This will mean that the film is set to be one of the box office biggest losses of movie history, with audiences shunning the mega budget 3D CGI-packed space epic.
The sci-fi story is based on a series of classic novels by Edgar Rice Burroughs in which an adventurer goes to Mars and gets involved in a war between the alien population. It stars Taylor Kitsch as the eponymous hero, Willem Defoe as warrior leader of the Tharks and British actress Samantha Morton, who plays Sola, a caring and gentle member of the Tharks Martians.
Disney’s share prices dipped 1% following the announcement yesterday. It hopes to regain profits later this year with the release of superhero film The Avengers and the next Pixar animation, Brave – both of which will be released this summer.
The film has achieved an average score of 51% on the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes.
It wasn’t all bad news – some critics have praised the film for it’s pure fun entertainment value.
Kate Muir of The Times was positive, saying there was “a delightfully unfashionable cheesiness” about the film.
A.O Scott of the New York Times said it was “messy and chaotic…but also colorful and kind of fun.”
Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian was slightly less generous about his experience of sitting through John Carter, writing “I felt as if someone had dragged me into the kitchen of my local Greggs, and was baking my head into the centre of a colossal cube of white bread.”
Watch the trailer for John Carter below…