Chris Pratt has been the darling of the box office in recent years, but he may be begging for mercy as his new action thriller with Rebecca Ferguson looks set to struggle when it opens this weekend. As you may have guessed, we are talking about Mercy, a sci-fi thriller set in a near future where an L.A. detective must stand trial for the murder of his wife and has just 90 minutes to prove his innocence to an AI judge.
Pratt has found huge success recently with movies like The Super Mario Bros. Movie and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, but was also the end of some scathing criticism of the Netflix movie The Electric State. He also scored a small screen hit with his Prime Video series The Terminal List and its spin-off, Dark Wolf. While critics are yet to have their say on Mercy, his new movie is reportedly performing poorly in pre-sales, which could see the film “not even reach double digits.”
Mercy was originally announced two years ago, with Pratt and Ferguson being brought onboard almost immediately, while others such as Annabelle Wallis, Kali Reis, Chris Sullivan, Kylie Rogers, Jeff Pierre, and Rafi Gavron rounded out the main cast soon afterward. As an Amazon MGM Studios production, the movie’s performance at the box office could either support or work against the argument for cinematic release over straight-to-streaming.
Some people have already made their mind up that the movie is going to be “Minority Report lite,” with the plot having several similarities to the Tom Cruise/Steven Spielberg collaboration. With AI being the new “big bad” of sci-fi, or at least a more prominent one, Mercy is attempting to tap into the trend of dystopian AI-themed movies and TV shows that are growing in number as though they are being churned out by ChatGPT.
Can Chris Pratt’s ‘Mercy’ Be a Hit This Weekend?
Mercy arrives in cinemas later this week but could face competition from at least one of the other new releases. Avatar: Fire and Ash managed to see off new release 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple this past weekend, with a $13.3 million domestic haul. Assuming that there isn’t a resurgence in either James Cameron’s billion-dollar hit or the second chapter in the belated zombie horror continuation, then it would be expected that a new action flick led by two A-listers should easily be able to beat them into submission.
One of the biggest challengers to Pratt and Ferguson’s team-up could be Return to Silent Hill, the third installment of the horror franchise which is this time based on the video game, Silent Hill 2. Horror movies have been doing big things in recent years, and the nostalgia attached to the new Silent Hill film could be enough to see it make a surprise run at the number one spot this weekend.
Whatever happens at the box office, Mercy will no doubt follow several other Amazon MGM Studios movies in becoming a big hit when it finally lands on Prime Video in the coming months. However, if it fails to make a mark in cinemas, it could be yet another talking point in the theatrical experience versus streaming-at-home debate.
- Release Date
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January 23, 2026
- Runtime
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100 Minutes
- Director
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Timur Bekmambetov
This story originally appeared on Movieweb
