Well, that backfired — Tom Cruise’s Digger is among the biggest bombs of all time

Let’s get straight to it: Tom Cruise is used to being the bloke who saves Hollywood’s skin at the box office – but not this time. His streak of massive hits, from the endless Mission: Impossible series to the frankly astonishing haul of Top Gun: Maverick, mostly put him beyond reproach. But his latest venture, Digger, has landed with an almighty thud, and the numbers are genuinely brutal.

Digger could end up losing as much as $250 million before its cinema run is actually over.

If that makes you wince, wait till you see the breakdown. So, here’s the set‑up: Cruise took on a pretty radical shift for Digger, going full method as a larger-than-life oil baron, Digger Rockwell. The plot goes off the rails almost immediately – Cruise’s character triggers a catastrophic ice shelf collapse that puts Europe in jeopardy, and the film turns into this madcap disaster PR mission. Honestly, it sounded mad enough to work, and Cruise did more than his fair share of press – even by his standards, he was everywhere trying to flog this thing. But audiences weren’t having it, and critics didn’t exactly rally behind it either.

Box office blues

This is where it all gets properly grim for the studio (which, by the way, is Skydance – now fresh from merging with the newly combined Warner Bros./Paramount). All that effort, and on opening weekend, Digger took in a measly $8 million in the US and $21 million worldwide. There are British indie horror films pulling in more at the multiplex.

Now, perspective: according to people at Skydance, the film isn’t even on track to reach $40 million total worldwide. For context, the reported budget was up at $163 million – and that’s before marketing, which insiders claim hit $100 million. Even for Cruise, these are numbers that keep accountants up at night. They were reportedly sweating when earlier estimates said the film might drop $125 million – the idea that this could double, and then some, is genuinely painful.

• Opening US box office: $8 million
• Total opening worldwide: $21 million
• Projected total global haul: Under $40 million
• Production budget: $163 million
• Marketing: $100 million

Repercussions and what next

Big picture, this couldn’t really have happened at a worse moment for Skydance, what with the whole Warner Bros. and Paramount merger just fresh out of the box. The expectation (probably fair, given Cruise’s CV) was that he’d come in swinging and give confidence to the new regime with a massive hit. Instead, the film everyone banked on turned out to be the bomb they were all worried about. Makes you wonder how much patience studios will have now for Cruise’s passion projects, especially the more… let’s call them 'original' scripts.

Cruise, being Cruise, isn’t exactly going away. He’s already gearing up for Days of Thunder 2 – yes, really – alongside Anne Hathaway, with shooting on the cards for early 2027 and a pencilled-in 2028 premiere. Add to that yet another Top Gun sequel also in the pipeline, and he’s clearly not giving up on legacy films. But, there’s no way around it – the scale of Digger’s collapse will sting for a while.

If you’re curious (or a glutton for box office pain), Digger is out now – but don’t expect a crowd at the screening.