Published May 5, 2026, 3:30 p.m. ET Now that movies based on video games are no longer shorthand for D-grade shlock that’s more likely than not to bomb at the box office, with The Super Mario Galaxy Movie instantly becoming a top 2026 grosser and Mortal Kombat II expected to do well at the summer box office, maybe games have finally surpassed their analog counterparts — which leaves movies based on action figures on the lower rung of Hollywood’s never-ending IP-fixation ladder. Now, technically, video game movies have a ways to go before they generate as much cash as the eight-movies-and-counting Transformers series, several installments of which have made a billion dollars globally. But despite some good reviews for the animated spinoff Transformers One , it couldn’t match its predecessors at the box office (it was fairly thrashed by a more peaceful metallic option, The Wild Robot ), and it seems unlikely that a Transformers movie will hit that galactic Super Mario level any time soon.…