Shazam! Fury Of The Gods Is One Of The Biggest Box Office Bombs In Superhero History
One would be forgiven for forgetting all about it at this point, but "Shazam! Fury of the Gods" is still in theaters, and it just had an absolutely brutal fourth weekend at the box office. The latest from DC and Warner Bros. fell another 65.3% — which it could ill afford to do — and took in just $1.6 million, while "The Super Mario Bros. Movie" took the lion's share of the attention from moviegoers to the tune of $377 million worldwide. That left little room for the Shazam Family and, with that, the movie's run at the domestic box office is pretty close to over, with little left in the tank internationally, either.
While the movie's final total has yet to be determined, it currently sits at $128 million worldwide against a $125 million budget. That is, to put it lightly, an absolutely disastrous number for a sequel to a critically beloved superhero film. 2019's "Shazam!" remains one of the best-reviewed DC movies ever, taking in $363 million against a relatively small $100 million budget. That was the character's coming out party for the masses, and in many ways, it seemed like a sequel was destined for breakout success. Instead, it arrived with a thud and is officially a bomb. But not just any bomb, unfortunately — it's one of the biggest superhero movie bombs in history. Yes, really.
Again, "Fury of the Gods" isn't entirely out of theaters yet, but it arrived on VOD over the weekend (debuting at number three on the charts) and it should be on HBO Max before long. A finish of $150 million would be a best-case scenario at this point. With what we have in front of us, it's safe to put this one in the "biggest superhero bombs" category.
Bombing its way into the record books
When accounting for marketing, Warner Bros. Discovery is probably at least $200 million all-in on this movie (at the very least). This to say, they are going to lose a lot of money here. Naturally, this isn't what anyone had in mind when this movie got the green light. Theaters keep around half of all money made from ticket sales, meaning that WB would be very lucky to see $75 million returned to them when all's said and done. Since "Shazam! Fury of the Gods" didn't even top the VOD charts, we can probably assume, at best, that people are just going to wait and stream it on HBO Max, which doesn't really bring in any much-needed revenue for the film (or at least not in the same quantifiable way).
That's a disaster for any superhero movie, but particularly one that was a follow-up to such a beloved DC Comics adaptation. As far as being one of the biggest superhero bombs ever? The relativity of it gets tough, but there are only a few other comic book films that even come close in terms of failing so dramatically to live up to expectations.
On the more recent side of things, 2019's "Dark Phoenix" failed spectacularly, with the "X-Men" film earning just $246 million globally against a steep $200 million budget. Similarly, that film came out after Disney purchased Fox, bringing with it the promise of an "X-Men" reboot in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Right now, DC is getting ready for its own reboot under its new leaders James Gunn and Peter Safran, which left "Fury of the Gods" kind of caught in the middle. Fair or not, that certainly didn't help the movie's case. Another contributing factor to its dismal performance? As we've previously discussed, critics' reviews were middling at best (it currently sits at 50% on Rotten Tomatoes), and word of mouth has not been nearly as strong as it was for the first film.
It's all relative
There are certainly superhero movies that made less money that "Fury of the Gods" will, but they also generally carried much lower budgets, meaning they hurt the bottom line less in the end. Even so, 1997's ill-fated "Steel" starring Shaquille O'Neal made just $1.6 million against a $16 million budget, and that movie's surely in the discussion as far as these things go. But that film didn't have nearly as much upside potential as David F. Sandberg's "Shazam!" sequel did, nor did it have a genuine blockbuster budget on its side.
Then we arrive at 2004's "Catwoman," which starred Halle Berry and remains one of the most maligned comic book movies ever made. (Interestingly, Berry herself does not think it was a total failure.) It earned a mere $82 million against a $100 million budget, and may stand alone as the biggest, high-profile superhero movie flop ever. But "Fury of the Gods" isn't all that far behind it, particularly relative to expectations. The fact that we're even having to talk about this movie alongside the likes of "Catwoman" and "Steel" says how bad things are. Even 2015's "Fantastic Four," which made $167 million worldwide on a $120 million budget, may come out looking just a tiny bit better from a financial point of view, but "Fury of the Gods" is in that same territory — and that is not good company to be in.
For better or worse, this movie's failure adds fuel to the fire that suggests Warner Bros. Discovery is doing the right thing by letting Gunn and Safran reboot the DC Universe. What happened under the old guard is hit-or-miss at best, and it's time for a makeover to get the moviegoing public more consistently on DC's side.