The Electric State: Russo Brothers’ graphic novel adaptation debuts at #1 on Netflix with a surprisingly low number of views

Anthony and Joe Russo, the Russo Brothers, have directed some of the biggest movies of all time, with their film Avengers: Endgame coming in second place just behind James Cameron’s Avatar – and on March 14th, the Netflix streaming service released their latest film, the robot adventure The Electric State. The film topped the English films chart on Netflix over its debut weekend – but managed to do so with a surprisingly low number of views. The Electric State reached #1 with 25.2 million views, which pales in comparison to the debut numbers of recent hits like Back in Action (46.8 million views) and Carry On (42 million views), but is slightly higher than last year’s release of Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver (21.4 million views, which followed up Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire‘s 23.9 million views). Still, this is the third Millie Bobby Brown-led film to debut at #1 for Netflix, following last year’s Damsel (which got started with 35.3 million views) and 2022’s Enola Holmes 2, which was released back in the days when these things were counted by hours instead of individual views. (So we were told that one debuted with 64.08 million hours streamed.)

The Electric State reached the top 10 in all of the countries where Netflix is available and was #1 in 47 of them. And speaking of Back in Action, which was just released back in January, that movie has already made its way onto the streaming service’s list of Most Popular Films list, moving into the #8 spot with 138.3 million views.

The story of the film begins in July of 2017, when Free League launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds for Simon Stålenhag’s book called The Electric State, which had the following description: In late 1997, a runaway teenager and her yellow toy robot travel west through a strange USA, where the ruins of gigantic battle drones litter the countryside heaped together with the discarded trash of a high tech consumerist society in decline. As their car approaches the edge of the continent, the world outside the window seems to be unraveling ever faster as if somewhere beyond the horizon, the hollow core of civilization has finally caved in.

The Russos teamed with screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, who worked with the brothers on Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Captain America: Civil War, Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame, and The Gray Man, to turn Stålenhag’s story into a film that has the following synopsis: The Electric State is a spectacular adventure from the directors of Avengers: Endgame set in an alternate, retro-futuristic version of the 1990s. Millie Bobby Brown (Stranger Things) stars as Michelle, an orphaned teenager navigating life in a society where sentient robots resembling cartoons and mascots, who once served peacefully among humans, now live in exile following a failed uprising. Everything Michelle thinks she knows about the world is upended one night when she’s visited by Cosmo, a sweet, mysterious robot who appears to be controlled by Christopher — Michelle’s genius younger brother whom she thought was dead. Determined to find the beloved sibling she thought she had lost, Michelle sets out across the American southwest with Cosmo, and soon finds herself reluctantly joining forces with Keats (Chris Pratt, Guardians of the Galaxy), a low-rent smuggler, and his wisecracking robot sidekick, Herman (voiced by Anthony Mackie, Captain America: Brave New World). As they venture into the Exclusion Zone, a walled-off corner in the desert where robots now exist on their own, Keats and Michelle find a strange, colorful group of new animatronic allies — and begin to learn that the forces behind Christopher’s disappearance are more sinister than they ever expected.

Millie Bobby Brown, Chris Pratt, and Anthony Mackie are joined in the cast by Giancarlo Esposito (Breaking Bad), Ke Huy Quan (The Goonies), Billy Bob Thornton (Sling Blade), Woody Harrelson (Zombieland),  Stanley Tucci (The Devil Wears Prada), Brian Cox (X-Men 2), Martin Klebba (the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise), Woody Norman (C’mon C’mon), Jenny Slate (It Ends with Us), and Jason Alexander (Seinfeld).

The Russos produced the movie with Mike Larocca, Angela Russo-Otstot, Chris Castaldi, and Patrick Newall. Markus, McFeely, and Stålenhag executive produce alongside Tim Connors, Nick van Dyk, Jake Aust, Geoffrey Haley, Jeffrey Ford, Julia Angelin, Russell Ackerman, John Schoenfelder, Anthony Muschietti, and Barbara Muschietti. Anthony J. Vorhies, Joseph Micucci, and Murtaza Kathawala are co-producers.

JoBlo’s own Chris Bumbray watched The Electric State and was unimpressed, giving it a 5/10 review that you can read at THIS LINK. I intend to watch the movie at some point, but didn’t get around to it during its debut weekend, so those 25.2 million views did not include one from me.

Did you watch The Electric State during its debut weekend? If so, let us know what you thought of it by leaving a comment below.

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