Superheroes aren't cheap. Studios need to make serious bank just to break even on a movie, and these DC duds put Warner Bros. hundreds of millions of dollars in the hole... sometimes for some pretty weird reasons.
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00:00Superheroes aren't cheap.
00:02Studios need to make serious bank just to break even on a movie.
00:06These DC duds put Warner Brothers hundreds of millions of dollars in the hole,
00:11sometimes for pretty weird reasons.
00:14By the time the DC Extended Universe got around to giving The Flash his own movie,
00:18the ship had already sailed.
00:202023's The Flash was one of the last movies in the faltering franchise.
00:24It cost anywhere between 200 and
00:26$220 million to make, with estimates indicating that it needed to pull in
00:31around $400 million to break even.
00:35It didn't come close to that, earning only $271 million globally.
00:40Why?
00:41To start with, Ezra Miller didn't do the movie any favors.
00:44Allegations of misconduct against Miller brought a lot of negative attention to
00:48the film, just before its marketing push got into full swing.
00:52But even without the negative buzz, the film itself garnered numerous complaints.
00:57For one, the stylized Speed Force scenes didn't land the way the filmmakers
01:01probably hoped, and the CG itself was sometimes jarringly bad.
01:05Finally, I don't know how much this affected ticket sales, but
01:08it probably didn't help that a reverse clip of the Scarlet Speedster appearing to
01:12put a baby in a microwave took over social media and
01:16turned the whole thing into even more of a joke.
01:19Basically, the Flash stumbled hard before it even began its theatrical run, and
01:23it only got worse from there.
01:26I had a really great time, by the way.
01:27We should do this again.
01:27Blue Beetle is a fairly popular DC Comics character who's been around since 1939.
01:39But despite his long history, he hasn't shown up much outside of comics,
01:42cartoons, and minor TV appearances.
01:45The character's fan base is on the smaller side, so
01:47there wasn't a huge crowd of people waiting for his movie.
01:51Casting Sholo Maraduena of Cobra Kai fame in the title role for
01:55the 2023 movie was a smart move by Warner Brothers.
01:59But even his charisma couldn't save this film from financial failure.
02:03Let's do this.
02:05Yeah!
02:10It's estimated that Blue Beetle cost $120 million to produce.
02:15But it only made around $130 million at the global box office.
02:19Part of the reason was a poorly structured marketing campaign.
02:22But more importantly,
02:24Blue Beetle was another movie riding on the dwindling fumes of the DCEU.
02:29Everyone knew from the start that there wouldn't be a sequel.
02:32It wouldn't kick off anything bigger.
02:34People were sort of just waiting for the universe to reboot at this point.
02:38There are a lot of reasons Blue Beetle bombed, but
02:40it basically boiled down to this.
02:43Nobody wanted to watch it.
02:45I believe in truth, but I'm also a big fan of justice.
02:52Justice League, where do you even start with this movie?
02:55The 2017 team up was supposed to be Warner Brothers and
02:58DC's answer to the Avengers.
03:00But even though it made a decent chunk of change, it was still a financial flop.
03:05All told, Warner Brothers pumped an estimated $300 million into the production.
03:10Spending so much meant that the breakeven point was around $750 million.
03:15But it only brought in $661 million worldwide,
03:19costing the studio nearly $100 million in losses.
03:24The problem started in production.
03:26Director Zack Snyder had to leave before it was finished due to personal reasons.
03:30And Joss Whedon was brought aboard to punch up the script,
03:33tackle reshoots, and take the whole thing to the finish line.
03:37It was a disaster, to put it lightly.
03:39Something tells me we're not getting the band back together.
03:42Whedon's lighter take was jarring next to the tone set up by Snyder.
03:46The story was generic and it often felt, for obvious reasons,
03:50like two completely different movies stapled together.
03:53And then to top it all off, it went and committed an unforgivable sin in comic
03:57book movies, the main villain was forgettable and ultimately pointless.
04:02Black Adam is another DC character who is largely unknown by those
04:06unfamiliar with the comics.
04:08That's not always a problem.
04:09And the 2022 film also had a huge star in the lead role in Dwayne Johnson,
04:14who promoted the movie extensively.
04:17Things will never be the same, because the hierarchy of power in the DC
04:21universe is about to change.
04:25Well, that didn't happen.
04:26Black Adam cost around $200 million to make,
04:30so its box office take of around $393 million
04:34wasn't anywhere near enough to justify the expense.
04:37When all was said and done, Warner Brothers
04:39lost as much as $100 million on the film.
04:43Johnson reportedly exerted a lot of creative control,
04:45which ultimately didn't help.
04:48One exec told The Wrap anonymously, Dwayne
04:51tries to sell himself as bigger than the movie.
04:54Instead of making a movie, he wants to extend his brand
04:57and make a brand centered on himself.
05:00That might explain some of the baffling creative decisions
05:03that went into the movie.
05:04But Johnson allegedly pressuring the studio to get his own way
05:08isn't the only reason Black Adam bombed.
05:11The DCEU was already in its death throes at this stage,
05:14and the film also had some stiff competition,
05:16with Marvel's Black Panther Wakanda Forever coming out soon after.
05:21How does it feel?
05:24Wrong.
05:25The first Aquaman film was a rare success for the DCEU,
05:29so a sequel was inevitable.
05:31Unfortunately, Warner Brothers waited too long.
05:34Five years passed before Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom
05:36hit theaters in 2023.
05:39Surprisingly, the movie actually did pretty well at the box office,
05:42pulling in over $434 million.
05:45Unfortunately, while that more than covered the film's
05:48$205 million production budget,
05:50the film still failed to make a profit.
05:53Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom reportedly needed to make
05:56somewhere between $510 million and $555 million just to break even,
06:02which was always going to be a big ask.
06:04The second Aquaman made a valiant effort,
06:06but between poor critical reactions,
06:08the long wait from the first film,
06:10and a bit of superhero fatigue,
06:12the film was destined to sink.
06:15Green Lantern has been a fan-favorite DC character for decades,
06:19but it took a long time before he arrived on the silver screen.
06:22In 2011, Ryan Reynolds took the reins as Hal Jordan,
06:26but unfortunately, his highly anticipated outing was a massive flop.
06:30The film cost $200 million to produce,
06:33and only made $237 million.
06:37Green Lantern was meant to launch a new film universe,
06:40but it bombed so hard that DC scrapped those plans.
06:43There are several reasons why Green Lantern bombed at the box office,
06:46but first and foremost was its over-reliance on visual effects.
06:51The decision to make the main character's costume with CGI was,
06:55well, let's call it misguided.
06:57What the hell is with that mask?
06:59It came with the outfit.
07:03Cool, huh?
07:04Due to budget changes, a lot of the CGI didn't get completed
07:07until super late in the production process, and it shows.
07:11Beyond the terrible graphics, Green Lantern also suffered from bad pacing,
07:15overstuffed backstory, and a generic plot.
07:17You can't paint over that with CGI, no matter how good.
07:21And in this case, none of it was good.
07:27Rough night, huh?
07:28The first Shazam caught lightning in a bottle at the box office.
07:32It managed to introduce a new character to the DCEU
07:35in a lighthearted, relatable way,
07:37without diluting the stakes of a good superhero film.
07:40It was just a grown-up kid fighting monsters.
07:42What's not to love?
07:43But that love had withered a bit by the time Shazam! Fury of the Gods came around.
07:48Zachary Levi gave it his all in the sequel,
07:50but the story didn't quite capture audiences the way the first one did.
07:54Reviews were unenthusiastic,
07:55and ultimately, the movie only brought in $134 million globally
08:00against a $125 million budget.
08:04For his part, Levi penned the poor performance on marketing.
08:07He wrote on X,
08:22One thing it had going for it was a sensible budget.
08:25But once the dust settled, it still ended up costing Warner Bros. a ton of cash.
08:30Long before Josh Brolin played the Mad Titan in the MCU,
08:33he took on the title role in DC's Jonah Hex.
08:37The trouble was, it was almost guaranteed to flop from its inception.
08:41A supernatural western based on a DC character mainstream audiences had never heard of
08:46is a hard sell.
08:48Even more so at the time when audiences had already tasted superhero greatness
08:52in films like The Dark Knight, on one hand,
08:55and on the other hand,
08:56were being shoveled endless CGI and gorge dribble from studios looking to capitalize on those good movies.
09:02The marketing suggested pretty strongly that Jonah Hex was one of the latter.
09:06So nobody was really surprised when Jonah Hex limped through theaters with $10.9 million to show for it.
09:12It seems like everybody pointed fingers at everyone else.
09:16Brolin in particular blamed an interfering studio and an inexperienced director,
09:21telling Variety that the studio re-cut it multiple times in test screenings
09:25and ultimately made, quote,
09:302017's Wonder Woman is an excellent film that introduced the character to a whole new generation of fans.
09:36It performed very well, so Warner Bros. was bound to prioritize a follow-up.
09:41Or so everyone thought.
09:42It took three years for Wonder Woman 1984 to materialize,
09:47and when it did, it was hamstrung by the COVID-19 pandemic.
09:51The sequel was delayed six times before it was released in December 2020,
09:55and Warner Bros. made the decision to release it simultaneously to theaters and via HBO Max.
10:02Bringing the movie to streaming obviously had a big impact on the box office haul.
10:06The $200 million production only made $169.6 million at the box office.
10:12While COVID is largely to blame for the film's rocky release, it's not the only reason the movie failed.
10:18It also had a ridiculous plot, a wooden villain,
10:21and at least a few fight scenes that belonged more in a video game than a tentpole blockbuster.
10:34Pandemic or not, Wonder Woman 1984 couldn't stand up to the original.
10:39One of the worst things filmmakers can do when making a superhero movie is to completely disregard the comics.
10:45Well, that's what happened with Halle Berry's Catwoman,
10:48which bears no resemblance to the comics outside the title.
10:52Instead of Selina Kyle, Catwoman is Patience Phillips.
10:56She has no connection to Batman or her comic book counterpart.
10:59But more than that, it's just a bad movie.
11:03It was me who flushed down the pipes.
11:06The script is terrible, the CGI is dreadful, and Berry's Catwoman costume doesn't make any sense,
11:11which is the only not-problem with the movie.
11:13Catwoman cost $100 million to produce and only made $82 million at the box office.
11:20The movie was so bad that it won four Razzies, including one for Berry,
11:24who accepted the award in person while holding her Best Actress Academy Award.
11:29At least she had a sense of humor about it.
11:33Director Tim Burton surprised the world with the highly successful Batman in 1989.
11:38After turning in a solid sequel, Burton left the franchise.
11:41The next film, Batman Forever, was directed by Joel Schumacher.
11:44It wasn't objectively awful, but Schumacher's follow-up, 1997's Batman & Robin,
11:49was so bad, it killed the Batman film franchise for the better part of a decade.
11:55Burton's films are dark and brooding while still having some campy elements,
11:59but Batman & Robin is all camp. All the time.
12:02Forgetting the so-called Batnipples and other ridiculous additions to the costume,
12:06the film plays like a toddler's fever dream,
12:09complete with some of the worst one-liners ever conceived.
12:12I'm running on empty. I need the diamonds from my hideout.
12:16I'll get them.
12:17I'm not going to let you go.
12:19I'm not going to let you go.
12:20I'm not going to let you go.
12:22I need the diamonds from my hideout.
12:24I'll help you grab your rocks.
12:26Batman & Robin cost the studio $125 million to produce, which was a lot in 1997.
12:33Ticket sales weren't too bad, all things considered,
12:36with the film bringing in $238 million at the box office.
12:41But it failed to break even and is considered to be one of the worst superhero movies ever made.
12:47Years later, George Clooney apologized for the film.
12:52He said,
12:53I'm not going to let you go.
12:55I'm not going to let you go.
12:57I'm not going to let you go.
12:59I'm not going to let you go.
13:01I'm not going to let you go.
13:03I'm not going to let you go.
13:05I'm not going to let you go.
13:07I'm not going to let you go.
13:09I'm not going to let you go.
13:11I'm not going to let you go.
13:13I'm not going to let you go.
13:15I'm not going to let you go.
13:17I'm not going to let you go.
13:19I'm not going to let you go.