Birds of Prey BoP Box Office Thread

[Black Narcissus]

Yup. This needed DP level type marketing and not a last minute push by releasing the final trailer.

 

[TheVileOne]

It's very easy to play Monday morning quarterback on this especially when the film got fairly good reviews.

That said, I think it didn't need to be a Birds of Prey movie. The Birds of Prey are relatively pointless in this film and undercooked. This is really Harley Quinn's movie. So calling it Birds of Prey was nuts.

You can't say to me because FEMINISM and BECAUSE WOKE. People were beating those same drums before Captain Marvel came out wanting that film to fail and it still made over $1 billion and over $400 million domestic.

I think they should've maybe waited until Valentine's Day to release this.

I will say this. I've never been fond of "superhero" Harley Quinn. I get wanting to make her a bigger character and more than just Joker's girlfriend. But trying to elevate her as this heroic superhero is kind of wrong to me. It's sort of like turning Venom into a hero. Doesn't really work or make sense.

But the push into making her a hero just because she's popular and because Joker abused her doesn't really work IMO.

 

[writer0327]

But marketing is still the key is the point. You can make people care about anything with marketing.

Marketing is tricky. Its too simple to say "oh the marketing was just terrible for this movie", because that begs the question...what exactly makes for good marketing? Is it amount of money spent, is it how good the trailers are, is it the number of trailers and TV spots released? Is it actor interviews? Is it billboards plastered everywhere? We know it when it works, of course, because the buzz is everywhere and the box office explodes, but plenty of movies have been made with equally tremendous marketing campaigns that also bombed.

I agree you can make anyone like anything if you sell it correctly, but in the case of this film, I think ultimately this bad OW performance comes down to people just didn't really want to see it anyway. Not saying marketing didn't have something to do with it, but if I'm carving up the box office blame pie, I think "no one asked for it" gets the biggest piece.

 

[Shinobi Shaw]

I thought I would be surprised by this flopping, but I'm not. They made a very good movie, but they made it for the wrong target audience. Instead of teenage girls, they should have targeted teenage boys and single men.

Make this the Magic Mike version of a super hero movie. Sexify the s*** out of it. You have one of the most sexiest women in the world as your lead, lean into it.

Nah that's not the answer. For all that, you could just go online and watch a porno.

If this movie had been promoted more, given more exposure and had an ounce of Batman then it would've made more money IMO. But sexing things up just for the hell of it makes for a weak narrative. It's sexy watching women handling their business, having fight scenes and all that in alluring costumes, but just having T&A for no reason is tired.

 

[Sithborg]

I thought I would be surprised by this flopping, but I'm not. They made a very good movie, but they made it for the wrong target audience. Instead of teenage girls, they should have targeted teenage boys and single men.

Make this the Magic Mike version of a super hero movie. Sexify the s*** out of it. You have one of the most sexiest women in the world as your lead, lean into it.

Here's the problem. The women are plenty of sexy. And show quite a bit of skin. But, the movie was not pandered to the male gaze. And the reason why the audience that this movie seems to be resonating the most with didn't show up, is because they treated Harley like a sex object in Suicide Squad.

 

[TheVileOne]

I don't get what was specifically bad about marketing the film other than that calling it Birds of Prey when it's really Harley Quinn's film and the Birds of Prey are really her backup singers in the film wasn't a great idea but that's more in how they made a movie that's a Harley Quinn movie and a minor backdoor pilot for BoP.

 

[Micromind]

Audience in US are not supporting DC movies (Aquaman and Joker are the exceptions)

Its great that DC movies are doing well in countries like Brazil, Mexico, Australia and South Korea but it needs to do well in US too, which is the place of origin.

 

[Micromind]

Or Wonder Woman?

Wonder Woman 84 ? We will see how that goes.

Edit:As I pointed out earlier, I expect BW to do really well.

 

[Erzengel]

I don't necessarily expect either BW or Eternals to do what CM or FFH did last year. So "well" is subjective. I think if it either did $750M that would be outstanding.

WW84 I would expect to do better seeing as much as the previous one did.

 

[writer0327]

Audience in US are not supporting DC movies (Aquaman and Joker are the exceptions)

Its great that DC movies are doing well in countries like Brazil, Mexico, Australia and South Korea but it needs to do well in US too, which is the place of origin.

I think its more DC is not making the movies the US fans want. Also, these films don't seem to be building towards any "universe" experience so many are looking for thanks to Marvel. We've been begging for MoS2 for a couple of years now, which could probably signal a restart of the DCEU and build towards a Superman v Darkseid after New Gods drops.

Shazam and Birds of Prey feel like one offs that aren't leading anywhere.

 

[Micromind]

I think its more DC is not making the movies the US fans want. Also, these films don't seem to be building towards any "universe" experience so many are looking for thanks to Marvel. We've been begging for MoS2 for a couple of years now, which could probably signal a restart of the DCEU and build towards a Superman v Darkseid after New Gods drops.

Shazam and Birds of Prey feel like one offs that aren't leading anywhere.

But, why would they make expensive movies if people are not supporting it ?

 

[Invader Joker]

I wonder how similar actual execs discussions are to these forums when we discuss box office lol.
I imagine probably surprisingly similar. Someone blaming marketing, someone blaming the aesthetic, someone blaming lack of sex appeal, etc.

 

[Greenlite]

I wonder how similar actual execs discussions are to these forums when we discuss box office lol.
I imagine probably surprisingly similar. Someone blaming marketing, someone blaming the aesthetic, someone blaming lack of sex appeal, etc.

They're probably reading our forum right now

Hi Mr Hamada, you rating messed up big time =P (I'd have brought my wife and daughter to this if it's not R rated)

 

[Invader Joker]

They're probably reading our forum right now

Hi Mr Hamada, you rating messed up big time =P (I'd have brought my wife and daughter to this if it's not R rated)

You joke but they probably actually do that. Maybe not specifically this forum but they probably check Twitter a lot too.

If we are on these forums and checking all this stuff and different discussions even though we have no financial risk or benefit from this movie, imagine people that actually do.

 

[Erzengel]

I think its more DC is not making the movies the US fans want. Also, these films don't seem to be building towards any "universe" experience so many are looking for thanks to Marvel. We've been begging for MoS2 for a couple of years now, which could probably signal a restart of the DCEU and build towards a Superman v Darkseid after New Gods drops.

Shazam and Birds of Prey feel like one offs that aren't leading anywhere.

But, why would they make expensive movies if people are not supporting it ?

Yeah, I think the only way DC spends $200M or more on a movie is if a movie they spent $125-$150M previously dominated the BO or if it's Batman.

WB is doing the low risk, high reward movies now in between proven movies. I don't foresee a big budgeted revamp or new movie from DC anytime soon.

 

[Invader Joker]

Yeah, I think the only way DC spends $200M or more on a movie is if a movie they spent $125-$150M previously dominated the BO or if it's Batman.

WB is doing the low risk, high reward movies now in between proven movies. I don't foresee a big budgeted revamp or new movie from DC anytime soon.

Or if you are Christopher Nolan.

 

[DlAMONDZ]

Audience in US are not supporting DC movies (Aquaman and Joker are the exceptions)

Its great that DC movies are doing well in countries like Brazil, Mexico, Australia and South Korea but it needs to do well in US too, which is the place of origin.

So you're just gonna act like WW didn't make over 400m? Coming off BvS and SS no less

 

[writer0327]

But, why would they make expensive movies if people are not supporting it ?

Because they are Hollywood. Why does Hollywood do a lot of stuff that they do? This was a Margot Robbie passion project so that's part of it.

 

[psylockolussus]

The opening weekend number isunfortunate. An actual Birds of Prey movie would have been so exciting and I felt like this will kill the chances of Huntress, Black Canary and Oracle starring in their own film as bop. Shame.

 

[Vlyse]

I will wait for the rest of February to play out. Nothing else is coming besides some blue hedgehog and the 2 movies can coexist.

I know this is WB, but it's not unheard of for low-budget and underperformed movies like this to get a second chance.

 

[Greenlite]

So around 33M DOM and 48M OS, 81M WW

was hoping for closer to 40M DOM, OS was expecting 35M-ish so it's way better than expected all things considered.

51% female DOM so probably similar WW, meaning the legs should be decent, 81M WW OW gives it a shot at breaking even, if it does x3. Valentine weekend hopefully will help, I don't know if they still market the thing (I think they do), they need to play up the critical/audience receptions + urgency to turn it into profit to help fund more girl team movies angle.

And ya if it's a passion project/franchise then I hope break even will be enough to keep it going - they know where they F'ed up - rating, title, bigger name stars (maybe).

I just feel sorry for Batgirl, like dafuq, with the society we live in, she should be getting her live action film with instant strong buzz, but we don't know her status at least until next year.

And I think Harley should be fine in TSS, not gonna reduce her role if it's well received, see how Leto lost his role even if SS made $$$

 

[Moncton]

This had very low trailer views and never tended high on Twitter when the trailers/posters were released- that is a marketing issue not an r rated issue

 

[TheVileOne]

Someone please explain to me how the marketing was bad.

 

[misslane38]

It’s still an animated movie. It should be compared to other R Rated CBM that have cost similarly to what BOP did.

Both films have pros and cons. ITSV is animated (are animated films at a disadvantage?), but it's also more family friendly and features the most famous and popular superhero in the world: Spider-Man. Those are advantages, including its awards cred, that should've given it a boost. BOP is rated R and features a rising in popularity star/character in Margot/Harley; she's still not as popular as Spider-Man, though. The animated and R rating kind of cancel each other out as possible disadvantages. Meanwhile, both received good reviews and responses from audiences, generally speaking. They're both relatively standalone without obvious connections to the larger Marvel or DC cinematic universes, which could be a good or bad thing. I certainly think it helped Captain Marvel, which itself was more family friendly and was part of the build up to Endgame.

If I had to guess, the issue with BOP is that it's so unique. It doesn't look like a typical comic book movie, so it's not necessarily going to grab those viewers keen on that kind of content, and it doesn't come across as the serious cinematic take Joker was. It's this weird hybrid of darkness with humor and color. Margot said she had to fight for the R rating, and I wonder if R is more viable with male-driven films or with films that present themselves as serious or straight horror. MOS and BvS may have struggled for similar mismatch reasons. That said, I wouldn't have wanted BOP to be any different and don't think the marketing could've presented it any other way than what it is. This is new territory for comic book movies and female-led movies, so it's understandable that it'll be more of a baby step than a giant leap.

 

[TheVileOne]

Margot Robbie is not a proven box office draw. Just saying.

 

[Greenlite]

PG13 would have helped especially considering they didn't push things that far in the film, and I know I don't represent everyone on earth, but I could have brought my family to the film if it's PG13, that's 3 times what they got from me, that's money on the table.