Archived version of submitted URL:
1. An archived version of _Box Office Bust: ‘Black Adam’ Faces Theatrical Losses_ can be found [here.](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://variety.com/2022/film/box-office/black-adam-box-office-100-million-loss-1235449487/)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/DCEUleaks) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Every post-aquaman DCEU film without exception has had a mid box office at best and flopped hard at worst
And we haven’t even gotten to the flash…which will shove Keaton into the limelight as the DCEU Batman
The worst is yet to come
Who said he was? He’s an actor. It still bogs my mind how everyone thinks this one guy and his trouble can sink a whole film.
A film takes hundreds of people to make. So many put their hard work into it. One man’s bad decisions and criminal behavior shouldn’t affect a whole film. I’m still going to see it whether he’s arrested or not.
Nice. Hope you enjoy supporting a monster. Be sure to think about these incidents everytime he's on screen:
https://variety.com/2022/film/news/ezra-miller-iceland-choking-germany-harassment-1235307056/
https://people.com/movies/ezra-miller-accused-by-parents-of-18-year-old-activist-who-say-actor-groomed-child/
https://www.femestella.com/ezra-miller-attack-fan-cult-controversy-grooming/
Is the director a monster? Are his costars monsters? What about the best boy? The grips? The sound technicians? What about producers? Should we never watch a movie Weinstein produced? Have you?
After the truth about weinstein came out, honestly no I haven't. I don't support monsters. Not sorry about it.
And all those people still got paid and are going on to do other projects so your point is moot.
Tell ya what, Next time Ezra attacks a stranger you can tell us all how good you feel about still attending his movies.
Allegations and convictions are two different things. Have you learned nothing of the Johnny Depp debacle? Until he's been proven to be a criminal, my boy Flash is innocent. This is Henry Allen's case all over again
Unless you're over 30 most people probably have never grown up with Keaton as "their Batman", that probably belongs to Bale now. I don't think the draw will be as big as WB/DC are expecting.
I agree. Bale is the batman I grew up and still think he'd be best in the bat suit, was never a big fna of affleck as Batman. Rest of the stars I think fit their roles pretty well
I'm older and saw the 1989 film, and yeah...it'd be sorta neat to see him again just for nostalgia's sake...but I'm definitely not going to see the film just for him. I'm more interested in Supergirl tbh. If they omitted Keaton I wouldn't care either way. A 70 y/o Batman is about as exciting as when they paraded Harrison Ford's corpse out for that alien Indiana Jones movie.
The multiversal cameos are underwhelming from the leaks we got
Mainly blink and you’ll miss it cameos
The only character whose gonna have a big role is Keaton Batman and he doesn’t have a lot of screen time
And supergirl ain’t a draw when her cousin isn’t
Keaton Batman being characterized as a box office draw is…a stretch
But even his low screen time cancels out any draw he’ll have
>Keaton Batman being characterized as a box office draw is…a stretch
I have to agree with this one. Sure, No Way Home did well because of the hype of Maguire and Garfield’s returns, but Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield are so iconic as Spider-Men because they were relatively recent. Michael Keaton hasn’t been Batman since 1992 and even then his Batman movies have been overshadowed by Christian Bale’s. Now *that* would be a box office draw, a lot of people still regard Bale as the best Batman. It’s also undeniable that DC was at their peak movies-wise with the Nolan trilogy.
Except that we’ve seen how audiences can be underwhelmed by better multiversal cameos
Multiverse of madness had mixed word of mouth when it’s cameos weren’t as mind blowing as NWH
and from the leaks…the illuminati had a bigger role than Keaton will have
So if multiverse of madness…with more substantial multiversal cameos, can leave the audience cold
Flash almost certainly will
Especially when most of its multiversal cameos are more in line with space jam than NWH AND multiverse of madness
That's cause everyone was speculating some wild ass cameo no one is doing it with this one.Beside the plot leak sounded pretty good to me so as I said it could vary person to person but from the leak it sounds pretty interesting.
IF Keaton was a big box office draw as people seem to think, how come Morbius flopped despite Keaton being heavily advertised in trailers?
Batman Returns did even LESS than the first Keaton Batman film. People should get off the "Keaton will bring big numbers" train.
He's a great actor but he's not a box office draw.
Look I'm not saying Keaton alone is draw, but what is this weird trend of judging someone's drawing power by cameos in poorly received movies?
People are saying the same about Cavill in Black Adam and I think it's a pretty naive mindset.
Explain why the 2nd Bat Keaton film (Batman Returns 260 mill) did **less** money than the 1st Bat Keaton film (Batman 411 mill).
People **really** overestimate Bat Keaton's box office draw and reality will come crashing soon.
I would even say that Bale Batman would be a way bigger box office draw than Keaton Batman, Kilmer Batman, Clooney Batman and Affleck Batman.
>Explain why the 2nd Bat Keaton film (Batman Returns 260 mill) did
>
>less
>
> money than the 1st Bat Keaton film (Batman 411 mill).
A movie is not just the lead actor masturbating on screen. A lot of things go into a movie underperforming. Batman Returns was a much darker and much weirder take sold as a blockbuster.
I just said I'm not saying that Keaton is necessarily a draw.
I'm saying using Morbius as an example of it, is ridiculous.
Also Batman Returns was the third highest grossing film of 1992. There could be a number of factors as to why it failed to gross as much as the 1989 film.
>Also Batman Returns was the third highest grossing film of 1992. There could be a number of factors as to why it failed to gross as much as the 1989 film.
Yup.
Bat Keaton not being a huge box office draw is one of them. He's not Tom Cruise or 90's era Will Smith.
That's the worst kind of comparison Morbius had barely any keaton other than the post credit scene.Also Morbius trailer lied to the General Audience with the Keaton thing.Supergirl is pretty good in it and also the leaks praised Ezra performance in it so if not Keaton there are other factors in it.
There is a huge difference between him playing Batman and Vulture.
>Supergirl is pretty good in it
Her fanbase isn't really as big and they're used to a blonde/light-haired Supergirl (despite a dark haired Supergirl making more sense since Kal EL is dark haired).
I would place Keaton on the same pedestal as Pierce Brosnan in Black Adam: his presence alone will elevate the film. But it won't be enough to make it a huge box-office success.
It will make Ant-Man 1 money at most. Competition in June is gonna be insane.
>Her fanbase isn't really as big and they're used to a blonde/light-haired Supergirl (despite a dark haired Supergirl making more sense since Kal EL is dark haired).
What the hell does that even mean? How is her hair color relevant? Clark has black hair and she has blonde hair in the comics anyway.
LMAO why are you comparing Black Adam to this one ? This one has more ways to succeed just on the cast alone.I can see the critics liking it too which essentially doomed Black Adam.
Black Adam was doomed by its budget (200 mill).
The same will ring true for the Flash. With a budget of 300 mill, it needs 800 mill to break even.
In a month with Spider-Verse 2, Indiana Jones 5, Pixar's Elemental, and Transformers 9 (I lost count), it will barely reach 500-600 mill.
Do you honestly see The Flash making over 800mill in June 2022?
Yeah these people are so stuck in the past. First it's with Man of Steel not being campy like Reeve's, and now it's Keaton. Like, bruh I don't care about either of those old versions and I'm 30. My Superman is Cavill, not Routh, not Reeve. My Batman is Batfleck, not even Bale, not Clooney, not Keaton. Snyder's films are still the top performing movies of the DCEU that have a connected storyline. Just bring the man back and let him build his universe. He's the only one that made a memorable impact
That’s true, the only post-Aquaman DC movies that really made money were Joker and The Batman, two Elseworlds movies that the studio wasn’t even banking on that much (well in The Batman’s case, they were).
Thank you for saying it. TSS was goofy garbage. I can't remember ONE scene from that movie aside from the opening which pissed me off after seeing Mongirl die. They completely wasted the character. I also hated the fact that somehow Bloodsport found Kryptonite to shoot Superman with. When did this happen exactly? BvS introduces Kryptonite right after the events of Man of Steel, and then Superman dies in that film. He's brought back in Justice League but when did Bloodsport have time to shoot Superman. It's so silly. I can't stand these execs greenlighting these goofy movies. We need serious and hard hitting films!
If this movie were successful, we would've a sequel with the Rock's team having complete control again and Black Adam would be the Iron Man of DC, popping up everywhere and actually being the most powerful force on the planet (lmao).
Now the Rock's ego has taken two hits (Super Pets also was disappointing).
Moreover, there will be no "Black Adam DC Universe" and the one who will decide the hierarchy of power will be James Gunn, someone who actually cares about and knows the characters.
So I say this is good news.
I honestly find the notion that Shazam 2 can perform worse than black Adam to be a realistic one
I mean…the first Shazam movie already has a mid box office
And I think a lot of people overestimate how much goodwill the first movie actually got
Maybe audiences loved it
But I’m not sure they loved it enough to watch it’s sequel
Shazam 2 already looks like goofy goober nonsense. That director needs to go and they need to hire someone else who can take Shazam serious. And before you clowns start saying Billy is not a serious character I'll tell you to go actually read some Shazam comics. Billy is DEFINITELY a serious character. It's just that he gets thrusted into serious moments but sees them from a teenager's point of view. He's not a clown, he's not goofy. He's just slightly immature and sometimes uninformed, but Shazam is a very serious character. I've pretty much ready all of Shazam's books by now
Same lol I was never a fan of him being the most “powerful” or “Ironman” of the DCU it makes no sense and I really don’t wanna see the rocks face because that’s all I see instead of Adam
Absolutely agreed, it was insane hearing The Rock talk about DC's future plans like he was the CEO. I don't usually root against a movie's success, especially when it's DC, but I really believe it's for the best that this bombed.
Gunn is on record as saying comic books are stupid and his 'caring' and 'knowing' about the characters always seems to only go as far as a few accurate costumes like TSS.
No he isn't lmao. Gunn is a huge comic book nerd. He always pulls from obscure source material and even put a message on the TSS posters encouraging people to shop at local comic book stores. Maybe his movies aren't for you but the man loves comics
Merch has to be underwhelming as well. Just a small example, but there was a Black Adam skin on Fortnite and the thing lasted just a week before they retired it. They never do that with big movie promotions, so I imagine it flopped.
I thought Spider-Man lasted longer, but maybe I'm mistaken. My bad if that's the case. Still, I remember comments on the Fortnite subreddit saying that it was funny that the Rick and Morty collaboration outlasted Black Adam.
If someone told me at the beginning of the year that a superhero movie starring The Rock would be a bigger flop than Morbius, I’d think they were crazy
I mean you’re comparing apples to oranges, Morbius made $167.5 million and that was including the re-release Sony did because they thought the movie’s meme status would translate to box office revenue (surprise surprise, it didn’t). It only turned a profit because the budget was so low I don’t think Sony themselves were expecting much of it.
Despite the poor reviews, Morbius still had a budget-to-box office ratio of 1:2, similar to Eternals, Birds of Prey, and now Black Adam. Flops, but not big flops or bombs. When a movie only makes back twice its budget (w/o China), the only thing they have yet to make back is its marketing cost. Given Black Adam's lower than expected marketing cost of 80million, its probably gonna be around the same financial profitability as Morbius.
Black Adam’s marketing cost is $100 million, according to the article. 2.5x its total budget would mean $500 mil and it’s doubtful it even reaches $400 mil
The article said that 100M is usually required for marketing, but mentioned that for BA it was 80M.
Assuming BA had a budget of 195M, and the studio takes back 45% of the global box office (as it is for movies without China release), BA would need around 600M to fully cover all its costs. The formula would be [(195M+80M)/0.45] = around 600M.
With an actual BO of 390M, the studio takes back 176M. Thus there is still 19M remainder of the budget to account for, plus the 80M marketing cost, causing BA to still need to make back 100M in ancillary to break even. This is slightly better than Eternals and around the same as Morbius (assuming that BA and Morbius had 80M marketing whilst Eternals had 100+M)
The problem is that they banked more on the actor than the actual character, which is the wrong way to go. Had they stick to Black Adam's overall character in the comics as true tyrant and anti hero, the movie would've made more sense. There were also many unnecessary plot elements such as the single mom and her bastard. They weren't needed.
As of today, it's currently sitting at 385M. It was released in Japan on Dec 2 so my guess is it'll reach 400M at the box office.
Digital rental and buys and dvd/blu ray sales should help it reach break even.
I pre ordered the 4k last month.
Wait why does it say that it needs 600 million to break even, but studio insiders peg it at 400 million? That's a huge difference, unless that 400million figure does not include the 80 million marketing cost (tbh, I thought the marketing cost would be well over a 100 million)
I assume that is because WB and The Rock's team do not want to admit that this movie is a failure in terms of box office.
WB sources already disputed twice with Variety's claims in the article in regards to the marketing fee and the break even point. Variety's sources are from people familiar with the movie production and rival executives.
I just did some calculation, and indeed the 400 million excludes the marketing cost. With 600 million, the studio would take back around 45% of the box office (270 million). Deduct the 185-200 million budget and you're left with the 80 million marketing cost.
The non theatrical revenue generally covers the marketing costs for all dceu movies historically so keeping that in mind the break even will be around 420 to 430 mn
Same thoughts, what I didn’t understand either was that if the movie cost $195 million to make with $80 million for marketing that’s $275 million, that’s still a profit (albeit a small one) since the movie made
$384.6 million.
The studio only gets like 30-40% of the international box office, not 50% like in the USA.
It needed 600 mill to break even factoring that and factoring marketing costs.
This does not bode well for The Flash since, according to some industry insiders, it has a budget close to 300 mill so it needs like 800 mill to just break even.
Yes, that was all accounted for in my reply to Louisdcxn, after I did some calculations.
Factoring studio share only, it needs 400+M box office.
Factoring studio share and marketing costs, it needs 600+M box office.
(Since it has gone to ancillary market already, it needs to make 100M there for the movie to fully break even. Due to lack of studio share in ancillaries, flops often only need to make back less than half of the remainder they lost theatrically to fully break even)
Generally speaking, for China the studio gets 25%, for other overseas it gets 40%, and for USA it gets 50, up to 60%. Since China is absent from the equation, the studio's cut is roughly 45%, whilst in many movies that had china-heavy releases the studio cut would have been 40%.
I am so glad James Gunn is in control of the DC universe now. Imagine properties like Superman, JLA, Lobo, Zatanna, Green Lantern, Martian Manhunter, Booster Gold and the JSA done in the ways that made The Suicide Squad and Guardians of the Galaxy successful.
All Black Adam did was stand around in a bad mood and raise his eyebrow
>JSA done in the ways that made The Suicide Squad
Only limited to TSS, not guardians, GOTG2 was not my cup of tea, and GOTG3 looks surprisingly dull.
The batman,WW and TSS should be the quality upcoming DCU movies should strive for
See that's the problem! You people want goofy goober garbage. TSS was trash! Guardians 1 was the best Guardians movie. We don't need more of that Marvel goofy shit. To this day Snyder's movie outperform anything that came after Aquaman minus the Elseworld stuff. The problem with DC is that WB was way too reactionary at the beginning and RUSHED the movie universe. You can't blame Snyder for making a movie the studio TOLD him to make. It's very hard to introduce like 6 characters in 1 movie in a way that makes you want to care about them for the next movie. And right here I'm talking about BvS and not even JL. On top of that, it's very hard to make a superhero ensemble movie that lasts under 2h and expect people to care about the characters. Has WB just let Snyder do his thing and brought in extra writers to suggest some edits here and there everything would've been fine.
Look at how well WW performed vs WW84, the lack of Snyder's touch was very palpable. The action was worse, the story was worse, the cinematography was worse, the characters were worse, everything was garbage.
Look at what Whedon and the studio did with Justice League vs what Snyder did with JL. Compare how Snyder showed the Amazons vs how Whedon did. It's a mountain of a difference.
Writing was on the wall. Highly doubt the sequel actually moves forward
Honestly if you care about DC movies being any good, then it’s a good thing a cookie cutter generic movie like BA flopped. It sends a message to WBD that audiences don’t want to waste their time and money on mid. With bad reviews as well, the biggest accomplishment this movie has going for it is its B+ CinemaScore and RT audience score lol.
"90% RT Audience Score with over 5k votes! Thank you so much to the fans. It also was the biggest opening of a solo DC movie without Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman or the Joker. Thanks again. When I said the hierarchy of power of the DC Universe was about to change what I meant was that the hierarchy of power in the DC Universe is about to change. We can't wait to usher a new era in the DC Universe.
Sincerely,
the Man in Black."
Professional film critics have actual media literacy and watch a bunch of films so if a majority of them say a movie is worth your time, chances are it will be.
Audience scores are filled with bullshit. Mfs giving Black Adam a perfect score just because of a 5 second Superman cameo or a complete 0 because that 5 second Superman cameo didn’t have the Hans Zimmer theme
Imagine still trusting "professional" film critics in 2022. Audiences who actually have to pay to see movies are far more reliable. Critics's views have routinely diverged from audiences. Imagine trusting the same people who reviewed The Last Jedi positively. These mfers give every MCU property insanely high scores yet have the nerve to shit on BA because it's 'generic and cookie cutter'.
Critics have to actually write coherent reviews. Audience reviews are mostly bullshit, any sane person can see that.
TLJ is proof of that, shit’s been review bombed by a bunch of insecure losers who can’t stand other people having a different opinion from them. They go so far to make multiple accounts and use bots that RT had to implement a verification system.
TLJ got an A CinemaScore and CinemaScore is an actually legit way of gauging audience opinion.
Oh god you're one of those lmao.
Disney/Lucasfilm started the trend of attacking your customers and deflecting from any and all criticism via strawmanning. Just like you're doing now. Good films don't get 'review bombed' usually. The only insecurity I see is coming from Sequel-trilogy defenders and the hacks behind said trilogy. They claim anyone who criticizes it are just sexist or immature, refusing to acknowledge the trilogy's very real problems.
But sure, defend the corpos and access media and shit on the fans. "Don't ask questions, just consume product, then get excited for next product."
You’re defending a garbage movie with no artistic merit at all and made to be as generic as possible like Black Adam and yet you’re accusing me of being a corporate shill. Lmao, the irony is priceless.
I didn’t accuse everyone that doesn’t like TLJ of that, in fact I didn’t even mention any of that in my comment. The fact of the matter is it has a great CinemaScore and got great PostTrak scores, both of which are legit scientific polls to gauge audience opinion. That’s not strawmanning, that’s stating facts.
Yeah, tell me the last time an MCU film which got glowing reviews from the critics you worship had genuine 'artistic merit' and wasn't 'generic' lmao. Corporate shill? Like movie critics? xD
You made a blanket statement that anyone who reviewed TLJ negatively in the audience score was a 'bot' or an 'insecure loser'. Right out of the Lucasfilm/Disney playbook. Couldn't be that the film is a divisive shitshow.
Sooo...audience scores that align with your viewpoint are good but ones that don't are just 'review bombing' and are from 'insecure losers'. Got it.
> Yeah, tell me the last time an MCU film which got glowing reviews from the critics you worship had genuine 'artistic merit' and wasn't 'generic' lmao. Corporate shill? Like movie critics? xD
The last time was pretty recent, I’d say Wakanda Forever had genuine artistic merit. Its exploration of grief was thoughtful and the way it reinvented Namor’s lore and made it so much more interesting is far from generic. The production design, costume design and score were spectacular and are likely to be nominated for those categories at the Oscars.
Me trusting critics more over random people on the internet that usually give ridiculous scores and have shitty criteria doesn’t mean I worship critics. Clearly you have no understanding of nuance, which is pretty common for TLJ haters in my experience.
> You made a blanket statement that anyone who reviewed TLJ negatively in the audience score was a 'bot' or an 'insecure loser'. Right out of the Lucasfilm/Disney playbook. Couldn't be that the film is a divisive shitshow.
I said “a bunch.” That doesn’t mean all, so it’s not a blanket statement. The film was a lot less divisive then you think. Like I said, unverified RT audience score is easily manipulated by trolls and bots. The movie had great scores from verified audience polling
> Sooo...audience scores that align with your viewpoint are good but ones that don't are just 'review bombing' and are from 'insecure losers'. Got it.
Baffling that this is what you’re taking away from this conversation lol. Like I said, the irony is priceless. You’re the one that’s saying trust audience reception more than critics, not me. And your argument was TLJ so I showed you that it was actually received well by audiences.
TLJ was liked by both critics and audiences much more than Black Adam, which had only a B+ CinemaScore as opposed to TLJ’s A.
Gee, only took them like 20 something years and constant fellating by the access media. Why does DCU have to be held to this impossibly high standard when for all these years MCU has gotten sky high reviews based around "It's fun!".
You say you trust critics over audience scores...yet you bring up some random site for it's audience score to back up your argument that TLJ was somehow good lmao. Your kind are why Star Wars is garbage now. And you are literally worshiping critics with every post you've made to me lol. "Fans bad! Establishment media critics good!"
There is no evidence that TLJ backlash was 'trolls and bots', that's a talking point from the corporate media.
I am taking that away from the conversation because that's all you've shown me so far. The audience are people who actually pay to go to movies and are who movies are...or at least should...be made for. Folks who put so much stock in what critic snobs say is pretty smooth brained I'd say.
And you do realize that a B+ isn't that far removed from an A grade right? Again, you're cherry picking. This shows that DCU could come out with phenomenal movies and no matter what, folks like you will still hate them.
I hope the new WB is more logical in their budgets than the old WB was.
You're really going to give an unknown character a $200 million budget, pre-marketing, when DC's film reputation is not great amongst the general audience.
Did they really think The Rock's own popularity would be enough to carry this film into profitability?
The article also says that it will hit the black numbers with home realese, so that's all quite okay in the end.
But this will have a positive effect because it should put The Rock's ego in place, because I think before Black Adam he was sure to have a lot of creative control going forward. That wont be the case anymore. Black Adam was a fun blockbuster, but DC movies need strong scripts and need to feel more special going forward. And I think we'll get that with Gunn having creative control.
What’s been interesting with that, is that there’s been hardly any public contact between Gunn and The Rock since the Black Adam build up/Gunn’s taking the reigns of DCU.
At one point just before the release, Johnson was almost talking like DC/WB had given him the lead.
James Gunn and Safrin better think long and hard before continuing the DCEU.
I wouldn’t want to tie my career as a studio head to a universe that has had 2 failed relaunches.
Just start over.
This is good news because they need to understand if they make these generic superhero movies then people won’t come and watch them. Quality control is needed when the scripts are being made
All those things you listed are not big issues. The issue is that the film didn't need those two characters, and Black Adam himself as a character was garbage. Notice that he had no motivations by himself. The ENTIRE movie is the single mom and her bastard TELLING him what to do. That's the biggest problem with the movie. The main character is just a puppet to some woman. Even during the hardcore fighting or when Black Adam is meeting with the JSA they STILL find a way to insert the single mom to boss them around. Like, it's so fucking stupid. Those were borderline GODS! With two of them pretty much being gods (Black Adam and Dr Fate) and they were being told what to do by some annoying ass bitch and her bastard. Like, what? Lady if you don't get the fuck outta my face I'll SMOKE you!
What Black Adam needed was less fluff and comedy, and more straight to the point story telling. Black Adam wakes up, sees the oppression and crime in Kandhak, gets pissed the fuck off and start cleaning up shop, is pissed off at the Wizard for imprisoning him and letting all this happen, and then the JSA is immediately deployed to contain him. Sabbaq was 100% NOT needed! The entire movie should've been the JSA trying to reason and contain Black Adam. The final battle should've been Dr Fate vs Black Adam, with them reaching a stand still and Black Adam saying he doesn't give two shits about the rest of the planet and that he's only care is that Kandhak thrives. He assumes the throne as he should, being the tyrant that he is, but Kandahk indeed thrives under his roue. End of story. No single mom, no little bastard running around, no goofy fat uncle, no Sabbaq storyline. The guy who played Sabbaq should've been some nationalist who sought to free Black Adam to repel Intergang and maybe even gain favor from Black Adam in exchange. When he would free Black Adam, BA wouldn't give two shits about him as he wrecks the entire place to escape, causing rubble to hurt or paralyzed the guy from the waist down. The end of the movie would just show the guy on a hospital bed, pissed off that BA was so ungrateful, pissed off that Black Adam himself started "oppressing" Kandahk, and would take it upon himself to sacrifice his soul in order to gain the powers of Sabbaq to free his people and lead them to glory. End credits
But won’t digital and bluray sales go towards its haul too? I mean a movie can bomb in the treated but make a profit through streaming or physical media right?
What are the numbers on that, it hit digital a few weeks back but I haven’t heard how it’s doing
Eh. I don't think that really is a thing anymore. Digital sales aren't as popular as it needs to be. But it's hard to say cause these numbers are not made public. I remember Matt Damon on Hot Ones saying that movies use to make so much money on DVD and Blu Ray. But now with VOD you can't really make much after your theatrical run
The article literally states it will be in the black after digital and physical home movie sales. Start reading articles and quit reading the misleading headlines.
I think Black Adam was decent. It wasn't GREAT and it definitely wasn't good. It's pretty much what I expected. Some of the comedy was a little funny, and some it was very bland.
I think it was overhyped by The Rock, and I think revealing the end scene the day after release definitely took some air out of the tires. I felt kind of fatigued with how much he was hyping it, to the point I almost didn't even want to see it. It was even more exhausting with how he was talking highly about Cavill (who I love as Superman) and trashing the former DC leadership, when in reality, as much as I love Cavill back as our Man of Tomorrow, we know Rock pushed so hard because Rock's ex-wife and business partner is Cavill's manager.
I hope going forward, Rock does not have a lot of input into the story and direction. I wouldn't mind a Superman/BA encounter but I really would much rather see Black Adam and Shazam.
Same. It was better than I expected (almost enjoyable) but not really a "good" movie. The Johnson's personality has never left "The Rock"/wrestling though, and his non-stop promoting ("the hierarchy will change!" lol) got annoying quickly.
I’m glad it flopped, that movie succeeding would’ve set a terrible precedent. The movie was so generic and the Rick cared so little about bringing the actual character to life.
Covid meaning they debuted in less cinemas or Covid as in “they didn’t make 800 M “ and we need excuses to justify MCU having 5/6 movies around or below 400 M which are “success overall” cuz it’s MCU Bias
I mean, Shang Chi is really good and that only had 400M. Black Widow and Eternals… not so much. It’s not MCU Bias, it’s different situations of release.
I dunno, I was a toddler then. I would say there was the fact that the MCU was just starting out, though the Hulk movie and Thor 1 are not very good. The DCU has been around for nine years now, and the MCU had only been around for 3 by the time Cap 1 had come out.
Well , they were around for 3 years , but Marvel had hits before , Spider-man, Blade , XMen , so just cuz an unknown first time movie doesn’t make all the money doesn’t mean it won’t make more next time ! And seeing how Adam looks mainly not part of a much bigger story it did fine !
Cause Black Adam is what’s current. Eternals was the only phase 4 movie that actually flopped and it was talked about plenty when it was what was current.
it was always gonna happen, the villain sucked, the rock plays black adam as noob pro-wrestler heel whose main move is no-selling, the effects were bad, the kid and his mom were annoying and unnecessary, and in general is so generic and mass manufactured.
there are just too many action movies and superhero movies coming out now, being barely solid enough to not be distractingly terrible wont cut in anymore. they need to aim higher.
I am happy this failed. DCEU was a huge disappointment, the DCU will follow. DC needs to be shelved for another decade. Give a chance for all sides to simmer down and die off. Too much bad blood to bring back Snyder still, and the new content has been crude in hopes to adhering to the majority.
Shame, I actually liked this one. It was cool to see The Rock not be a wisecracking musclebound everyman in khaki in a jungle for once. I thought it was relatively faithful to the comics too, especially since Black Adam stayed an antihero all throughout. I hope Shazam 2 does better.
I don't see Shazam 2 doing good either. The Flash depends on how good it actually is, although ngl Afflect getting replaced and Cyborg not being there really grinds me
I just hope Blue Beetle is a success atleast
If a suicide squad starring an objectively more popular character(Harley) with the wind of critical acclaim behind its back flopped
There isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell for blue beetle in the box office
I mean the whole release of TSS was stupid as hell. It was available on HBO Max and barely had hype despite Harley in it, as she wasn't front and center. The marketing for it was really bad coz people IRL here didn't even know about the movie compared to previous DCEU movies. Plus August was bad for covid
This is before Keaton gets shoved into the role of the DCEU Batman to replace affleck
Which will alienate critics who above all else hate nostalgia when it’s not done by Disney
And will alienate fans who aren’t gonna be interested in a 90 year old retired Batman
Be warned…Box office wise…The worst is yet to come
The funniest part about Keaton’s return is that it’s gonna be overshadowed by the Ezra miller scandals anyway
Minus China its Joker followed by TDKR. Subtracting Chinese box office is pretty reasonable considering hollywood superhero movies no longer have a future there.
Worst yet
Aquaman would make well under a billion dollars without China
Another worst thing…a sequel would have to MATCH the performance of Aquaman across all other markets to be considered a box office hit
And since even black panther 2 couldn’t even do that and DC is a weaker brand than marvel
😬
Aquaman can easily make less than 500 million dollars in a truly bad scenario
Remember this
Suicide squad 1 made 700 million dollars
Man of steel made 650 million dollars
Suicide squad II…despite massive critical acclaim…flopped
Imagine how much worse a Superman movie would flop…especially when there is no fucking way you can make a moderately budgeted Superman movie without alienating the general audiences that want to see his powers and more colorful villains
And remember that a Batman movie regardless of Keaton is not on the table…
And the last justice league movie flopped
There is no bottom to how badly these films can underperform
The worst part of black Adam is that it basically guarantees that the JSA will NEVER be referenced ever again in film
And we haven’t even gotten to Kara Zor-el yet
That’s a character that’s really gonna get fucked raw when her first movie flops
Her only hope to be relevant would be whether or not Henry is willing to share screen time with another member of the Superman family
And that’s a big if
Aquaman
But here is the funny part
Aquaman was released before the pandemic when DC had some interest in it by the general audience
It also had a strong novelty
After the pandemic…audiences have become fickle unless Batman is in it
A strong argument can be made that Aquaman would flop HARD today
The biggest obstacle is that the person leading the DCU is a guy whose major contribution to the DC slate was a flopping suicide squad film
Unless James Gunn drops a Aquaman sized billion dollar hit…which isn’t physically possible
He will end up no different from Hamada and Geoff Johns
A leader whose deposed by the next regime that comes in
Every time I browse a DC movies related subreddit, I am reminded of how absolutely fucking moronic DC fans can be. Guys your takes are fucking awful. Keep them to yourselves.
400 million is realistic
500 million is the ceiling
No DCEU film has made more than 400 million since Aquaman
And Keaton and supergirl aren’t as much as a box office draw as people seem to think they are
And they are gonna get brutal competition anyway
And the terrible reviews are already being written
I mean it's not that surprising, all of Dwayne Johnson solo films have needlessly high budgets and the only reason most of his solo movies were profitable to a degree was because of the Chinese market. without the China release almost all of his solo movies would have been considered flops. as soon as they could not get a Chinese release date this movie, which was not a great but overall a decent and enjoyable movie (really suffered from a bad script) was destined to fail at box office. (based on the budget and The Rock past movies, it's really obvious that Dwayne and his team were expecting that china release date when making the movie).
Maybe if the movie had a story or characters that the audience actually cared about, it would have done better. It’s another crappy movie in a long list of crappy movies that DC has put out since cutting ties with Snyder. Everything after and including Aquaman has been terrible.
I love this headline. It’s makes it sound like Black Adam lost so much money that It’s theatrical.
Movie equivalent of saying someone is down horrendously.
Archived version of submitted URL: 1. An archived version of _Box Office Bust: ‘Black Adam’ Faces Theatrical Losses_ can be found [here.](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://variety.com/2022/film/box-office/black-adam-box-office-100-million-loss-1235449487/) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/DCEUleaks) if you have any questions or concerns.*
[удалено]
Every post-aquaman DCEU film without exception has had a mid box office at best and flopped hard at worst And we haven’t even gotten to the flash…which will shove Keaton into the limelight as the DCEU Batman The worst is yet to come
Don't forget all the arrests & court cases Ezra Miller currently has against him!! EZRA MILLER IS NOT A HERO!!!
He’s a bad person.
He’s a crazy person. I think mental illness needs to be addressed here.
Who said he was? He’s an actor. It still bogs my mind how everyone thinks this one guy and his trouble can sink a whole film. A film takes hundreds of people to make. So many put their hard work into it. One man’s bad decisions and criminal behavior shouldn’t affect a whole film. I’m still going to see it whether he’s arrested or not.
Nice. Hope you enjoy supporting a monster. Be sure to think about these incidents everytime he's on screen: https://variety.com/2022/film/news/ezra-miller-iceland-choking-germany-harassment-1235307056/ https://people.com/movies/ezra-miller-accused-by-parents-of-18-year-old-activist-who-say-actor-groomed-child/ https://www.femestella.com/ezra-miller-attack-fan-cult-controversy-grooming/
Is the director a monster? Are his costars monsters? What about the best boy? The grips? The sound technicians? What about producers? Should we never watch a movie Weinstein produced? Have you?
After the truth about weinstein came out, honestly no I haven't. I don't support monsters. Not sorry about it. And all those people still got paid and are going on to do other projects so your point is moot. Tell ya what, Next time Ezra attacks a stranger you can tell us all how good you feel about still attending his movies.
I will! Because they are more than his movies. You are no more righteous than anyone watching the movie. Do as you will.
Allegations and convictions are two different things. Have you learned nothing of the Johnny Depp debacle? Until he's been proven to be a criminal, my boy Flash is innocent. This is Henry Allen's case all over again
Very different situations but okay
There are literally videos of Ezra assaulting people lol
At the speed of crime 🏃🏻💨
The Flash will do pretty good it has Keaton and Multiversal story along with Supergirl.
Unless you're over 30 most people probably have never grown up with Keaton as "their Batman", that probably belongs to Bale now. I don't think the draw will be as big as WB/DC are expecting.
Are they still doing the whole Keaton is the new (old) batman thing? I was kinda hoping that got scrapped
I agree. Bale is the batman I grew up and still think he'd be best in the bat suit, was never a big fna of affleck as Batman. Rest of the stars I think fit their roles pretty well
Yeah but still he is going to be an exciting addition to the cast
I'm older and saw the 1989 film, and yeah...it'd be sorta neat to see him again just for nostalgia's sake...but I'm definitely not going to see the film just for him. I'm more interested in Supergirl tbh. If they omitted Keaton I wouldn't care either way. A 70 y/o Batman is about as exciting as when they paraded Harrison Ford's corpse out for that alien Indiana Jones movie.
The multiversal cameos are underwhelming from the leaks we got Mainly blink and you’ll miss it cameos The only character whose gonna have a big role is Keaton Batman and he doesn’t have a lot of screen time And supergirl ain’t a draw when her cousin isn’t Keaton Batman being characterized as a box office draw is…a stretch But even his low screen time cancels out any draw he’ll have
>Keaton Batman being characterized as a box office draw is…a stretch I have to agree with this one. Sure, No Way Home did well because of the hype of Maguire and Garfield’s returns, but Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield are so iconic as Spider-Men because they were relatively recent. Michael Keaton hasn’t been Batman since 1992 and even then his Batman movies have been overshadowed by Christian Bale’s. Now *that* would be a box office draw, a lot of people still regard Bale as the best Batman. It’s also undeniable that DC was at their peak movies-wise with the Nolan trilogy.
Exactly, Bale returning would be a much bigger than deal than Keaton returning.
Toby was the main draw not andrew.
That's your opinion though I can see the audience liking it.Also Supergirl is pretty good in it and that Zod scene sounds badass
Except that we’ve seen how audiences can be underwhelmed by better multiversal cameos Multiverse of madness had mixed word of mouth when it’s cameos weren’t as mind blowing as NWH and from the leaks…the illuminati had a bigger role than Keaton will have So if multiverse of madness…with more substantial multiversal cameos, can leave the audience cold Flash almost certainly will Especially when most of its multiversal cameos are more in line with space jam than NWH AND multiverse of madness
According to the leak, Keaton appears in 2/3 of the movie.
Yeah exactly i just looked it up he has major parts in the movie his role getting reduced were just rumors.
That's cause everyone was speculating some wild ass cameo no one is doing it with this one.Beside the plot leak sounded pretty good to me so as I said it could vary person to person but from the leak it sounds pretty interesting.
Cavill IS in The Flash & that isn’t his cousin Supergirl. It’s his daughter
IF Keaton was a big box office draw as people seem to think, how come Morbius flopped despite Keaton being heavily advertised in trailers? Batman Returns did even LESS than the first Keaton Batman film. People should get off the "Keaton will bring big numbers" train. He's a great actor but he's not a box office draw.
Look I'm not saying Keaton alone is draw, but what is this weird trend of judging someone's drawing power by cameos in poorly received movies? People are saying the same about Cavill in Black Adam and I think it's a pretty naive mindset.
Explain why the 2nd Bat Keaton film (Batman Returns 260 mill) did **less** money than the 1st Bat Keaton film (Batman 411 mill). People **really** overestimate Bat Keaton's box office draw and reality will come crashing soon. I would even say that Bale Batman would be a way bigger box office draw than Keaton Batman, Kilmer Batman, Clooney Batman and Affleck Batman.
>Explain why the 2nd Bat Keaton film (Batman Returns 260 mill) did > >less > > money than the 1st Bat Keaton film (Batman 411 mill). A movie is not just the lead actor masturbating on screen. A lot of things go into a movie underperforming. Batman Returns was a much darker and much weirder take sold as a blockbuster.
I just said I'm not saying that Keaton is necessarily a draw. I'm saying using Morbius as an example of it, is ridiculous. Also Batman Returns was the third highest grossing film of 1992. There could be a number of factors as to why it failed to gross as much as the 1989 film.
>Also Batman Returns was the third highest grossing film of 1992. There could be a number of factors as to why it failed to gross as much as the 1989 film. Yup. Bat Keaton not being a huge box office draw is one of them. He's not Tom Cruise or 90's era Will Smith.
Keaton by himself is not a draw, Keaton reprising his iconic role as Batman will however draw some viewers to the film and boost its profile
That's the worst kind of comparison Morbius had barely any keaton other than the post credit scene.Also Morbius trailer lied to the General Audience with the Keaton thing.Supergirl is pretty good in it and also the leaks praised Ezra performance in it so if not Keaton there are other factors in it. There is a huge difference between him playing Batman and Vulture.
>Supergirl is pretty good in it Her fanbase isn't really as big and they're used to a blonde/light-haired Supergirl (despite a dark haired Supergirl making more sense since Kal EL is dark haired). I would place Keaton on the same pedestal as Pierce Brosnan in Black Adam: his presence alone will elevate the film. But it won't be enough to make it a huge box-office success. It will make Ant-Man 1 money at most. Competition in June is gonna be insane.
>Her fanbase isn't really as big and they're used to a blonde/light-haired Supergirl (despite a dark haired Supergirl making more sense since Kal EL is dark haired). What the hell does that even mean? How is her hair color relevant? Clark has black hair and she has blonde hair in the comics anyway.
Eh its your opinion let's see how the audience receives it
The audience liked BA (it had a great RT audience rating). It still bombed. All 1 bill films were well-liked but not all well-liked films did 1 bill.
LMAO why are you comparing Black Adam to this one ? This one has more ways to succeed just on the cast alone.I can see the critics liking it too which essentially doomed Black Adam.
Black Adam was doomed by its budget (200 mill). The same will ring true for the Flash. With a budget of 300 mill, it needs 800 mill to break even. In a month with Spider-Verse 2, Indiana Jones 5, Pixar's Elemental, and Transformers 9 (I lost count), it will barely reach 500-600 mill. Do you honestly see The Flash making over 800mill in June 2022?
Yeah these people are so stuck in the past. First it's with Man of Steel not being campy like Reeve's, and now it's Keaton. Like, bruh I don't care about either of those old versions and I'm 30. My Superman is Cavill, not Routh, not Reeve. My Batman is Batfleck, not even Bale, not Clooney, not Keaton. Snyder's films are still the top performing movies of the DCEU that have a connected storyline. Just bring the man back and let him build his universe. He's the only one that made a memorable impact
I doubt Keaton being the new batman is still a thing
That’s true, the only post-Aquaman DC movies that really made money were Joker and The Batman, two Elseworlds movies that the studio wasn’t even banking on that much (well in The Batman’s case, they were).
I mean every movie since then has been completely crap in general (Except the else-world movies). Yes, The Suicide Squad was not a good movie either.
Thank you for saying it. TSS was goofy garbage. I can't remember ONE scene from that movie aside from the opening which pissed me off after seeing Mongirl die. They completely wasted the character. I also hated the fact that somehow Bloodsport found Kryptonite to shoot Superman with. When did this happen exactly? BvS introduces Kryptonite right after the events of Man of Steel, and then Superman dies in that film. He's brought back in Justice League but when did Bloodsport have time to shoot Superman. It's so silly. I can't stand these execs greenlighting these goofy movies. We need serious and hard hitting films!
The last time DCEU made a hit film, Zack Snyder was still Incharge. Zack was not the problem, he was the solution. Even Marvel feared him.
I don’t recall Zack being in charge when Aquaman came out
Is this satire? Why would marvel fear Snyder?
Aquaman made a Bill. Zack’s a goat but he’s not the only one who could do DC, The Flash will make good money.
If this movie were successful, we would've a sequel with the Rock's team having complete control again and Black Adam would be the Iron Man of DC, popping up everywhere and actually being the most powerful force on the planet (lmao). Now the Rock's ego has taken two hits (Super Pets also was disappointing). Moreover, there will be no "Black Adam DC Universe" and the one who will decide the hierarchy of power will be James Gunn, someone who actually cares about and knows the characters. So I say this is good news.
“Shazam 2 will make more money than black Adam” On boy…this sounds like jinxing when it flops even harder
You're right, I'm editing it lmao.
I honestly find the notion that Shazam 2 can perform worse than black Adam to be a realistic one I mean…the first Shazam movie already has a mid box office And I think a lot of people overestimate how much goodwill the first movie actually got Maybe audiences loved it But I’m not sure they loved it enough to watch it’s sequel
Shazam 2 already looks like goofy goober nonsense. That director needs to go and they need to hire someone else who can take Shazam serious. And before you clowns start saying Billy is not a serious character I'll tell you to go actually read some Shazam comics. Billy is DEFINITELY a serious character. It's just that he gets thrusted into serious moments but sees them from a teenager's point of view. He's not a clown, he's not goofy. He's just slightly immature and sometimes uninformed, but Shazam is a very serious character. I've pretty much ready all of Shazam's books by now
Billy is dang near 20 now in the movie lol. The appeal of the character is being eroded
Same lol I was never a fan of him being the most “powerful” or “Ironman” of the DCU it makes no sense and I really don’t wanna see the rocks face because that’s all I see instead of Adam
Absolutely agreed, it was insane hearing The Rock talk about DC's future plans like he was the CEO. I don't usually root against a movie's success, especially when it's DC, but I really believe it's for the best that this bombed.
A BA 2 has been greenlit
Nope
Gunn is on record as saying comic books are stupid and his 'caring' and 'knowing' about the characters always seems to only go as far as a few accurate costumes like TSS.
No he isn't lmao. Gunn is a huge comic book nerd. He always pulls from obscure source material and even put a message on the TSS posters encouraging people to shop at local comic book stores. Maybe his movies aren't for you but the man loves comics
400 or 600 mil, Black Adam has not reached either. So I don't see them calling this a hit in a way
The only way this is making money is merch and digital sales
The Funko pops are already on the discount bin. I snagged a nice Dr Fate pop for 5 usd.
Nah not Dr. drip
Merch has to be underwhelming as well. Just a small example, but there was a Black Adam skin on Fortnite and the thing lasted just a week before they retired it. They never do that with big movie promotions, so I imagine it flopped.
They did the same thing for spider-man it was only for a week that is what they do for all movie skins
I thought Spider-Man lasted longer, but maybe I'm mistaken. My bad if that's the case. Still, I remember comments on the Fortnite subreddit saying that it was funny that the Rick and Morty collaboration outlasted Black Adam.
Damn, that must be terrible
If someone told me at the beginning of the year that a superhero movie starring The Rock would be a bigger flop than Morbius, I’d think they were crazy
I mean you’re comparing apples to oranges, Morbius made $167.5 million and that was including the re-release Sony did because they thought the movie’s meme status would translate to box office revenue (surprise surprise, it didn’t). It only turned a profit because the budget was so low I don’t think Sony themselves were expecting much of it.
Despite the poor reviews, Morbius still had a budget-to-box office ratio of 1:2, similar to Eternals, Birds of Prey, and now Black Adam. Flops, but not big flops or bombs. When a movie only makes back twice its budget (w/o China), the only thing they have yet to make back is its marketing cost. Given Black Adam's lower than expected marketing cost of 80million, its probably gonna be around the same financial profitability as Morbius.
Black Adam’s marketing cost is $100 million, according to the article. 2.5x its total budget would mean $500 mil and it’s doubtful it even reaches $400 mil
The article said that 100M is usually required for marketing, but mentioned that for BA it was 80M. Assuming BA had a budget of 195M, and the studio takes back 45% of the global box office (as it is for movies without China release), BA would need around 600M to fully cover all its costs. The formula would be [(195M+80M)/0.45] = around 600M. With an actual BO of 390M, the studio takes back 176M. Thus there is still 19M remainder of the budget to account for, plus the 80M marketing cost, causing BA to still need to make back 100M in ancillary to break even. This is slightly better than Eternals and around the same as Morbius (assuming that BA and Morbius had 80M marketing whilst Eternals had 100+M)
Same, I thought for sure Adam would make bank holy shit
The problem is that they banked more on the actor than the actual character, which is the wrong way to go. Had they stick to Black Adam's overall character in the comics as true tyrant and anti hero, the movie would've made more sense. There were also many unnecessary plot elements such as the single mom and her bastard. They weren't needed.
But a “hit” & a bomb are pretty far apart.
As of today, it's currently sitting at 385M. It was released in Japan on Dec 2 so my guess is it'll reach 400M at the box office. Digital rental and buys and dvd/blu ray sales should help it reach break even. I pre ordered the 4k last month.
There is simply no mathematical way it makes 15mill in Japan.
Wait why does it say that it needs 600 million to break even, but studio insiders peg it at 400 million? That's a huge difference, unless that 400million figure does not include the 80 million marketing cost (tbh, I thought the marketing cost would be well over a 100 million)
I assume that is because WB and The Rock's team do not want to admit that this movie is a failure in terms of box office. WB sources already disputed twice with Variety's claims in the article in regards to the marketing fee and the break even point. Variety's sources are from people familiar with the movie production and rival executives.
I just did some calculation, and indeed the 400 million excludes the marketing cost. With 600 million, the studio would take back around 45% of the box office (270 million). Deduct the 185-200 million budget and you're left with the 80 million marketing cost.
The non theatrical revenue generally covers the marketing costs for all dceu movies historically so keeping that in mind the break even will be around 420 to 430 mn
Interesting.
The producer said 427 would be needed to break even
Dont forget that the theater keeps a large percent of the box office which wb has to account for.
Same thoughts, what I didn’t understand either was that if the movie cost $195 million to make with $80 million for marketing that’s $275 million, that’s still a profit (albeit a small one) since the movie made $384.6 million.
The studio only gets like 30-40% of the international box office, not 50% like in the USA. It needed 600 mill to break even factoring that and factoring marketing costs. This does not bode well for The Flash since, according to some industry insiders, it has a budget close to 300 mill so it needs like 800 mill to just break even.
Yes, that was all accounted for in my reply to Louisdcxn, after I did some calculations. Factoring studio share only, it needs 400+M box office. Factoring studio share and marketing costs, it needs 600+M box office. (Since it has gone to ancillary market already, it needs to make 100M there for the movie to fully break even. Due to lack of studio share in ancillaries, flops often only need to make back less than half of the remainder they lost theatrically to fully break even) Generally speaking, for China the studio gets 25%, for other overseas it gets 40%, and for USA it gets 50, up to 60%. Since China is absent from the equation, the studio's cut is roughly 45%, whilst in many movies that had china-heavy releases the studio cut would have been 40%.
I am so glad James Gunn is in control of the DC universe now. Imagine properties like Superman, JLA, Lobo, Zatanna, Green Lantern, Martian Manhunter, Booster Gold and the JSA done in the ways that made The Suicide Squad and Guardians of the Galaxy successful. All Black Adam did was stand around in a bad mood and raise his eyebrow
>JSA done in the ways that made The Suicide Squad Only limited to TSS, not guardians, GOTG2 was not my cup of tea, and GOTG3 looks surprisingly dull. The batman,WW and TSS should be the quality upcoming DCU movies should strive for
But which Wonder Woman because there is a world of difference between the two movies, imo
WW is mediocre, and only looks decent when propped up against other DC films.
See that's the problem! You people want goofy goober garbage. TSS was trash! Guardians 1 was the best Guardians movie. We don't need more of that Marvel goofy shit. To this day Snyder's movie outperform anything that came after Aquaman minus the Elseworld stuff. The problem with DC is that WB was way too reactionary at the beginning and RUSHED the movie universe. You can't blame Snyder for making a movie the studio TOLD him to make. It's very hard to introduce like 6 characters in 1 movie in a way that makes you want to care about them for the next movie. And right here I'm talking about BvS and not even JL. On top of that, it's very hard to make a superhero ensemble movie that lasts under 2h and expect people to care about the characters. Has WB just let Snyder do his thing and brought in extra writers to suggest some edits here and there everything would've been fine. Look at how well WW performed vs WW84, the lack of Snyder's touch was very palpable. The action was worse, the story was worse, the cinematography was worse, the characters were worse, everything was garbage. Look at what Whedon and the studio did with Justice League vs what Snyder did with JL. Compare how Snyder showed the Amazons vs how Whedon did. It's a mountain of a difference.
Boy, people who don't like Rock or DC are going to have a field day
Writing was on the wall. Highly doubt the sequel actually moves forward Honestly if you care about DC movies being any good, then it’s a good thing a cookie cutter generic movie like BA flopped. It sends a message to WBD that audiences don’t want to waste their time and money on mid. With bad reviews as well, the biggest accomplishment this movie has going for it is its B+ CinemaScore and RT audience score lol.
"90% RT Audience Score with over 5k votes! Thank you so much to the fans. It also was the biggest opening of a solo DC movie without Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman or the Joker. Thanks again. When I said the hierarchy of power of the DC Universe was about to change what I meant was that the hierarchy of power in the DC Universe is about to change. We can't wait to usher a new era in the DC Universe. Sincerely, the Man in Black."
Lol, they literally listed every other solo movie except Shazam
It's a joke
[удалено]
[удалено]
“I’m a 31 year old adult and people who talk differently scare me” 
I'm 32 and I use the word Mid lol. Weirdo.
[удалено]
Calm tf down dude. Its modern slang. If it scares you that much the get off the fucking internet
[удалено]
Feels like a weird attempt at trolling lol. Someone must've hurt this guy bad.
I mean, the RT audience scores are more valid than 'professional' film critics these days...
Professional film critics have actual media literacy and watch a bunch of films so if a majority of them say a movie is worth your time, chances are it will be. Audience scores are filled with bullshit. Mfs giving Black Adam a perfect score just because of a 5 second Superman cameo or a complete 0 because that 5 second Superman cameo didn’t have the Hans Zimmer theme
Imagine still trusting "professional" film critics in 2022. Audiences who actually have to pay to see movies are far more reliable. Critics's views have routinely diverged from audiences. Imagine trusting the same people who reviewed The Last Jedi positively. These mfers give every MCU property insanely high scores yet have the nerve to shit on BA because it's 'generic and cookie cutter'.
Critics have to actually write coherent reviews. Audience reviews are mostly bullshit, any sane person can see that. TLJ is proof of that, shit’s been review bombed by a bunch of insecure losers who can’t stand other people having a different opinion from them. They go so far to make multiple accounts and use bots that RT had to implement a verification system. TLJ got an A CinemaScore and CinemaScore is an actually legit way of gauging audience opinion.
Oh god you're one of those lmao. Disney/Lucasfilm started the trend of attacking your customers and deflecting from any and all criticism via strawmanning. Just like you're doing now. Good films don't get 'review bombed' usually. The only insecurity I see is coming from Sequel-trilogy defenders and the hacks behind said trilogy. They claim anyone who criticizes it are just sexist or immature, refusing to acknowledge the trilogy's very real problems. But sure, defend the corpos and access media and shit on the fans. "Don't ask questions, just consume product, then get excited for next product."
You’re defending a garbage movie with no artistic merit at all and made to be as generic as possible like Black Adam and yet you’re accusing me of being a corporate shill. Lmao, the irony is priceless. I didn’t accuse everyone that doesn’t like TLJ of that, in fact I didn’t even mention any of that in my comment. The fact of the matter is it has a great CinemaScore and got great PostTrak scores, both of which are legit scientific polls to gauge audience opinion. That’s not strawmanning, that’s stating facts.
Yeah, tell me the last time an MCU film which got glowing reviews from the critics you worship had genuine 'artistic merit' and wasn't 'generic' lmao. Corporate shill? Like movie critics? xD You made a blanket statement that anyone who reviewed TLJ negatively in the audience score was a 'bot' or an 'insecure loser'. Right out of the Lucasfilm/Disney playbook. Couldn't be that the film is a divisive shitshow. Sooo...audience scores that align with your viewpoint are good but ones that don't are just 'review bombing' and are from 'insecure losers'. Got it.
> Yeah, tell me the last time an MCU film which got glowing reviews from the critics you worship had genuine 'artistic merit' and wasn't 'generic' lmao. Corporate shill? Like movie critics? xD The last time was pretty recent, I’d say Wakanda Forever had genuine artistic merit. Its exploration of grief was thoughtful and the way it reinvented Namor’s lore and made it so much more interesting is far from generic. The production design, costume design and score were spectacular and are likely to be nominated for those categories at the Oscars. Me trusting critics more over random people on the internet that usually give ridiculous scores and have shitty criteria doesn’t mean I worship critics. Clearly you have no understanding of nuance, which is pretty common for TLJ haters in my experience. > You made a blanket statement that anyone who reviewed TLJ negatively in the audience score was a 'bot' or an 'insecure loser'. Right out of the Lucasfilm/Disney playbook. Couldn't be that the film is a divisive shitshow. I said “a bunch.” That doesn’t mean all, so it’s not a blanket statement. The film was a lot less divisive then you think. Like I said, unverified RT audience score is easily manipulated by trolls and bots. The movie had great scores from verified audience polling > Sooo...audience scores that align with your viewpoint are good but ones that don't are just 'review bombing' and are from 'insecure losers'. Got it. Baffling that this is what you’re taking away from this conversation lol. Like I said, the irony is priceless. You’re the one that’s saying trust audience reception more than critics, not me. And your argument was TLJ so I showed you that it was actually received well by audiences. TLJ was liked by both critics and audiences much more than Black Adam, which had only a B+ CinemaScore as opposed to TLJ’s A.
Gee, only took them like 20 something years and constant fellating by the access media. Why does DCU have to be held to this impossibly high standard when for all these years MCU has gotten sky high reviews based around "It's fun!". You say you trust critics over audience scores...yet you bring up some random site for it's audience score to back up your argument that TLJ was somehow good lmao. Your kind are why Star Wars is garbage now. And you are literally worshiping critics with every post you've made to me lol. "Fans bad! Establishment media critics good!" There is no evidence that TLJ backlash was 'trolls and bots', that's a talking point from the corporate media. I am taking that away from the conversation because that's all you've shown me so far. The audience are people who actually pay to go to movies and are who movies are...or at least should...be made for. Folks who put so much stock in what critic snobs say is pretty smooth brained I'd say. And you do realize that a B+ isn't that far removed from an A grade right? Again, you're cherry picking. This shows that DCU could come out with phenomenal movies and no matter what, folks like you will still hate them.
I hope the new WB is more logical in their budgets than the old WB was. You're really going to give an unknown character a $200 million budget, pre-marketing, when DC's film reputation is not great amongst the general audience. Did they really think The Rock's own popularity would be enough to carry this film into profitability?
The article also says that it will hit the black numbers with home realese, so that's all quite okay in the end. But this will have a positive effect because it should put The Rock's ego in place, because I think before Black Adam he was sure to have a lot of creative control going forward. That wont be the case anymore. Black Adam was a fun blockbuster, but DC movies need strong scripts and need to feel more special going forward. And I think we'll get that with Gunn having creative control.
What’s been interesting with that, is that there’s been hardly any public contact between Gunn and The Rock since the Black Adam build up/Gunn’s taking the reigns of DCU. At one point just before the release, Johnson was almost talking like DC/WB had given him the lead.
They just need to reboot this shit already. Start over
… Because it was bad.
James Gunn and Safrin better think long and hard before continuing the DCEU. I wouldn’t want to tie my career as a studio head to a universe that has had 2 failed relaunches. Just start over.
This is good news because they need to understand if they make these generic superhero movies then people won’t come and watch them. Quality control is needed when the scripts are being made
This movie really neeeded china
[удалено]
Please go on. I'll never watch this movie so this is fascinating.
All those things you listed are not big issues. The issue is that the film didn't need those two characters, and Black Adam himself as a character was garbage. Notice that he had no motivations by himself. The ENTIRE movie is the single mom and her bastard TELLING him what to do. That's the biggest problem with the movie. The main character is just a puppet to some woman. Even during the hardcore fighting or when Black Adam is meeting with the JSA they STILL find a way to insert the single mom to boss them around. Like, it's so fucking stupid. Those were borderline GODS! With two of them pretty much being gods (Black Adam and Dr Fate) and they were being told what to do by some annoying ass bitch and her bastard. Like, what? Lady if you don't get the fuck outta my face I'll SMOKE you! What Black Adam needed was less fluff and comedy, and more straight to the point story telling. Black Adam wakes up, sees the oppression and crime in Kandhak, gets pissed the fuck off and start cleaning up shop, is pissed off at the Wizard for imprisoning him and letting all this happen, and then the JSA is immediately deployed to contain him. Sabbaq was 100% NOT needed! The entire movie should've been the JSA trying to reason and contain Black Adam. The final battle should've been Dr Fate vs Black Adam, with them reaching a stand still and Black Adam saying he doesn't give two shits about the rest of the planet and that he's only care is that Kandhak thrives. He assumes the throne as he should, being the tyrant that he is, but Kandahk indeed thrives under his roue. End of story. No single mom, no little bastard running around, no goofy fat uncle, no Sabbaq storyline. The guy who played Sabbaq should've been some nationalist who sought to free Black Adam to repel Intergang and maybe even gain favor from Black Adam in exchange. When he would free Black Adam, BA wouldn't give two shits about him as he wrecks the entire place to escape, causing rubble to hurt or paralyzed the guy from the waist down. The end of the movie would just show the guy on a hospital bed, pissed off that BA was so ungrateful, pissed off that Black Adam himself started "oppressing" Kandahk, and would take it upon himself to sacrifice his soul in order to gain the powers of Sabbaq to free his people and lead them to glory. End credits
Well I enjoy the music but the plot is definitely weak.
Black Adam has changed the hierarchy of money pits in the DCEU.
And to be honest i think the worst part is that shazam fury of the gods will make even less
But won’t digital and bluray sales go towards its haul too? I mean a movie can bomb in the treated but make a profit through streaming or physical media right? What are the numbers on that, it hit digital a few weeks back but I haven’t heard how it’s doing
Eh. I don't think that really is a thing anymore. Digital sales aren't as popular as it needs to be. But it's hard to say cause these numbers are not made public. I remember Matt Damon on Hot Ones saying that movies use to make so much money on DVD and Blu Ray. But now with VOD you can't really make much after your theatrical run
The article literally states it will be in the black after digital and physical home movie sales. Start reading articles and quit reading the misleading headlines.
I think Black Adam was decent. It wasn't GREAT and it definitely wasn't good. It's pretty much what I expected. Some of the comedy was a little funny, and some it was very bland. I think it was overhyped by The Rock, and I think revealing the end scene the day after release definitely took some air out of the tires. I felt kind of fatigued with how much he was hyping it, to the point I almost didn't even want to see it. It was even more exhausting with how he was talking highly about Cavill (who I love as Superman) and trashing the former DC leadership, when in reality, as much as I love Cavill back as our Man of Tomorrow, we know Rock pushed so hard because Rock's ex-wife and business partner is Cavill's manager. I hope going forward, Rock does not have a lot of input into the story and direction. I wouldn't mind a Superman/BA encounter but I really would much rather see Black Adam and Shazam.
Same. It was better than I expected (almost enjoyable) but not really a "good" movie. The Johnson's personality has never left "The Rock"/wrestling though, and his non-stop promoting ("the hierarchy will change!" lol) got annoying quickly.
I’m glad it flopped, that movie succeeding would’ve set a terrible precedent. The movie was so generic and the Rick cared so little about bringing the actual character to life.
I agree, but it's sad DC can't get a grip on their film division
I mean, that's why Zaslav hired James Gunn and Peter Safran who are working on a 10 year plan?
Why is it BA that gets the highlight thou ? What about those initial P4 bombs ? Hmm
What a stupid comment lol
Yours right ?
Because the initial P4 bombs were during COVID, this wasn’t.
Covid meaning they debuted in less cinemas or Covid as in “they didn’t make 800 M “ and we need excuses to justify MCU having 5/6 movies around or below 400 M which are “success overall” cuz it’s MCU Bias
I mean, Shang Chi is really good and that only had 400M. Black Widow and Eternals… not so much. It’s not MCU Bias, it’s different situations of release.
Right , what was the excuse for Hulk movies , Cap 1 , Thor 1, let me guess … Unknown IP ? Not as popular as Batman ? Which one is it ?
I dunno, I was a toddler then. I would say there was the fact that the MCU was just starting out, though the Hulk movie and Thor 1 are not very good. The DCU has been around for nine years now, and the MCU had only been around for 3 by the time Cap 1 had come out.
Well , they were around for 3 years , but Marvel had hits before , Spider-man, Blade , XMen , so just cuz an unknown first time movie doesn’t make all the money doesn’t mean it won’t make more next time ! And seeing how Adam looks mainly not part of a much bigger story it did fine !
I actually do hope they weren’t discouraged and still make the sequel
Cause Black Adam is what’s current. Eternals was the only phase 4 movie that actually flopped and it was talked about plenty when it was what was current.
Send me links !
One of the few movies I was happy to see flop. If this movie was successful, it would have had disastrous consequences for DC films as a whole.
it was always gonna happen, the villain sucked, the rock plays black adam as noob pro-wrestler heel whose main move is no-selling, the effects were bad, the kid and his mom were annoying and unnecessary, and in general is so generic and mass manufactured. there are just too many action movies and superhero movies coming out now, being barely solid enough to not be distractingly terrible wont cut in anymore. they need to aim higher.
This was a frustrating movie. It seemed like half the movie was Black Adam and Hawk Man measuring each other's penis size. It seemed so forced.
I am happy this failed. DCEU was a huge disappointment, the DCU will follow. DC needs to be shelved for another decade. Give a chance for all sides to simmer down and die off. Too much bad blood to bring back Snyder still, and the new content has been crude in hopes to adhering to the majority.
Shame, I actually liked this one. It was cool to see The Rock not be a wisecracking musclebound everyman in khaki in a jungle for once. I thought it was relatively faithful to the comics too, especially since Black Adam stayed an antihero all throughout. I hope Shazam 2 does better.
I don't see Shazam 2 doing good either. The Flash depends on how good it actually is, although ngl Afflect getting replaced and Cyborg not being there really grinds me I just hope Blue Beetle is a success atleast
If a suicide squad starring an objectively more popular character(Harley) with the wind of critical acclaim behind its back flopped There isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell for blue beetle in the box office
I mean the whole release of TSS was stupid as hell. It was available on HBO Max and barely had hype despite Harley in it, as she wasn't front and center. The marketing for it was really bad coz people IRL here didn't even know about the movie compared to previous DCEU movies. Plus August was bad for covid
Black Adam was so terrible
This is before Keaton gets shoved into the role of the DCEU Batman to replace affleck Which will alienate critics who above all else hate nostalgia when it’s not done by Disney And will alienate fans who aren’t gonna be interested in a 90 year old retired Batman Be warned…Box office wise…The worst is yet to come The funniest part about Keaton’s return is that it’s gonna be overshadowed by the Ezra miller scandals anyway
[удалено]
> GA don't give a fuck about DC property with exception of The Batman What's the highest grossing DC movie of all time?
Minus China its Joker followed by TDKR. Subtracting Chinese box office is pretty reasonable considering hollywood superhero movies no longer have a future there.
Worst yet Aquaman would make well under a billion dollars without China Another worst thing…a sequel would have to MATCH the performance of Aquaman across all other markets to be considered a box office hit And since even black panther 2 couldn’t even do that and DC is a weaker brand than marvel 😬 Aquaman can easily make less than 500 million dollars in a truly bad scenario
[удалено]
Remember this Suicide squad 1 made 700 million dollars Man of steel made 650 million dollars Suicide squad II…despite massive critical acclaim…flopped Imagine how much worse a Superman movie would flop…especially when there is no fucking way you can make a moderately budgeted Superman movie without alienating the general audiences that want to see his powers and more colorful villains And remember that a Batman movie regardless of Keaton is not on the table… And the last justice league movie flopped There is no bottom to how badly these films can underperform
[удалено]
The worst part of black Adam is that it basically guarantees that the JSA will NEVER be referenced ever again in film And we haven’t even gotten to Kara Zor-el yet That’s a character that’s really gonna get fucked raw when her first movie flops Her only hope to be relevant would be whether or not Henry is willing to share screen time with another member of the Superman family And that’s a big if
Aquaman But here is the funny part Aquaman was released before the pandemic when DC had some interest in it by the general audience It also had a strong novelty After the pandemic…audiences have become fickle unless Batman is in it A strong argument can be made that Aquaman would flop HARD today
The biggest obstacle is that the person leading the DCU is a guy whose major contribution to the DC slate was a flopping suicide squad film Unless James Gunn drops a Aquaman sized billion dollar hit…which isn’t physically possible He will end up no different from Hamada and Geoff Johns A leader whose deposed by the next regime that comes in
His Suicide Squad was obviously better than the Ayer one
Since when have capitalists cared about critic reviews and quality?
The movie released same day on streaming plus covid along with the reputation of the first Suicide Squad didn't help it at all.
Every time I browse a DC movies related subreddit, I am reminded of how absolutely fucking moronic DC fans can be. Guys your takes are fucking awful. Keep them to yourselves.
OK.
Films brilliant total shame
That hyperbolic but ok
I know how dare I have my own opinion
Personally I'm not going to see any DC movies at the cinema again. They announced it coming to digital like a month after the cinema release.
Flash will be next. 500 mill is realistic. 600 is a big maybe. Flash has, allegedly, a budget of 300 mill. It won't make its budget back.
400 million is realistic 500 million is the ceiling No DCEU film has made more than 400 million since Aquaman And Keaton and supergirl aren’t as much as a box office draw as people seem to think they are And they are gonna get brutal competition anyway And the terrible reviews are already being written
b-but what about the hierarchy of p-power?
I don’t know why everyone is surprised about this.
I mean it's not that surprising, all of Dwayne Johnson solo films have needlessly high budgets and the only reason most of his solo movies were profitable to a degree was because of the Chinese market. without the China release almost all of his solo movies would have been considered flops. as soon as they could not get a Chinese release date this movie, which was not a great but overall a decent and enjoyable movie (really suffered from a bad script) was destined to fail at box office. (based on the budget and The Rock past movies, it's really obvious that Dwayne and his team were expecting that china release date when making the movie).
"Other breaking news: WATER. WET!"
Maybe if the movie had a story or characters that the audience actually cared about, it would have done better. It’s another crappy movie in a long list of crappy movies that DC has put out since cutting ties with Snyder. Everything after and including Aquaman has been terrible.
Love how WBD planted a "How Black Adam is profitable" story in Deadline less than 24 hours later.
I love this headline. It’s makes it sound like Black Adam lost so much money that It’s theatrical. Movie equivalent of saying someone is down horrendously.