Arnold Schwarzenegger arrived at 1993 on an unstoppable hot streak, having seen nearly all of his films throughout the 1980s and early 1990s turn a profit. Following the massive success of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, the action star was Hollywood's most bankable leading man. His next project, Last Action Hero, was an ambitious self-referential comedy directed by John McTiernan that played with genre conventions and featured Schwarzenegger poking fun at his own public image—a novel concept for mainstream audiences at the time. The studio invested heavily in promotion, including an eye-catching $500,000 stunt to launch the film's logo into space aboard an unmanned rocket.

The film's release proved disastrous for Schwarzenegger's winning streak, hitting cinemas just one week after Jurassic Park became a cultural phenomenon. Mainstream audiences in 1993 were not yet primed for the sort of ironic, meta-commentary that Last Action Hero offered, leaving it behind in the blockbuster race despite being a credible artistic effort. Schwarzenegger later acknowledged he had sensed the downturn coming, remarking that after climbing so high professionally, a fall was inevitable. He rebounded quickly, however, reclaiming his box office dominance the following year with True Lies, which became one of 1994's highest-grossing films.