Borderlands will be released on streaming services in less than a week after its disastrous cinematic debut

I'm waiting for the redemption arc of Borderlands to kick in. This thing has been universally deemed a stinker, and not the so bad-it-is-good kind. PCG's Joshua Wolens said it made him long for the original Super Mario Bros film, Rotten Tomatoes' score is 10%, and opening box office receipts are utterly poor ($16 million worldwide on a $145-million production/marketing budget, before theatres take a cut).

The latter is what matters, of course. Hollywood wouldn't care if everyone hated Borderlands or if the cinema cash registers rang. Uwe Boll chose this angle of attack, as he has presided over a number of terrible videogame films but believes this one is so bad that everyone wishes he directed it. Now it seems that the writing is on the wall.

According to the Hollywood Handle (August 30), Borderlands will be available on unspecified home streaming service 21 days after its premiere on August 9. This does not mean that it will be free on Netflix but more likely available for rent or to purchase on Prime Video. (The distributor is Lionsgate which has films available on various platforms).

This move shows that Borderlands' backers have given up quickly on any significant returns for its cinema run and are now trying to squeeze as much out of it as they can, Morbius style, while people might still be interested in watching the thing. This is likely to be a huge flop, with a possible loss of more than $100 million. It will certainly have people questioning the viability and future of Borderlands beyond the fourth mainline video game.

The only light I can see for Borderlands is the fact that the audience reviews at Rotten Tomatoes average 53%, which is slightly better than the critics' reviews. It's unlikely that this will translate into a significant groundswell of public support for the game when it is released to a wider audience, but stranger things have occurred. Randy Pitchford of Gearbox has adopted the classic internet strategy, posting throughout the whole thing and pretending to be "super flattered".