Matt Damon’s Chinese Epic Cracks Netflix’s US Top 10 Nearly a Decade After Its Box Office Disaster

Matt Damon has spent the better part of the last decade proving he can carry just about any genre, from prestige dramas to survival thrillers to Christopher Nolan’s sprawling epics. But every filmography has its outlier, and for Damon, that outlier has quietly clawed its way back into the cultural conversation.

Streaming charts have a funny way of resurrecting movies nobody expected to matter again. The Great Wall is currently sitting at number 606 on JustWatch’s daily streaming charts, but its real home right now is Netflix, where subscribers have been rediscovering the 2016 fantasy epic in droves.

According to Netflix’s own rankings shown in the platform’s Top 10 Movies list, ‘The Great Wall’ has landed among the ten most-watched films in the US, appearing alongside titles like ‘Facing El Chapo,’ ‘Don’t Say Good Luck,’ and ‘Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.’ It marks the latest in a string of resurgences for the film, which first broke onto Netflix’s charts back in 2024 and has continued popping up on various platforms ever since.

‘The Great Wall’ originally hit the Netflix top 10 in the US back in May 2024, debuting at number four for the week. The film joined Netflix’s library on May 1 of that year, and because Netflix does not release detailed viewing-hour data for its domestic Top 10 Movies list, the exact number of streams remains unclear. Its momentum didn’t stop there, either, as the movie later surged into the top five of HBO Max’s US chart and broke into Prime Video’s top ten as well, proving its streaming appeal spans multiple platforms.

For those unfamiliar, ‘The Great Wall’ is directed by acclaimed Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou, known for Hero and House of Flying Daggers, and follows European mercenaries William and Tovar, played by Damon and Pedro Pascal, as they travel into ancient China searching for gunpowder before stumbling into a secret Chinese military force defending the Great Wall against a monstrous species. The cast also includes Jing Tian, Willem Dafoe, and Andy Lau.

The film’s theatrical run, however, was rough. Despite grossing $334.9 million worldwide on a $150 million budget, ‘The Great Wall’ is widely considered a flop, and The Hollywood Reporter noted that once marketing costs of roughly $80 million were factored in, the film was expected to lose around $75 million overall. Reviews weren’t kind either, with Rotten Tomatoes currently listing the film at 36 percent and IMDb rating it 5.9 out of 10.

Much of the pre-release buzz around ‘The Great Wall’ centered on controversy rather than anticipation. Critics and viewers accused the film of promoting a white savior narrative and whitewashing its cast, arguing that centering three European leads decentered the story of the Chinese characters despite the production being a joint American and Chinese co-production filmed largely in Qingdao.

Damon himself has been candid about the experience. Appearing on a podcast, the actor admitted that making the movie was disheartening, joking that his own daughter refuses to call it anything but “The Wall” because she doesn’t think there’s anything great about it.

Timing may also be playing a role in this latest wave of interest. Damon has had a massive 2026, starring in Netflix’s The Rip alongside Ben Affleck and in Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, which has grossed over $1.35 billion and become the highest-grossing R-rated film ever made. With Damon’s stock higher than ever, curious viewers appear to be circling back to one of his more infamous swings.

Whether ‘The Great Wall’ deserves its second life is up for debate, but the numbers don’t lie. Nearly ten years after bombing in theaters, Damon’s much-maligned monster movie has found the audience it never had, one Netflix binge at a time.