HBO Max’s $490M Crime Franchise Is Sneaking Its Way Up Streaming As New Release Awaits Details
Jeff Dodge (he/him), a published author and graduate of Western Washington University, has been a TV news editor for many years and has had the chance to interview multiple reality show stars, including Randy Jackson, Nick Cannon, Heidi Klum, Mel B and John Cena. Fun Fact: he’s been to every single Idol Live! Tour.
A popular crime franchise is finding renewed success on HBO Max's global streaming chart right now. There are several crime films and series available to stream on HBO Max, most notably The Sopranos and The Wire, along with True Detective, Boardwalk Empire, Mare of Easttown and The Penguin.
The genre isn't relegated to just live-action dramas, though. There are also animated crime comedies on the streaming platform, like DreamWorks' The Bad Guys, which was originally released in 2022 and centers on a group of criminals who pretend that they've rehabilitated their image in order to evade a prison sentence. The movie grossed $250 million at the box office and earned positive reviews from critics, with an 87% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes.
The Bad Guys Pulls Off A Top 10 Streaming Heist
Now, four years later, The Bad Guys has become a hit all over again. On HBO Max's global streaming chart, the film is currently sitting at No. 9, behind Supergirl, Practical Magic, 3:10 to Yuma, Sniper: No Nation, Fool's Gold, Clown in a Cornfield, Band of Brothers: Legacy and Despicable Me 3. Rounding out the Top 10 is Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.
In the United States, The Bad Guys is streaming on Netflix, but globally, HBO Max is home to the animated film in countries like Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Serbia and Slovenia. The country where The Bad Guys is performing the best is Bulgaria, where's it's at No. 1 on the streaming chart.
The Franchise's Future Is Still Unknown
Three years after the success of The Bad Guys, DreamWorks released a sequel, The Bad Guys 2, which performed about as well as its predecessor, with a box office haul of $239.7 million and an 88% on Rotten Tomatoes. The studio continued to expand the franchise with the short films The Bad Guys in Maraschino Ruby and The Bad Guys: Little Lies and Alibis, the holiday specials The Bad Guys: A Very Bad Holiday and The Bad Guys: Haunted Heist, and a Netflix TV show that has already released two seasons.
A third feature-length Bad Guys film was confirmed before the first sequel had even come out, with director Pierre Perifel and co-director JP Sans revealing in mid-2025 their involvement with The Bad Guys 3 (though the studio has yet to greenlight it). Unfortunately, the project faced a major setback several months later when they announced they were no longer at DreamWorks and had moved over to Sony Pictures Animation. At this point, it's unclear what the future holds for the animated crime franchise, but until another status update is revealed, fans can rewatch The Bad Guys all over again on HBO Max.
- Release Date
- April 22, 2022
- Runtime
- 100 minutes
- Director
- Pierre Perifel
- Writers
- Etan Cohen
- Producers
- Rebecca Huntley, Damon Ross
-
Sam Rockwell
Wolf (voice)
-
Snake (voice)
- Main Genre
- Animation
- Executive Producer(s)
- Etan Cohen, Aaron Blabey
- Budget
- $80 million
- Studio(s)
- Universal Pictures
- Distributor(s)
- Universal Pictures
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