The Flash Box Office Thread

[psylockolussus]

Gunn inserted that final scene cameo and removed the original ending scene with

Spoiler: Spoilers

Cavill, Gadot, Keaton and Calle meeting Barry at the court steps.

Most people agree that was a mistake and the original ending would have fit the film much better narratively. But I'm sure Gunn's worry was teasing people a future that just wasnt going to happen.

There's a litany of reasons working in conjunction with each other contributing to this movie's spectacular failure but bottom line is that this is showing that The Flash as a character holds very little weight with the general public. I admit WB managed to fool me and people like me into thinking the hype for this movie was much bigger than it actually was. It felt like an event movie. But in reality, people just dont care about the Flash despite the decade long running tv series.

Spoiler

Having Keaton in the same universe as Gal Gadot and Henry Cavill would have been confusing as well though, not that any of these films will matter in 2 years.

 

[SomeOldGuy]

Weekend looking grim…

 

[Karelia]

Weekend looking grim…

Tbh, I expected it to do a little better than expected in the second weekend, not jaw droppingly better, but woo boy, everyone is checked out I guess.

Would DC benefit just not releasing Blue Beetle/Aquaman 2 at this point? Maybe a break until the new Superman is needed. Idk.

 

[JKKS085]

From day 1 the numbers have been nothing if not brutal. Looking at a sub-17M second frame for a movie that was tracking at or over 140M ow a month ago is surreal. This is surely shaping up to be the biggest box office flop in contemporary superhero movie history.

But at least it should give Gunn ample leeway to rebuild without pressure to carry over elements of this disastrous era for DC movies. Rebuilding the brand (especially in the context of a shared cinematic universe), rebuilding goodwill outside of the well-received elseworld stories like The Batman and Joker, is going to take momentous efforts and patience, precise vision and careful strategic planning. And I’m not sure I’m seeing that in the slate announced earlier this year.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

Tbh, I expected it to do a little better than expected in the second weekend, not jaw droppingly better, but woo boy, everyone is checked out I guess.

Would DC benefit just not releasing Blue Beetle/Aquaman 2 at this point? Maybe a break until the new Superman is needed. Idk.

They are already made, so I would think that getting something back would be better than nothing.

 

[Silver Surfer]

Weekend looking grim…

Deadline is predicting a 75% drop.

Steel's 26 year old drop record (78%) might be in reach.

History in the making!

 

[CaptainWagner]

Tbh, I expected it to do a little better than expected in the second weekend, not jaw droppingly better, but woo boy, everyone is checked out I guess.

Would DC benefit just not releasing Blue Beetle/Aquaman 2 at this point? Maybe a break until the new Superman is needed. Idk.

Blue Beetle is iffy, but it has August all to itself. It has a decent shot at turning a profit, IMO, but the marketing has been nonexistent. As for Aquaman, they'd be insane to cancel a sequel to their only billion dollar hit, no matter how bleak things are. Panicking now would only spook the shareholders more.

Deadline is predicting a 75% drop.

Steel's 26 year old drop record (78%) might be in reach.

History in the making!

 

[samsnee]

I was expecting 65% at worst. This is just pure disaster. Ezra is done and I doubt they will be in another major picture again. Keaton came back for this?!?

 

[RiXi]

The one user who voted less than $200 millions:

 

[Silver Surfer]

The one user who voted less than $200 millions:

 

[Frodo]

So goes The Flash at the box office

Thawne won after all

 

[Karelia]

Time to release the 4 hour epic "Muschietti Cut"

 

[kguillou]

Man, I’ve never seen so many “Why Did It Bomb?!” video editorials for a movie before. Every youtube critic I follow seem completely baffled by this catastrophic performance.

 

[Lily Adler]

I was expecting 65% at worst. This is just pure disaster. Ezra is done and I doubt they will be in another major picture again. Keaton came back for this?!?

More like he was brought back to try and save it.

 

[Mani-Man]

Man, I’ve never seen so many “Why Did It Bomb?!” video editorials for a movie before. Every youtube critic I follow seem completely baffled by this catastrophic performance.

Is it really that baffling?
Like sure i didnt expect it to get this low, but still...you could see this coming.

Last but not least because of the deranged hate campaign that was running days before release on Twitter where you would have thought they had CGI Christopher Reeves punching kittens in it.
The people were acting like this movie was the worst insult to anything ever made and managed to convince a ton of people of it.

The amount of people who said they watched the movie and hated it, is insane seeing how this doenst translate at all to the Box Office.
A lot watched either just an awful camrip or just clips of it.

The Ezra Miller thing hurt the movie too, that shouldnt come as a surprise.

Then you got the whole Reboot thing which caused many to go: Why should we watch this when they reboot all.

What i dont get is the huge drop considering word of mouth turned out far better.
I saw many people who werent convinced of the movie, be positive surprised once they watched it.
So that it dropped this hard, that baffles me a bit.
But in general, that it wouldnt turn out well...shouldnt come out as a surprise.
It had everything going against it.

 

[FeedOnATreeFrog]

Most friends I know, even film fans (though not to our forum-dwelling extent), didn’t know anything about Ezra Miller’s crimes (let alone his name) nor a reboot on the horizon.

A couple friends who didn’t watch it didn’t give any reason, though they did mention that they did see Spider-Verse the week or two prior.

Its a crowded summer in the streaming age. Guardians and Spider-Verse are sequels to quality films. Meanwhile Flash comes across like a sequel to Josstice League, or another Shazam/Black Adam type generic fare.

 

[kguillou]

1) They couldnt do press for this movie because of Ezra AND because of the writer’s strike shutting down late night talk shows.

2) Very crowded summer (Elemental and Little Mermaid bombed tol)

3) Audience fatigue. Guardians and Spiderverse are coming from known trusted IPs so people went to go see those. The Flash holds no weight with the GA, neither does Keaton sadly

But the thing that kind of still baffled me personally is i wouldve THOUGHT the wom wouldve been decent with the people who DID see it. You could pick apart its script Its a fun crowd pleasing movie the same way Aquaman was.

 

[Frodo]

At the end of the day, the people who were most invested in this film were in fandom , and the GA just isn't blown away by it.

I don't doubt that this film resonates with alot of people in our community, but this is one of those cases in which, it hasn't translated to the GA .

 

[Pfeiffer-Pfan]

Keaton came back for this?!?

Keaton came back for a multi-film contract:

- The Flash
- Batgirl
- Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom
- Batman Beyond
- Possibly more

All of which, combined, would have allowed him to flesh out his characterization (especially Batgirl and Beyond). All culminating in a Crisis movie where he could have potentially teamed up with Affleck and perhaps Clooney, Bale, etc.

He did not sign on for what The Flash became in it's finished form, with Gunn's ending. Regime changes, a problematic lead actor and a divided DC fanbase changed the potential for more.

In saying that, he's probably signed a pay or play contract and is off happily shooting Beetlejuice 2 with his buddy Burton. He'll be fine.

 

[DarkKnight88]

In saying that, he's probably signed a pay or play contract and is off happily shooting Beetlejuice 2 with his buddy Burton. He'll be fine.

Which will end up grossing more than The Flash.

And stars an actual up-and-coming star in Jenna Ortega which will bring in the younger (female) audience that this never got.

 

[SomeOldGuy]

 

[Detective Conan]

How could this have happened?! It got beaten by a romantic comedy in its second weekend!

 

[Pfeiffer-Pfan]

Safe to say WB will NOT be doing free fan screenings in the future. Premiere and embargo lifting only a few days before the actual release is the way to go. No matter how good they think the product is.

 

[Frodo]

They should also probably down play expectations in the future, as opposed to bluster that can't be backed up with results.

 

[Pfeiffer-Pfan]

They should also probably down play expectations in the future, as opposed to bluster that can't be backed up with results.

Yeah... let the audience generate word of mouth, not the company behind the product.