Denzel Washington’s Most Ambitious Epic Is Still Dominating Global Streaming Charts

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Adam Blevins began working in the entertainment industry in 2022 as a Staff Writer for Agents of Fandom, where he progressed to Senior Editor and interviewed talent from Marvel Studios, House of the Dragon, and Planet of the Apes. He joined Collider as a News Author in April 2024, was promoted to a Senior position in December 2024, and has written over 3,000 articles for the site, including exclusives relating to Avengers: Doomsday, The Penguin, Star Wars: Skeleton Crew, and more. He primarily writes about the latest box office numbers and the hottest movies and TV shows on streaming, while also covering superhero and sci-fi news. He has completed a set visit for The Chosen and even has several months of experience writing Gaming Features at ScreenRant. You can find him on X, LinkedIn, and Muckrack.

Denzel Washington is hard at work filming his next heist thriller, Here Comes the Flood, with Robert Pattinson, but a few years ago, he starred in a legendary historical epic that’s becoming an all-time streaming success. Washington stars opposite Paul Mescal and Pedro Pascal in Gladiator II, the legacy sequel to the 2000 Oscar-winning masterpiece, continuing the story of Maximus (Russell Crowe) through his son Lucius (Paul Mescal). Gladiator II is streaming on Prime Video, Paramount+, and Amazon MGM+, where it’s still one of the top 10 most popular movies in more than 25 countries around the world.

It’s safe to say expectations for Gladiator II were high, considering Gladiator is one of the most beloved historical epics ever made. The film also won five Oscars, including one going to Crowe for his performance as Maximus. Most fans would agree that Gladiator II didn’t live up to the same hype as its predecessor, though it did earn solid scores of 70% from critics and 81% from audiences on Rotten Tomatoes. The first Gladiator grossed $465 million at the box office against a $100 million budget, but the sequel failed to reach this total, despite costing Paramount over twice as much as the original.

Gladiator II was directed by Ridley Scott with a script from Peter Craig and David Scarpa. David Franzoni also earned a writing credit on the film for his work creating the characters in the first Gladiator. Scott was met with blowback upon the release of Gladiator II for not including Russell Crowe in the story, but he dismissed these criticisms by saying that Crowe’s character, Maximus, died. Crowe recently went public with complaints about Gladiator II, saying that he doesn’t believe the story was handled well.

Are They Making Another ‘Gladiator’ Movie?

Around the same time that Gladiator II came out in 2024, Ridley Scott confirmed he was writing the script for another Gladiator movie. However, after Gladiator II struggled at the box office under the weight of its colossal production and marketing budgets, these talks cooled off pretty quickly. Scott’s next movie is coming to theaters this August, and he confirmed to Collider not long ago that he’s working on his first Western, so we may have seen the last from the Gladiator franchise as we know it, for now.

Check out Gladiator II on Prime Video and Paramount+ in America and stay tuned to Collider for more streaming updates.