Justice League What if Justice League bombs?

[Sarcastic Fan]

Warner Bros. Faces A Possible $50M To $100M Loss On 'Justice League'

 

[Binker]

The following is what happened:
Critics, especially in this world of extremes: love/hate, no middle ground.

Word of Mouth, being like/dislike, again in this world of extremes: no middle ground.

*BIG IMPORTANCE: Marketing, with no plot being revealed, but more importantly, no Superman meant people thought he wasn't in this AT ALL.

*BIG IMPORTANCE: Poor decisions made by WB: two hour running time, unnecessary cuts of scenes promoted in trailers, as well as those that cause some continuity errors. Humor at the wrong times, Whedon over-tweaking instead of connecting the dots that he was hired to do. The knowledge and high call for extended cut during opening weekend.

Two weeks after Thor, should've been released probably in December; specially the 1st, away from Thor, slightly away from Coco, but more importantly, two weeks before Star Wars. More breathing room. IT COULDN'T RELEASED IN 2018. THAT WAS NEVER GONNA HAPPEN.

Visual appealing: regardless of what people say, if it looks good, they'll see the movie. People have said, visually, JL didn't look good. Cheap/meh were the reactions.

Sequel to BvS: because of what happened with BvS, JL had high stakes to make up for it. But the studio interferences and the demand for an extended cut shows that WB didn't learn any lesson.

 

[smallville fan]

A movie with Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman bombing? What nonsense is this?

hahahaha

 

[Samuron]

The following is what happened:
Critics, especially in this world of extremes: love/hate, no middle ground.

Word of Mouth, being like/dislike, again in this world of extremes: no middle ground.

I'll disagree with your first two points; both the critics and the word of mouth did have middle ground. In fact, that's pretty much all they had.

The overwhelming response was "It's OK; not good, not bad, just OK".

That's just not enough to get people to shell out $20.

 

[MadVillainy]

I'll disagree with your first two points; both the critics and the word of mouth did have middle ground. In fact, that's pretty much all they had.

The overwhelming response was "It's OK; not good, not bad, just OK".

That's just not enough to get people to shell out $20.

Good point

 

[StormC]

Right. You can't pay for half a ticket then decide if you want to pay for the next hour. You need to make a movie that makes people say in no unclear terms "I want to see this."

 

[JerseyJoker]

I know its all DC, and its all under one umbrella, but when you talk about Justice League, you are talking about Zack Snyder.

People were willing post BvS to see Suicide Squad, cause it was something different and maybe had likable stars the general audience wanted to see.

People were more than willing to go see Wonder Woman over and over again, that movie was a record breaking smash. A lot of that had to do with positive word of mouth, great visuals, a story that people felt like they wanted to be part of opening weekend.

Justice League was the third film of a trilogy, a Zack Snyder trilogy.

On Man of Steel he divided a lot of people. On Batman v Superman, that division just grew larger, plus the fact he systematically got so many things wrong about characters people knew. Its not like Snyder made a Martian Manhunter movie and ****ed up his character, nobody would really care for the most part, cause not enough people know about MM like that.

Justice League was the effects of two previous movies and a general audience that was like, "I dont need to see this right away." Also doesnt help that DC been plagued with the 'directors cut' bug of telling audiences the movie you pay nearly 20+ bucks to see, half the time isn't the full movie, youll get that on home media.

JL could of been just okay and made 140+ mill in a time, where it wasnt' the third film from Snyders trilogy.

 

[MbJ]

Two weeks after Thor, should've been released probably in December; specially the 1st, away from Thor, slightly away from Coco, but more importantly, two weeks before Star Wars. More breathing room. IT COULDN'T RELEASED IN 2018. THAT WAS NEVER GONNA HAPPEN.

How is two weeks before Star Wars any more ideal? If Thor: Ragnarok hurt Justice League's box office, Star Wars would absolutely demolish its legs.

The fact of the matter is this was probably a bad year to release it period. WB's hand was forced because they were so confident everyone would love Batman v. Superman that they were already ramping up production Justice League before BVS was even released to the public, which in hindsight was a horrible idea.

If they'd waited, think about it. They could replace the director, work out a new script that has an actual organic tonal shift more towards what they want (meaning they don't have to do 50 million dollars worth of reshoots), and perhaps find a more ideal release date where they aren't competing with juggernauts like Pixar, Marvel, and Star Wars, all of which have way more audience goodwill than the DCEU does right now.

 

[Raiden]

I know its all DC, and its all under one umbrella, but when you talk about Justice League, you are talking about Zack Snyder.

People were willing post BvS to see Suicide Squad, cause it was something different and maybe had likable stars the general audience wanted to see.

People were more than willing to go see Wonder Woman over and over again, that movie was a record breaking smash. A lot of that had to do with positive word of mouth, great visuals, a story that people felt like they wanted to be part of opening weekend.

Justice League was the third film of a trilogy, a Zack Snyder trilogy.

On Man of Steel he divided a lot of people. On Batman v Superman, that division just grew larger, plus the fact he systematically got so many things wrong about characters people knew. Its not like Snyder made a Martian Manhunter movie and ****ed up his character, nobody would really care for the most part, cause not enough people know about MM like that.

Justice League was the effects of two previous movies and a general audience that was like, "I dont need to see this right away." Also doesnt help that DC been plagued with the 'directors cut' bug of telling audiences the movie you pay nearly 20+ bucks to see, half the time isn't the full movie, youll get that on home media.

JL could of been just okay and made 140+ mill in a time, where it wasnt' the third film from Snyders trilogy.

Audience of today have social media and are very savvy about the inner workings of Hollywood, and they would stay away if a movie is bad or they have had awful experiences with previous movies (like MOS & BVS). JL's failure is a result of a very strong rebuttal against the Snyderverse that WB has been building in their DC universe.

 

[Binker]

I'll disagree with your first two points; both the critics and the word of mouth did have middle ground. In fact, that's pretty much all they had.

The overwhelming response was "It's OK; not good, not bad, just OK".

That's just not enough to get people to shell out $20.

That's what i mean. In this day and age, people on the internet don't believe its love/like/okay/dislike/hate, its love or hate. Hell, saying it was good isn't confident to them, so they just write it off as bad and that's it.

 

[SilverBatarangs]

The following is what happened:
Critics, especially in this world of extremes: love/hate, no middle ground.

Word of Mouth, being like/dislike, again in this world of extremes: no middle ground.

*BIG IMPORTANCE: Marketing, with no plot being revealed, but more importantly, no Superman meant people thought he wasn't in this AT ALL.

*BIG IMPORTANCE: Poor decisions made by WB: two hour running time, unnecessary cuts of scenes promoted in trailers, as well as those that cause some continuity errors. Humor at the wrong times, Whedon over-tweaking instead of connecting the dots that he was hired to do. The knowledge and high call for extended cut during opening weekend.

Two weeks after Thor, should've been released probably in December; specially the 1st, away from Thor, slightly away from Coco, but more importantly, two weeks before Star Wars. More breathing room. IT COULDN'T RELEASED IN 2018. THAT WAS NEVER GONNA HAPPEN.

Visual appealing: regardless of what people say, if it looks good, they'll see the movie. People have said, visually, JL didn't look good. Cheap/meh were the reactions.

Sequel to BvS: because of what happened with BvS, JL had high stakes to make up for it. But the studio interferences and the demand for an extended cut shows that WB didn't learn any lesson.

I agree with most of this, except the idea
about the release date and it lacking visual appeal.

WB really should have had explosive promo for this film.
They should have had Superman front and center and teased his return.
Their marketing team really did fail Justice League.

I can see the extended cut being released on Blu-ray and
it getting higher ratings because of that. Maybe then WB will
learn not to interfere with a director's vision.

 

[FunkMiller]

I know its all DC, and its all under one umbrella, but when you talk about Justice League, you are talking about Zack Snyder.

People were willing post BvS to see Suicide Squad, cause it was something different and maybe had likable stars the general audience wanted to see.

People were more than willing to go see Wonder Woman over and over again, that movie was a record breaking smash. A lot of that had to do with positive word of mouth, great visuals, a story that people felt like they wanted to be part of opening weekend.

Justice League was the third film of a trilogy, a Zack Snyder trilogy.

On Man of Steel he divided a lot of people. On Batman v Superman, that division just grew larger, plus the fact he systematically got so many things wrong about characters people knew. Its not like Snyder made a Martian Manhunter movie and ****ed up his character, nobody would really care for the most part, cause not enough people know about MM like that.

Justice League was the effects of two previous movies and a general audience that was like, "I dont need to see this right away." Also doesnt help that DC been plagued with the 'directors cut' bug of telling audiences the movie you pay nearly 20+ bucks to see, half the time isn't the full movie, youll get that on home media.

JL could of been just okay and made 140+ mill in a time, where it wasnt' the third film from Snyders trilogy.

I think because of Zack’s tragedy, there’s something of an understandable unwillingness to pile the blame onto him, but that unfortunately doesn’t make it any less true. He is the common denominator in all of this. His vision for the DCEU is the reason we’re in the toilet.

The audience just hated what he gave them. It’s as simple as that.

It’s awful. It’s unpleasant. It’s not nice, considering how much of a good guy he appears to be. But it’s still the truth.

 

[vantheman77]

The minute that WB made JL under two hours is when I knew it was going to bomb.

Since it bombed, either two things - 1) have the Arrowverse TV shows use the Justice League or 2) have the JL cast appear in Arrowverse TV shows.

 

[Webhead38]

What really stands out about Warner Bros, for me, is just how detached they are in understanding the license or why these movies work (or don't work). They waltzed across the billion dollar mark first in the genre with Dark Knight, but didn't seem to have a clue where to go once the Nolan trilogy was over.

Instead of looking at that series as it's own animal that delivered a story that engaged audiences, they tried to dissect it on the surface with all of these superficial ideas of "dark tones" and "edgy characters" that really had nothing to do with the trilogy's success so much as the byproduct of the character portrayed in it. But the biggest thing that stands out to me is just how much weight they have put to all of these films, without showing any real commitment to any of them.

The Marvel license never did that. When studios started making those movies, they all started out quite modest in their returns. Captain America: The First Avenger and initial Thor films were not run away hits. The first Hulk movie was actually a critical and commercial failure. And when they rebooted it, the results were almost identical.

If not for Iron Man, none of those stand alone films, would have garnered much reason to make a film with all of them in it. But THE difference here is that with the Marvel license they started small, budgeted accordingly, and stayed on point to the end game which was marketing towards a bigger event. None of those initial movies really tie themselves to anything outside of a few scenes in credits to haphazardly suggest a shared story point.

And just like with the Nolan series, instead of Warner Bros. looking at the practicality of those films, they started looking at the surface results which spilled over with the Avengers. When the Avengers crossed the billion dollar mark, their eyes got big and suddenly EVERY product they put out had to cater to that idea of being "massive".

They serve up Green Lantern with a massive budget of $200 million. For comic fans an interesting investment, but to the public, few know who he is. A commercial flop and WB retreats. Up next is Man of Steel. Again WB makes a big to-do about this with even a BIGGER budget. Modest success, but the studio overspent, so that is the press.

Then we get Batman vs Superman. Wait a minute. Don't we need a new Batman introduced? WB says, " Forget it." So they balloon the budget AGAIN to reports of $300 million and while the movie comes out of the gate strong, it falters and once again the news becomes how WB overspent.

So here we are with Justice League. Another "second coming" from WB. Another bloated budget that oddly does not show. And again the news is they overspent. I smell a trend. The public does too.

What it comes down to is WB is selling a set of false goods to the public because they're wanting the money, without making a commitment to get there. They rush ensemble movies before they've introduced anyone because they believe they HAVE to jump to the front of the line where Marvel resides because they want those profits that Marvel has spent years building to.

So why did Justice League fail? Because the public no longer trusts what WB is putting out on this topic. The great irony to all this? Their most critical and commercially successful film to date was the one they didn't over-hype nor over budget - Wonder Woman. There you go.

Note to Warner Bros - Lay off the big budgets and hype. Invest in story and commit to what it is you're doing long term. Quit selling these movies like high-end priced cars and talk to your audience like they have a brain. Get directors that are actual fans of comics when they were growing up and allow more than one to display their vision. When you commit to your license and not just to how big your profit is, maybe the public will see you actually care about what you put out.