash good to instrumentality enactment of.

It’s not that GTA has a bigger taste footprint than Star Wars. On the contrary, everyone knows who Darth Vader is (even my Noni did, I expect; astatine the precise slightest she got maine a TIE Fighter artifact for my third-grade graduation). But the GTAs of the satellite are inactive aimed astatine a tighter demographic. The crushed thing similar GTA tin marque arsenic overmuch wealth arsenic it does (more connected that successful a sec) is due to the fact that folks walk a batch much playing a crippled similar that than they bash going to spot a movie. Its occurrence is not due to the fact that much radical are playing it than are watching Star Wars. But 1 indispensable besides see the lasting interaction of a crippled of this nature, the magnitude of clip that it takes to complete, the replayability, and the interactivity versus the, frankly, old-fashioned enactment of watching a movie oregon amusement and past moving on.

2015’s The Force Awakens, which kicked disconnected the epoch of modern (i.e., Disney) Star Wars, brought successful $2.071 cardinal astatine the container bureau worldwide. But Lucasfilm’s hyperdrive motivator was already starting to suffer immoderate steam by the clip the Sequel Trilogy closed out: The past caller Star Wars movie to beryllium released, 2019’s The Rise of Skywalker, made $1.077 billion, astir fractional what The Force Awakens did. Star Wars was already feeling beauteous commonplace aft conscionable 4 abbreviated years of its instrumentality to the large screen, and the numbers carnivore that out.

The Force Awakens really serves arsenic a amended examination than Rise of Skywalker to the past Grand Theft Auto game, GTA 5, since the crippled came retired successful 2013. That conscionable lets america comparison the magnitude of wealth the 2 properties brought successful a small much cleanly since it’s conscionable a two-year spread betwixt releases. And adjacent though Rey, Finn and Poe’s archetypal escapade (remember them?) is besides the fifth-highest grossing movie of each clip worldwide (not adjusted for inflation), its numbers inactive airy successful examination to those of GTA 5.

So astir that: Released successful September 2013, GTA 5 made a cardinal dollars successful 3 days. By May of 2014, the crippled had sold 33 cardinal copies, which would travel to astir $1.98 cardinal successful income (based connected a terms of $60 per unit, which is an estimation and doesn’t instrumentality into relationship merchantability prices, for example). I cognize – you’re thinking, ‘That’s inactive beneath The Force Awakens’ $2.017 cardinal and it took 9 months to get there.’ But whereas The Force Awakens made each that theatrical dough successful conscionable a mates of months earlier leaving theaters, GTA 5 conscionable kept connected grabbing the loot twelvemonth aft twelvemonth aft year.

In 2023, Barron’s reported that GTA 5 had grossed implicit $8.5 cardinal since its merchandise successful 2013. And past year, steadfast Take-Two revealed successful an net study that the crippled had, astatine that time, continued to merchantability astir 5 cardinal units each 3 months. This is of people successful portion owed to the information that GTA 5 has been released connected 3 generations of consoles implicit the years, and the gross from GTA Online indispensable beryllium considered arsenic well.

By comparison, the combined container bureau full of each the Disney-era Star Wars movies – The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, The Rise of Skywalker, Rogue One, and Solo – is $5.934 billion. That’s, well, a fewer billion dollars little than what is fundamentally a azygous crippled successful GTA 5. But the different wealth that the Star Wars franchise brings successful is simply a small harder to way – Blu-rays, integer downloads, streaming, merchandising, taxable parks, and, of course, its licensed video games arsenic well.

Things get a spot opaque present due to the fact that portion having, for example, each the Star Wars movies (and TV shows) disposable connected Disney+ exclusively is surely a gully for imaginable subscribers, it’s besides hard to connect a dollar worth to that scenario. Ditto the taxable parks. Yes, you excessively tin hitch elbows with an ersatz Rey portion astatine Galaxy’s Edge, and you tin besides wage $200-plus for a customized lightsaber to unopen up your kid’s whining, but however overmuch does that adhd to the wide take-home of quote/unquote Star Wars itself? (Star Wars games, meanwhile, tin beryllium deed oregon miss; for each Jedi Fallen Order occurrence there’s an Outlaws that has a unsmooth spell of it.) Does each the Star Wars worldly successful the satellite that radical tin and bash bargain marque up that other 3 cardinal dollars to enactment the bid astatine the aforesaid gross gross constituent arsenic GTA 5? Maybe.

But that’s lone 1 Grand Theft Auto crippled arsenic compared to the entirety of the modern Star Wars line. Of course, GTA’s online multiplayer mode, with its caller cars and interactive events, keeps players coming backmost implicit and implicit again – easy spending beyond the terms of the crippled itself acknowledgment to its in-game currency. (And by the way, wherefore doesn’t GTA person a much extended enactment of merchandise IRL? Where are my GTA toys? Why can’t I spell to a GTA taxable parkland successful California, oregon adjacent better, Florida, wherever I tin get successful an awesome car and tally implicit radical to my heart’s tendency earlier buying a customized uzi!?)

Well actually, possibly that’s wherever the existent quality betwixt these 2 franchises – successful the present and present of the twelvemonth 2025 – tin champion beryllium articulated, and wherefore radical rolled their eyes when, for example, the Ryan Gosling/Shawn Levy Star Wars movie Starfighter was officially announced precocious compared to the unthinkable excitement that tin beryllium felt astir immoderate and each GTA 6 news. As noted, it’s going connected 13 years since a caller GTA crippled was released. Compare that to the changeless watering down of Star Wars done streaming shows, announced movies that ne'er happen, atrocious movies (and, sure, immoderate bully ones!), and the aforementioned ever-present merchandising that we’ve been inundated with since astatine slightest 2014, erstwhile the selling build-up to The Force Awakens kicked in. There’s conscionable so overmuch Star Wars now.

And that brings maine backmost Noni and my pizza dreams – dreams that were dashed (Dash Rendar’d?) erstwhile I realized she was close astir excessively overmuch of a bully thing. Sure, sometimes the toppings are different, and immoderate days it tastes amended than others, but Star Wars is conscionable ever there now. There’s thing peculiar astir it anymore.

But GTA… GTA brings maine to a antithetic Noni memory. Rockstar lone serves caller editions of the beloved franchise connected the astir peculiar of occasions. It’s benignant of similar lasagna connected Christmas! We didn’t get lasagna each the clip increasing up, truthful erstwhile we recovered retired Noni was making condiment and lasagna was successful the offing, it was awesome. The meatballs and sausage sliced up, the oozing ricotta, the basil leaves connected top, the toasted Italian breadstuff to spell with it – conscionable the best. And it wasn’t conscionable the existent lasagna, but adjacent the anticipation of it. Knowing that it was coming was astir arsenic bully arsenic really sitting down and eating it. It was a uncommon and peculiar thing, similar a caller GTA game.

Rockstar besides has a past of delaying caller installments of the bid – they volition service nary vino earlier its time. The effect of this doctrine is that erstwhile a caller GTA rubric yet is released, determination is simply a immense demand, but besides the magnitude of clip and resources that person been enactment into the crippled are wide successful the finished version. With each owed respect to the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, determination was evidently nary program successful presumption of the trilogy part of it all. (One time Rian Johnson volition accidental however helium truly feels astir the 180-degree crook The Rise of Skywalker took aft his film.) Audiences aren’t dumb; they tin archer the quality betwixt thing that is rushed to marque a day versus a enactment of creation that is fixed its owed clip to make and germinate arsenic it should.

Is the GTA bid an outlier successful the satellite of games? Certainly. And yet, arsenic of 2023, Minecraft had sold implicit 300 cardinal copies (including income crossed the galore platforms it's released on) and Tetris had sold implicit 520 cardinal copies. (GTA 5 is astatine 200 million+ and the Grand Theft Auto franchise wide has 430 cardinal units sold.) And that’s conscionable the apical of the heap of best-selling games. People similar video games! Who knew?

It’s brainsick to deliberation present that determination was a 16-year spread betwixt Return of the Jedi and The Phantom Menace. It was a comparatively fallow play for Star Wars (even if the expanded beingness and merchandising continued), and erstwhile George Lucas yet did instrumentality to theaters successful 1999 with young Ani and Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon, determination were lines astir the artifact everywhere. That was excitement. There was immense anticipation for a happening we each loved that we hadn’t gotten a caller installment of successful a long, agelong time. The aforesaid happened 10 years aft Revenge of the Sith, which we had each thought was the extremity of the Star Wars movies forever, erstwhile The Force Awakens rekindled the Star Wars flame. Audiences were genuinely amped to instrumentality to that postulation far, acold distant again.

And that spread betwixt Return of the Jedi and The Phantom Menace, that 16 years, that’s not acold disconnected from the 13 years that volition person passed betwixt GTA 5 and GTA 6. The expectations, the hopes, the theorizing, the fun of knowing a caller crippled successful the bid is coming. It’s astir arsenic important arsenic the crippled itself.

But successful the lawsuit of the adjacent Star Wars movie… which is the continuation of a TV show… which has had 3 seasons already… and astatine slightest a mates of spin-offs… well, it’s gonna beryllium benignant of hard for audiences to get excessively excited for that, I think. Sure, it whitethorn beryllium to beryllium a bully oregon adjacent a large movie – I anticipation it does.

But you person to wonder. How galore radical are gonna accidental to themselves, “Eh, I’ll hold for erstwhile it hits streaming.”