“American Primeval” star Taylor Kitsch: So he recovered from the “John Carter” flop

Taylor Kitsch (43) is again. With the celebrated western series “American Primeval” by Netflix, the actor is back on the big stage. 13 years after he had ruined his career with a double strike. Some film stars make their breakthrough within a year. For example, Jim Carrey (63), who landed three hits in 1994 with “Ace Ventura”, “Die Mask” and “stupid and stupid”. But at Taylor Kitsch it went the other way around.

In 2012, Taylor Kitsch became Annus Herrribilis, the year of horror. At that time, the Canadian got the leading role lucrative on paper in “John Carter – between two worlds”. Walt Disney Pictures allegedly picked up $ 350 million in order to film the penny magazine stories of “Tarzan” author Edgar Rice Burroughs (1875-1950).

But the film about a veteran of the American Civil War, which ends up on Mars, flopped colossal. In the first few weeks, “John Carter” had so little money that Disney assumed a loss of $ 200 million. The then head of the film studio took his hat. Outside of North America, the spectacle still took $ 210 million. Nevertheless, the image remained one of the largest flops in film history.

Shortly after “John Carter”, Taylor Kitsch performed in a film with even stranger template. In addition to pop star Rihanna (36), he played the leading role in “Battleship”, which is based on the game “Sinking ships”. The film was successful at the box office, but was taken down by the criticism. It was raining nominations for the golden raspberry. Also in 2012, Taylor Kitsch came to the cinema with “Savages” by Oliver Stone (78). Not a real flop, but not a hit either.

In any case, Taylor Kitsch’s career seemed over before she really started. In 2010 he had the journal to the first row. Kitsch had his breakthrough with the series “Friday Night Lights” by “Battleship” director Peter Berg (60). Between 2006 and 2009 he played a high school footballer in the first four seasons. He was nominated twice for the teen Choice Award. When Kitsch embodied the Marvel fan favorite Gambit in “X-Men Origins: Wolverine”, everything seemed ready for the big career.

For Taylor Kitsch, there was not much more followed by the fate year 2012. At least not in the cinema. There are only a few titles there, for example “Lone Survivor” (2013), again by Peter Berg. His last film so far dated 2019.

Taylor Kitsch focused again on the medium that made him known. In 2015 he played a major role in the second season of “True Detective”. But compared to the first season with Matthew McConaughey (55), the second dropped significantly in quality. Kitsch had apparently preserved his bad luck in the choice of roles.

In recent years, Taylor Kitsch has slowly been going up again. In the German -Canadian series “Shadow The Murderer – ShadowPlay”, the election American played the leading role in 2020, alongside the German stars Nina Hoss (49) and Sebastian Koch (62).

Kitsch owes his comeback to his discoverer. Peter Berg occupied him in 2023 in his “Pinkiller” mini series about the opioid crisis in the United States.

And now “American Primeval”. Taylor Kitsch plays one of the main roles in one of the current hype series. As a traumatized trapper, he embodies the most interesting figure. Directed by “American Primeval”, of course: Peter Berg.