WARNING: The following article contains major spoilers for Chaos Walking, in theaters now.

The COVID-19 pandemic brought many difficulties to the film industry. When quarantine first hit, dozens of movie releases were pushed back and filmmaking came to a screeching halt. Now, a year later, audiences are slowly returning to theaters to enjoy films on the big screen once again. Chaos Walking is currently playing in theaters, and it too suffered from a delayed release. However, it wasn't due to the pandemic. Chaos Walking was a fraught project from the beginning, living up to its name, and it almost never even made it to audiences.

In 2011, Lionsgate acquired the rights to Patrick Ness's book, The Knife of Letting Go, with plans to adapt it to create Chaos Walking. The Knife of Letting Go is part of a book trilogy, and the studio wanted to turn it into its next Hunger Games. But this new book trilogy didn't start with the immense fanfare that Hunger Games did.

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Daisy Ridley as Viola Eade in Chaos Walking
Daisy Ridley as Viola Eade in Chaos Walking. Photo Credit: Murray Close

Chaos Walking was originally slated to hit the big screen on March 1, 2019. However, in early 2018, it was revealed that the film would be undergoing major reshoots. According to The Wall Street Journal, the film “turned out so poorly it was deemed unreleasable by executives who watched initial cuts last year, according to current and former employees.” Audiences and critics wondered if Chaos Walking would see its expected March 1 release date, and alas, it did not.

It's not uncommon for films to reshoot and revise before releasing the final product. However, Chaos Walking suffered from extenuating circumstances involving the star actors, Tom Holland and Daisy Ridley. At the time, Holland was working on Spider-Man: Homecoming and Daisy was working on Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, both of which took up the 2018 summer months that Chaos Walking needed to make the original release date. But because of the actors' prior commitments, reshoots couldn't begin until April 2019 -- a month after Chaos Walking's planned debut.

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Viola and Todd running in Chaos Walking

The reshoots lasted through May 2019, adding an extra $15 million to the budget, bringing the total to a grand $100 million. The film released on March 5, 2021 to a limited audience considering many theaters are still closed or at limited capacity due to the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions. As of March 21, 2021, Chaos Walking has grossed a total of $14.7 million worldwide against its production budget of $100 million, putting Lionsgate at an unfortunate loss.

Directed by Doug Liman, Chaos Walking stars Tom Holland, Daisy Ridley, Mads Mikkelsen, Demián Bichir, Cynthia Erivo, Nick Jonas, Kurt Sutter and David Oyelowo. The film is currently in select theaters.

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