Mila Kunis Says She Knew Jupiter Ascending Would Flop

Last minute budget cuts had Mila Kunis realizing before cameras even started to roll that Jupiter Ascending was destined for failure.

The sci-fi space opera movie Jupiter Ascending is not high up on the list of career accomplishments for Mila Kunis, to say the least. Written and directed by The Wachowskis, the film starred Kunis as Jupiter Jones, a cleaning woman who bonds with an interplanetary warrior played by Channing Tatum. Its budget was around $200 million, but with negative reviews pummeling Jupiter’s Ascending upon its release, the film bombed at the box office. It was also a big contender at the Razzie Awards with Eddie Redmayne bestowed with the “Worst Supporting Actor” award.

These days, it would be easy for Kunis to look back at Jupiter’s Ascending as a career misstep, but the film bombing was actually something the actress predicted from the start. Speaking about the movie on the Happy Sad Confused podcast with Josh Horowitz (via IndieWire), Kunis claimed she knew before filming started that the project would be ill-fated. She says that she had that feeling once the budget was slashed in half, making it obvious to Kunis that The Wachowskis no longer had the funding to realize their vision in a way that would satisfy viewers. Or, as Kunis puts it:

“When did we know [the movie would flop]? Before we started production, because our production got slashed in half. And so the original budget was twice as much, and you can do a lot more with a lot more money, and oftentimes those types of scripts have a very good storyline but extraordinary other things. Right before pre-production, for a multitude of reasons with studios and other things, the budget got cut, and the movie was different… I wish that Channing was here because we have some good stories.”

Related: 2016 Razzie Awards Nominations Are Here

Jupiter’s Ascending Was a Low Point for Mila Kunis

Fortunately, Jupiter’s Ascending did not derail Kunis’ career, even if the bad reviews weren’t fun to see at the time. She has since appeared in more movies like The Spy Who Dumped Me and a pair of Bad Moms films. More recently, she took the lead in Luckiest Girl Alive, a film that is playing in select theaters ahead of its release on Netflix on Oct. 7, 2022.

Meanwhile, Netflix subscribers can also look forward to seeing Kunis reprising her role as Jackie from That ’70s Show. She will be appearing alongside most of the other main cast members of that series for the spinoff That ’90s Show, and among those with her will be real-life husband Ashton Kutcher. The two are reuniting with other classic stars of that series like Topher Grace, Wilmer Valderrama, Laura Prepon, Kurtwood Smith, and Debra Jo Rupp. The show does not yet have a premiere date but filming was wrapped over the summer.