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Just Because It’s the Most Popular, Does That Mean It’s the Best?

Posted on 24 February 2009 by Brent Hartinger, Editor

Top-Grossing Fantasy Films
(U.S. Domestic Gross)

(1) The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003): $377,027,325
(2) The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002): $341,786,758
(3) Harry Potter and the Sorceror’s Stone (2001): $317,575,550
(4) The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001): $314,776,170
(5) Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007): $292,004,738
(6) The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005): $291,710,957
(7) Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005): $290,013,036
(8) Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002): $261,988,482
(9) Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004): $249,541,069
(10) The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008): $141,621,490
(11) Hook (1991): $119,654,823
(12) The Scorpian King (2002): $91,047,077
(13) Bridge to Terabithia (2007): $82,272,442
(14) Eragon (2006): $75,030,163
(15) The Spiderwick Chronicles (2008): $71,195,053
(16) The Golden Compass (2007): $70,107,728
(17) Willow (1988): $57,269,863
(18) Dragonheart (1996): $51,367,375
(19) Peter Pan (2003): $48,462,608
(20) Time Bandits (1981): $42,365,581

(See the complete list at BoxOfficeMojo.com.)

Bestselling FantasyBooks

(1) The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkier (1937): 100 million copies (worldwide)
(2) She: A History of Adventure by R. Rider Haggard (1887): 83 million copies
(3) Le Petit Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery (1943): 80 million copies
(4) Harry Potter and the Dealthy Hallows (2007): 72 million copies
(5) The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco (1980): 50 million copies
(6) The Wind and the Willows by Kenneth Grahame (1908): 25 million copies
(7) The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett (1989): 15 million copies
(8) Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (1964): 13 million copies

Various fantasy series (not broken out by individual book) with extraordinary sales include Harry Potter (400 million copies), The Lord of the Rings (150 million copies), The Chronicles of Narnia (120 million copies), Tarzan (50 million copies), The Wheel of Time (44 million copies), Twilight (42 million copies), Shannara (20 million copies), Artemis Fowl (18 million copies), and His Dark Materials (15 million copies).

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15 Responses to “Just Because It’s the Most Popular, Does That Mean It’s the Best?”

  1. grace says:

    OMG HARRY POTTER IS SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO MUCH BETTER ……………. BUT I REALLY LIKE TWILIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!

  2. Mari says:

    mmm.. The Name of The Rose a fantasy book? Who made this list?

  3. Tamilyn says:

    LOVE the Harry Potter movies…They quite sweep me away. I sure wish, though, that more audiences will discover Willow and Dragonheart; they’re truly great stories, fabuously produced, with memorable characters we really care about. And funny!

    LOTR will always stay classic…but I’m sorta kinda with the folks in that movie (what movie was it?) who complained: “Too much walking, man! The men walked. The hobbits walked. Even the freaking TREES walked!!”

    Does anyone know if the Golden Compass’ sequel will be coming soon?

  4. wandering-dreamer says:

    Whoa, Eragon beat out the Spiderwick Chronicles?!? Man, I liked the SC movie, it followed the books pretty well (they did change the ending but it was a good change this time) and I thought Eragon got much worse reviews. I shall never understand the consumer mindset…

  5. Christine P says:

    Just because somethings popular doesn’t automatically make it good, but it also doesn’t automatically make it over rated either. LotR, for instance, deserves some credit because it was one of the first mass appeal fantasy novels. However, looking back it is a bit dated and the pace does drag, at some points feeling as if it’s stopped altogether (and this is coming from a truly obsessed Ringer). I really enjoyed Harry Potter, but I think they will eventually file themselves away as classic childrens literature.

    However, as far as movies go most of them (even the ones executed well) are just attempts to feed long time personal obsessions or attempts to cash in on a fad.

    Generally speaking, for every book, movie or series on the list I’m sure you could find several thousand people to argue either side of the debate.

    I know I give poisitive points to LotR, Harry Potter and His Dark Materials and very negative points to Twilight, Wheel of Time, Twilight, and Twilight.

    I’m sort of interested to know where you fall on some of these. Which of the items on the list do you like and dislike? If you do think all of these are over rated, what fantasy do you enjoy?

    • Ha! Yeah…TWILIGHT. Rest assured, this site will not be going THERE very often… ;-)

      • Christine P says:

        Huh, was I perhaps a little too obvious in my epic loathing of that one. Sometimes it’s hard to tell?

        However, when you compare it to something like Vampire Baseball, it’s hard to think of anything as too much!

  6. Rigato says:

    In my opinion both the Harry Potter books and the LOTR series are highly overrated. We have Harry Potter repeating the same plotline over and over for seven books (Home, Hogwarts, Mystery, Investigation, OMG Voldemort, Battle, Hospital) and then LOTR with its horribly paced storyline (30 page battles?).
    I much prefer movies like Dragonheart and Willow…a bit more unconventional.

    • LOTR created the genre. If the books have any flaws–and I’m not sure they do–the achievement itself sort of overcomes that for me.

      Likewise, I have my nitpicks with the POTTER books, but all in all, she created something that feels “new,” and the storytelling was pretty darn good.

  7. Patrick B says:

    Um. its the Deathly Hallows not Gallows.

  8. Enron says:

    There are not NEARLY enough fantasy movies! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH!

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