10 Reasons Why JUSTICE LEAGUE Flopped at the U.S. Box Office

These guys fucked up a possible billion dollars in movie revenue for yearly bonuses. Seriously?

They wanted to line their pockets for the year. Just poor business decisions and not looking to the future. Feige is running circles around these idiots.
 
Hey DC people, would a team up of Joker and Lex Luthor as the main villains of Justice League have been a better idea for the movie?

It seems anything with Joker is a guaranteed money maker.
 
My dreams of an Animal Man and Plastic Man movie are slowly but surely fading away :(
 
10 Reasons for JUSTICE LEAGUE's Disappointing $94 Million U.S. Debut

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Warner Bros. and DC Film’s Justice League made its long-awaited launch last week and it debut to a dismal $94 million at the U.S. box office. The film was tracking to open at $110-$120 million last October. Cut to the present, it couldn’t even crack the $100 million ceiling. Compared to Man of Steel ($116M), Batman v Superman ($166M), Suicide Squad ($133M) and Wonder Woman ($103M), Justice League has the lowest opening weekend for a DCEU film ever. This would be unfathomable five years ago.

When The Avengers (2012) was released and everybody was losing their shit and declaring it to be the best comic book movie ever, the film had a whopping $207 million U.S. opening weekend and ended its theatrical run with $1.5 billion worldwide. People back then were saying that a live-action Justice League movie had a strong chance of beating The Avengers’ box office records, after all DC’s A-team was more popular and more well-known than Marvel’s “second-tier heroes.”

So who or what is to blame for the poor box office performance despite the promise of DC’s most iconic superheroes all gathered in one movie. Putting aside the quality of the actual film, below is a list of reasons that contributed either in a major way or small way to why Justice League flopped at the box office.


1. Post-Traumatic Snyder Disorder
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A lot of people found Batman v Superman relentlessly bleak, joyless, overlong, disjointed and crushed by its grim and incoherent narrative. So when they learn that Justice League is from the same director that made BvS, the thought of revisiting Snyder’s world seemed so unappealing and tedious to them. When they see the dark aesthetics and slow-motion action in the JL trailers, they conclude that JL will be more of the same as BvS.

With JL’s disappointing box office results, the general public is basically saying with their dollars that they don’t want to see a Zack Snyder handling the DCEU. The public actually told this to Warner Bros. with the poor box office performance of BvS last year but the studio refused to listen and now they’re paying the price… again. Even though it would cost them time and money to look for another director since they were already in pre-prodcution, not to mention the public humiliation, Warner Bros. should have just bit the bullet and replaced Synder.

With a reported production budget of $300 million and P&A (print & advertising) cost at $150 million, Justice League is considered to be the 3rd most expensive movie ever made. Box office experts report that the film might end up losing $50 to $100 million after its theatrical run. Ouch.


2. Batman v Superman was already like a Justice League movie
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The reason why the gathering of DC’s most popular superheroes didn’t feel quite as special in Justice League because WB already spoiled that moment with Batman v Superman where the Trinity (Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman) met for the first time and battled Doomsday. The $166 million opening BvS received would have belonged to JL if the the Big Three didn’t meet already. Sure, JL featured Flash, Aquaman and Cyborg joining the team but the casuals didn’t really care much for these “2nd-rate characters” since WB never gave them a solo movie prior to this, hence, the public didn’t really know them or cared much about them.


3. Rotten Tomatoes "cover-up" and score
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Rotten Tomatoes has become a very popular review aggregation website to the general public. So when RT withheld its score for Justice League to promote their Facebook show See It/Skip It (they also withheld their scores for other movies even before this), the public mistakenly thought it meant that JL must be really bad due to the embargo since Warner Bros. has a minority stake in RT. That incident and along with the actual RT score of 40% discouraged a lot of moviegoers to seeing BvS.


4. Poor word of mouth from the general public
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Even if you take out RT and the critics out of the equation, the public word of mouth has been mixed. Half that have seen Justice League thought it was good but not great, and half thought it was just above average or decent. Not exactly encouraging to hear for those undecided moviegoers, nor is it compelling enough to make them buy a ticket.

Five years ago when The Avengers came out, posters were singing its praises and raining down 9 and 10 star ratings like they were in a strip club. As of this writing, there’s barely any 9s and zero 10s so far in the Justice League ratings poll.


5. Marketing too early causing Justice League fatigue
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To assure the public that Justice League was not going to be as dark and gloomy as Batman v Superman, Warner Bros. invited the media on June 2016 for a sneak preview of a comical meeting between Bruce Wayne and Barry Allen and a scene where the team, except for Flash, disappears on Commissioner Gordon. WB then released the first official Justice League trailer to the general public at Comic-Con on July 2016, one year and four months before the film's release date. Since then, the public has been steadily bombarded with promos for the next 16 months which could have caused a Justice League fatigue among moviegoers.

This is one of the problems with Warner Bros. handling of the DCEU, they’re always reacting, sometimes over-reacting, and don’t have enough overriding vision. Let’s take a look at how Marvel Studios is handling their marketing for Avengers: Infinity War. Aside from the sizzle reel shown to the Comic-Con attendants, they still haven’t released a single official trailer for Infinity War yet and that movie comes out in just five months.


6. No Superman in promos
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Superman is noticeably absent from most of the marketing promos and posters for Justice League. I actually applaud them for not spoiling Superman’s return, even though everybody who followed the movie’s progress knows he is in there. But the fact is that the presence of Superman in the trailers and posters could have enticed casual viewers to go watch the movie and give JL an extra $10-$15 million boost to its opening weekend. Not really important but the team photos from the posters sorely lacks the vibrant blue color from Superman’s costume as well as seeing the iconic character with the team (plus they badly need a bright green color from Green Lantern or Martian Manhunter).


8. Thor: Ragnarok stealing Justice League's thunder
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Thor: Ragnarok came out 2 weeks ago and, not only received tons of praises from critics and audience alike, but debut to a surprising $122 million ($28 million more than Justice League). If somebody said last year that Ragnarok would defeat JL at the box office, that person would be laughed at. A Justice League insider tells THR, "If a B character from Marvel shut downs and outperforms the A team from DC, that’s an embarrassment." Indeed.

Ragnarok also earned $21.7 million on its 3rd weekend and possibly diverting ticket sales from JL. It’s also possible that casual moviegoers’ superhero fix have been met with Ragnarok and they’re no longer interested in seeing another superhero movie for the time being.

It's funny looking back at an old interview Snyder made back in 2008 where he made this foot-in-the-mouth statement, "The Marvel universe has gone nuts; we’re going to have a fricking Captain America movie if we’re not careful. Thor, too! We’re on our second Hulk movie. And Iron Man — $300 million domestic box office on a second tier superhero!" And this one in 2011, "I’m like, really? Thor? Thor has a movie? [Laughter.] Really? I mean, come on."


7. Steven Chbosky’s Wonder
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Steven Chboksy’s drama Wonder starring Julia Roberts and Owen Wilson earned an impressive $27 million to land No. 2 at the weekend box office, stealing some of the Justice League’s ticket sales. Per THR, Lionsgate's marketing team aggressively targeted elementary schools, a move that is paying off, with higher-than-usual group ticket sales. Busloads of kids from school went on a field trip to see Wonder, which also meant that some of the parents didn't also get the chance to accompany their kids to watch Justice League. RJ Palacio’s New York Times bestseller tells the story of a child with Treacher Collins Syndrome trying to fit in at a new school. Wonder is produced by Marvel Studios. (No it’s not)


9. Reports of post-production troubles
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Due to a family tragedy, Snyder left Justice League on May 2017 and Warner Bros. assigned Joss Whedon, who was already brought in by the studio months ago to rework on the script, to finish post-production and film the reshoots. On July 2017, word got out that the massive reshoots cost $25 million (the average reshoot for this type of movie cost around $6 to $10 million). Henry Cavill's mustache was also an issue as he was filming Mission: Impossible 6 at the same time as the Justice League reshoots. Paramount refused to let Cavill shave his mustache, so WB had to spend millions just to digitally remove the facial hair in post.

Soon, reports came in that WB has neutered Snyder and will no longer be a major creative influence for the DCEU. Near the JL release date, the negative buzz on Henry Cavill's CGI'd mouth began to circulate. All of this behind-the-scenes post-production drama and negativity could have influenced moviegoers into thinking that JL was going to be a disaster and not worth it to see at the cinemas.


10. Seventh member was deleted from final cut
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One of the reasons for Justice League’s stumble at the box office is the removal of all the scenes of the seventh member - Steve - in the actual movie despite being heavily promoted in their posters [1] [2], cover books [3], behind-the-scenes photo [4] and they even showed a clip [5] of this member in action. Snyder even teased Steve way back in 2015 when he tweeted a Justice League image with the slogan “Unite the Seven.” Such a shame, I for one would have liked to see war criminal and Marvel turncoat Steve kick some parademon butts.


Note: This might be merged with the official thread after a while.
Wait, wut?? Captain America is in the justice league??
 
Aquaman is already in the can. They're in post-production now. Shazam! is the next DCEU movie to go into production.

Here is a list of the DC Extended Universe films in various stages of development:

(Copied from Oct. 26, 2017 post, so some details might have changed.)


AQUAMAN - Finished principal photography. Directed by James Wan and stars Jason Momoa, Amber Heard, Willem Dafoe, Patrick Wilson and Nicole Kidman. December 21, 2018 release date.

SHAZAM! - The next DC film to go into production after Aquaman. David F. Sandberg (Lights Out) to direct. April 2019 release date.

WONDER WOMAN 2 - Patty Jenkins returns to direct. Dec. 2019 release date.

CYBORG - Premature announcement of movie and release date. Both are now unsure.

BATGIRL - Joss Whedon to write and direct.

THE BATMAN - Matt Reeves to write and direct, probably with a new Batman actor.

FLASHPOINT - The Flash movie already lost 2 directors. Still looking for a director. Flashpoint is a great story but a terrible idea for the first Flash movie and too early at this stage of the DCEU.

GOTHAM CITY SIRENS - Doubt this will get made since David Ayer badmouthed WB.

JUSTICE LEAGUE DARK - Lost director Doug Liman. Script is rewritten from scratch.

NIGHTWING - Adam McKay (The LEGO Batman Movie) to direct.

SUICIDE SQUAD 2 - Gavin O'Connor (Warrior, The Accountant) to write and direct.

GREEN LANTERN CORPS - David fucking Goyer to write the script. June 2020 release date.

UNTITLED BLACK ADAM MOVIE - Dwayne Johnson to play Black Adam.

UNTITLED DEADSHOT MOVIE - Suicide Squad spinoff with Will Smith to star.

UNTITLED JOKER AND HARLEY QUINN MOVIE - Suicide Squad spinoff from Crazy, Stupid, Love directors starring Jared Leto and Margot Robbie.

UNTITLED JUSTICE LEAGUE 2 MOVIE - Originally planned for June 2019 release, pushed back to unspecified date. They'll now wait and see how the first JL movie will do before proceeding.

UNTITLED LOBO MOVIE - Jason Fuchs to write the screenplay.

UNTITLED MAN OF STEEL 2 - Matthew Vaughn in discussion to direct.

UNTITLED JOKER ORIGIN MOVIE - Todd Phillips (The Hangover) to direct. The first film in the new DC banner that will be Not be connected with the DC Extended Universe.

The folks at DC are clueless. The solo movies are all cool ideas but they all needed to happen before Justice League so we would be familiar with these characters before they team up. Marvel showed the blueprint on how to do that, over the course of a decade.

DC wasted possibly their biggest villain and story arc (Doomsday and the death of Superman) on the second movie as an afterthought and it bombed. Where do they go from here? Steppenwolf was a joke.
 
ouch, 3 weekends to make 500 million world wide

the closer to star wars we get, will this movie even hit 700 million when all is said and done?
 
The folks at DC are clueless. The solo movies are all cool ideas but they all needed to happen before Justice League so we would be familiar with these characters before they team up. Marvel showed the blueprint on how to do that, over the course of a decade.

DC wasted possibly their biggest villain and story arc (Doomsday and the death of Superman) on the second movie as an afterthought and it bombed. Where do they go from here? Steppenwolf was a joke.

They should just keep all the actors and cancel or at least postpone all future projects until they introduce Green Lantern, Cyborg, Flash, and Aquaman properly. I like Deathstroke but why the hell is he getting his own movie before some of the most famous superheroes that DC has to offer. They're so stupid over there, literally any fan would run their cinematic universe better.
 
WB should do like DC Comics is doing and start cherry picking more talent from Marvel. DC Comics is killing Marvel books right now.
 
WB should do like DC Comics is doing and start cherry picking more talent from Marvel. DC Comics is killing Marvel books right now.

They need someone like Feige to steer the ship. Instead they get some assholes who just want to secure their yearly bonuses.

This is why the best solution is just give the movie rights to Feige and Marvel.
 
They need someone like Feige to steer the ship. Instead they get some assholes who just want to secure their yearly bonuses.

This is why the best solution is just give the movie rights to Feige and Marvel.
That'd be hilarious. I wonder if DC Comics would refuse to push any characters in the movies, like Marvel did with FF for a while there
 
That'd be hilarious. I wonder if DC Comics would refuse to push any characters in the movies, like Marvel did with FF for a while there

Or when Marvel thought the Inhumans (species) were an adequate replacement for not having mutants.
 
Or when Marvel thought the Inhumans (species) were an adequate replacement for not having mutants.

Judging by the fact that it was removed by Feige (after Disney purchased Marvel) from the upcoming lineup, I'm thinking it never really was thought as an adequate replacement for anything. Perlemutter was the one pushing for the Inhumans. That all changed once Disney became the new masters.
 
Hey DC people, would a team up of Joker and Lex Luthor as the main villains of Justice League have been a better idea for the movie?

It seems anything with Joker is a guaranteed money maker.
only if they can find good actors

both are geeks
 
I want DC to succeed as the more good movies out there the better. And nothing drives up quality like competition.
 
That's been Warner Brother's problem since day one: they are too greedy and too lazy to invest the time and money necessary to create an Expanded Universe that works. So they tried to run before they could walk. Instead of slowly building the core characters up with solo movies before the main event, they crammed together two of the most iconic story lines in comics history - Dark Knight Returns and Death of Superman - into a bloated mess, threw Wonder Woman in for good measure and managed to fuck up not only Lex Luthor but Doomsday as well.

These guys are pretty fcked from here on.

Where do they go from here, already messing up the main event and two of the most iconic story lines in comics??

They've already put a sour taste on all of us, and i'm already skeptical on their upcoming movies. I'll still watch it, support it but I just don't know how do they recover from such a flop
 
3 reasons

  1. Shitty characters not set up anywhere near what they needed
  2. Bad director who has a bad track record
  3. People are burnt out on generic ass superhero movies
 
Budget was $300 mil but the costumes and cgi looked like ass.
I think one reason the costumes looked so shitty was the fact that Whedon drastically changed the color palette. So in the end they had costumes designed for a dark and depressing film shot with a lot more brightness and color so they looked silly.

Cyborg would have looked like shit regardless though. From the first trailers I could not believe what I was seeing. So, so, so bad.
 
That'd be hilarious. I wonder if DC Comics would refuse to push any characters in the movies, like Marvel did with FF for a while there

For Marvel and Fantastic Four it was they got some monetary cut but the Fox idiots were destroying the brand. So it doesn't even matter if the comics are awesome if the brand is getting destroyed in the eyes of the general public. It's more like Sony and Spider Man. They couldn't do it right so Marvel cut a deal with them. Now movie Spider Man is awesome again.
 
Budget was $300 mil but the costumes and cgi looked like ass.

This is another thing I like about Marvel, they have their own concept design department. Not everything is a home run but at least they explore more designs than just rubber suit with carbon fiber texture.
 

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