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Morbius memes its way back to movie theaters to make morbillions

It is once again Morbin’ time

Jared Leto as Dr. Michael Morbius in the film’s poster Image: Sony Pictures
Nicole Clark (she/her) is a culture editor at Polygon, and a critic covering internet culture, video games, books, and TV, with work in the NY Times, Vice, and Catapult.

Morbius is back from the dead. The film had a paltry theatrical release in April — while it grossed $163.3 million internationally, the film’s domestic box office performance was less than stellar — and it was critically panned. But the Jared Leto-led movie has risen from the depths, and will be hitting theater screens hard this weekend, according to a tweet from Exhibitor Relations Co., an entertainment research and data firm. Perhaps the film will pull in additional morbillions at the box office.

Exhibitor Relations says Morbius will return to “over 1,000+ theaters this weekend,” a big change from the previous Memorial Day weekend, when it was showing in just 83 U.S. theaters, according to Box Office Mojo.

A search on Cinemark and AMC website confirmed showing times for the film. Sony Pictures also confirmed to Gizmodo that the film would be back in theaters this weekend, but didn’t elaborate on reasons why. We have a few hunches. Could it be because Morbius has taken on a second life as a meme? Or perhaps it’s because fans of the morb started streaming the film, in its entirety, on various social media platforms? Does this mean the film has officially crossed that threshold of “so terrible we’re attached to it now”? This wouldn’t be the first time a film that tanked took on a cult status.

Whatever the reasons, if you missed Morbius on the big screen (you wouldn’t be the only one) — or if you just can’t get enough of Dr. Michael Morbius — now is your time. It’s shaping into a really great movie weekend for people who hate the human form, seeing as David Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future is also debuting Friday.

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