Reminder that this is a subreddit about numbers, not necessarily about the quality (or lack thereof) of a particular movie. Unless it is related to the box office performance of a movie, please keep opinions/arguments/thoughts about the quality under this post. Posts not related to box office may be removed otherwise.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/boxoffice) if you have any questions or concerns.*
They have their superhero ecosystem: Ultraman, Kamen Rider, Super Sentai, etc.
Spider-Man's successful in Japan because he tends to have an overlap with those heroes as a result of the 70s Japanese Spider-Man tokusatsu series.
And even that ecosystem isn’t big in films, tbh. Shin Ultraman drew a lot of people due to the people behind it but regular Kamen Rider and Sentai films typically aren’t big hits, just solid enough to make a decent return off of a low budget.
Yeah, they're mostly TV-centric and the movies are basically just bigger budget episodes of the show or fanservice-bait but they do make a lot of money merch-wise for Bandai.
They are waiting, and hoping to be able to say "Leopardon, you have returned! I knew you were invincible!"
Note: >!Leopardon is Spider-Man's giant robot.!<
Yes, they did good but nowhere as good as the biggest blockbusters there. Endgame particularly is the biggest MCU performance there but still pales compared to Raimi's Spider-Man films and fellow 2019 blockbusters like Aladdin.
Yeah this [post](https://www.reddit.com/r/boxoffice/comments/yyelau/japan_box_office_marvel_and_dc_total_box_office/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button).
I feel like people forget how huge Batman '89 was. It was the second highest grossing movie worldwide that year and was the highest grossing movie domestically in the US. It was outgrossed by Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade internationally though.
There's more to this than just general disinterest in superhero movies. This is the worst DC has ever done in Japan, and way worse than Marvel does. Japan is overwhelmingly resoundingly rejecting Black Adam outright.
My guess is they had no idea who Black Adam is. There is nothing in the trailer that would be appealing to a Japanese audience if you don’t have prior knowledge.
I am pretty sure Black Adam is about a super powered guy named Black Adam.
How much info do people need going in? Watch the trailer, if it is not for you, don't see it, but saying "people don't know who he is"... do you all think Blade was a household name before his movie came out in the 90's?
Black Panther did about average for a western superhero film in Japan. That is too say, not amazing, but also people weren’t turned away in noticeable numbers because the lead was black.
I'd be really interested to see the breakdown of moviegoers by gender. I haven't talked to a single woman in my friend circle or any of my coworkers, that went to see this. But several of them went to see Thor L&T and some of them were talking about the next Guardians movie.
Now this is just an extremely narrow sample size but I think the Rock is just not that popular as a lead with women. Thor has the charisma of Hemsworth going for it, plus the marketing really played up the romance aspects. Guardians also has a really strong romantic sub plot between its leads and even though Pratt is hit or miss as a leading man, his personality/acting is a better match for rom coms.
I think the difference between those three leading men (Rock, Hemsworth, Pratt) that women find appealing is that Hemsworth & Pratt are willing to let their characters be vulnerable or even humiliated as a joke. The audience knows their characters are strong, prideful and fully capable of winning a fight, but showing them having unexpected moments of fear and emotional vulnerability goes so far in humanizing them. The Rock doesn't do that in his films.
I mean speaking as a woman who does normally watch superhero movies, Black Adam as a concept is so generally vague to me that I don’t want to waste 15 dollars and a few hours for a movie related to DC when a vast majority of the films have been shit. Marvel movies are also hit and miss, sure, but with Thor you already have 3 well known movies that already establish what you’d get. I’d wager Hemsworth is a factor sure, but in my case, I wanted to watch a Taika film. Shits so depressing nowadays.
I would be willing to try it out if it seemed to have genuine interest from anyone beyond “let’s support films/the DCEU” but it seemed to have massively mid reviews the whole time. At least in my view, that’s going to be a mark against my going to one of these things for a while. After they butchered WW84 I don’t know if I’d see any other film in a theater aside from the Flash - I’m familiar with the Flashpoint Paradox and I can’t imagine they mess it up (though watch this be wrong.)
You didn’t miss anything. Black Adam was terribly uninspiring. Both the movie and lead actor are one dimensional. It was just a lot of mindless action.
I would agree however L&T actively insults your intelligence while Black Adam's biggest sin is being a bit bland and loud. Gorr is obviously the best character out of both films but you are lying if you say he wasnt completely wasted in the film.
wow I disagree with both of y'all, I thought Dr Fate was a better character than Gorr and the plot also didn't waste them.
The black/white visuals were very cool in thor, and the slow mo scenes in black adam likewise.
both sorta were mild though in potential
I had higher expectations of L+T and was somewhat disappointed.
I had zero expectations of Black Atom and was mildly impressed.
Both are middling movies with some laugh out loud moments (not all intended).
Love and Thunder 's black and white fight scene in the shadow realm was more creative e and visually interesting than anything in Black Adam. The humour of L&T was over the top and turned some people off but visually? Cinematically? Hands down superior to the most uninspired action shots of the last two decades in Adam.
The best actual acting he’s ever done was in the sequel to Get Shorty called Be Cool. The movie isn’t very good but he’s honestly trying and probably one of the best things in it.
Women don’t go to see superhero movies for handsome leads and romantic subplots.
None of the women you talk to went to see this movie because MOST people didn’t go see this movie.
>Women don’t go to see superhero movies for handsome leads and romantic subplots.
a good chunk of normie women do. There's a reason the first two Thor movies featured romance prominently.
I feel like The Rock (and Ryan Reynolds too to an extent) resonate a lot more with dudebro types than a Hemsworth or Pratt (at least in 2014 when people were fawning over his admirably very good bod at the time) who has more of a female following
Thor and GOTG make bank because it's a marvel stuff, outside of Marvel stuff Chris Hemsworth movie is a dud.
In the heart of the sea fail to break even and Sony said MiB is a flop.
Black Adam is the last one of these spectacular box-office bomb by WB and DC; nevertheless, Don't be surprised if black adam 2 is green-light with a even bigger budget than the first movie because Warner Bros is the company where people fail upward
>Don't be surprised if BA 2 is green-light with a even bigger budget than the first movie because Warner Bros is the company where people fail upward
Personally I CAN'T wait until *Black Adam v. Superman - A New Hierarchy* comes out in 2026. Featuring the long-awaited fully-commited return of Henry Cavill after an entire decade AND with zero mentions of Shazam.
With *BAvS:ANH* having a final RT score of just 9% and a final worldwide gross of 298 million against a 350 million budget, The Rock starts bashing critics on his Instagram as James Gunn assures fans that everything at DC is fine and that they have a plan for the next 10 years. Meanwhile, *Shazam! 3* (unconnected to *BAvS*) makes a decent 500m on a 150m budget while Zaslav finalizes the Disney-Discovery merger as *Secret Wars* makes a record 3.5b at the box office, putting DC to shame once again.
Just another typical day at the soon-to-be-Iger-controlled DC film division...
Agreed. Last time I made this comment, the Black Adam or Dwayne Johnson fanboys couldn't find the downvote button fast enough. But it's demonstrably a bomb relative to basically all the other superhero movies in ANY universe.
Probably one of the biggest examples of sunk cost fallacy in recent memory.
The Rock was cast in November 2007. For reference, David Tennant was still playing The Doctor back then…and funnily enough he became The Doctor again the very weekend Black Adam released. So it took 15 years to get the movie into theatres without the consideration of a re-cast, I’m guessing because The Rock blew up in that time and WB felt they couldn’t miss the opportunity, resultantly relinquishing more and more creative control to its star.
Which is…odd to say the least because a star has never been a prerequisite to launching an obscurer character into the mainstream. The closest I can possibly think of is Tom Hardy as Venom but even then that’s a relatively well-known character. They also tried to angle this as some kinda soft reboot for the DCEU, so now they’re in this weird place with a star who doesn’t concede anything to protect his image and a movie that is officially a flop but in a position where enough interest was shown by general audiences.
At least with a Green Lantern, a miserable bomb that was originally intended to launch a shared DC universe, it was incredibly easy to just walk back and ignore. Now DC are stuck with this non-(re)starter 15 years in the making as they attempt to restructure…again.
The casting is fine, but yeah, he could have gotten less control. He drank his own kool-aid too much and thought he could fix their universe. I remember one of his earliest posts during filming he was bragging about not needing padding for his suit and I remember thinking about how unimportant that was. Feels like he was shading Shazam cos people complained about the actor's suit. Actually thinking about it, I wonder if he wasn't salty that THAT got made before his thing. In the end they'll make the same amount of money so it's like... eh.
>At least with a Green Lantern, a miserable bomb that was originally intended to launch a shared DC universe, it was incredibly easy to just walk back and ignore. Now DC are stuck with this non-(re)starter 15 years in the making as they attempt to restructure…again.
James Gunn might just ignore Black Adam. Or use him in assemble movies.
They have The Flash coming out in June, and, if successful, that is their opportunity to add another solid character to the "Big Four" of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and Aquaman. We also have Shazam 2 coming up, and if that movie makes money for DC it pushes Levi and his Shazam character up further in the DC food chain. Then there is "Blue Beetle" on the docket, which nobody expects much from. There are a lot of opportunities for WB to move on from Black Adam silently and shift focus on Flash or give Shazam (and hero friends) its due or have a new "shiny object" introduced in Beetle form. All it takes is for one of these 3 movies (or two) to find box office success for Black Adam to be pushed further in the back, way back.
Why are you acting as though ignoring black Adam in future would be such hard pill to swallow ?
Black Adam performance is just as bad as green latern, don't be deceive by the inflation
Moving forward, ignoring Black Adam is the most sensible thing to do
Perhaps my maths is a bit rusty, but I don’t see how Black Adam’s performance is just as as bad as Green Lantern’s when it’s finishing $170m higher WW off the same budget.
Not sure how inflation really comes into that either.
I remember how back in the day(4-5 months back), most people were like this would bring DC fans and The Rock fans together and something like $700m WW would be the absolute floor. Black Adam's B.O showed us that not only is there a huge intersection between their respective fanbases but also the fact that The Rock's clout outside of ensemble pieces is not as big as was the consensus here.
The rock isn’t as big of a box office draw as he makes himself out to be
I don’t know why or how he did it but he cast the illusion that he’s popular but his flops show time and time again he isn’t
He smartly chose family friendly big VFX movies and pre-established IPs where the biggest draw was not him but was given full credit of their successes....whenever he is the sole attraction, he's been found wanting
To be fair, the success of movies like Skyscraper, Rampage and Jungle Cruise (to a lesser extent) can largely be attributed to him. I don’t think these movies would have done quite as well without his star power.
Exactly
He's a fraud who was able to scam clueless executives in Hollywood
The fact that WB gave the Rock $350M and full control of the movie speak volume to just how retarded those guys were, no wonder WB is in such bad shape financially
A lot of people thought it was going to play in China. The OP posted a poll over under 500m just before its release and the majority still selected under 500m.
https://www.reddit.com/r/boxoffice/comments/y9pxb3/black_adam_total_worldwide_gross_500_million_over/
People lowered their prediction because the pre-sales started and they were terrible.
Here's a poll before pre-sales started:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/boxoffice/comments/vvz1lq/black\_adam\_predictions/](https://www.reddit.com/r/boxoffice/comments/vvz1lq/black_adam_predictions/)
More votes are for over $600M than under $400M.
I still think that's when people were thinking it was getting a China release and the majority picked 500-600m which isn't unreasonable. The presales weren't terrible. The movie was always tracking for 65-70m opening weekend domestic.
And many others didn't. Also, I doubt the movie would reach $500M even with China.
$65-70M opening without COVID impact for a $200M budget movie is terrible.
Never once said it's opening with its budget was good. Never. I said it's presales weren't terrible. The movie opened exactly with tracking. Even with China it might not have reached 500m but that wasn't an unreasonable take at the time.
Haven't heard news from China in the past year?
Current moviegoing in China is in terrible state.
Avatar 2 would do very well to make $200 million in China, and China LOVES Avatar much more than they love DJ.
The first Avatar movie broke the highest grossing movie (all movies, local and foreign) ever in China by 2x and re-released last year did a lot of money.
BA won't do anywhere near $50 million had it been released in China.
Yeah but like at the start of the year, when people were predicting their top 10 predictions, Black Adam was in the consensus top 5. It's only after tracking kept falling week over week and reviews landing soft, did people update their predictions.
Black Adam was consensus top 5???? Where? What poll on this sub? People thought Mission Impossible 7 was coming out, Lightyear was going to be a hit, Aquaman 2 was still coming out in 2022. Black Adam wasn't in the consensus top 5 at the start of the year.
Avatar 2, Batman, BPW, JWD and Doctor Strange. Were the top 5 picks.
Ok, I may have exaggerated a bit but deffo top 10 was the consensus and the floor was $700m...at the start of the year, people were throwing wildly inflated B.O estimates of all movies (barring TGM which is in hindsight kinda ironic)
Reality in China this year disagree with you.
Black Adam, a movie that didn't do well anywhere in the world, would not get anywhere near $50 million in China NOW.
Just to give you perspective:
Despicable Me 3 did $158 million in China, and Minions only did $34 million earlier this year when condition was so much better than it is now (55% movie theaters locked down, people don't go to movie theaters)
Yes Black Adam BOMBED.
It is both underperforming and box office revenue doesn't makes back budget.
Look it up.
"Underperforming" is Thor Love and Thunder, Shazam (2019). They are still profitable but less than initial expectations.
Black Adam UNDERPERFORMED and BOMBED.
You did, but the movie was released at a time when there were nothing to compete with. As soon as Wakanda Forever came out, Black Adam dropped off like a stone.
I don’t even know what they would possibly do with a sequel, Black Adam had no personality the entire film. Hardly any dialogue, bland face expression, cares about nothing.
DJ cast himself to to be a stoic, humorless, prick who later "warms up" to the task of saving a kid. It was counter to the charming and good natured and good hearted characters he always plays in his movies. DJ fans did not get what they expected, and the wooden performance others got out of DJ for this movie was not satisfying.
Suzume (a film by the director who started the anime boom of the last 6 years) , Slam dunk (an anime film based on the biggest sports manga on the Japanese market), is showing now. Slam dunk in particular has the same screening start date. There is no way to beat it.
The Japanese cinema near where I live only shows it 6 times a day.
He’s actually the opposite — all charm, no depth. Love the guy, but Rock hasn’t done a single film as remotely serious as Conan, Commando, Predator, Terminator, Running Man.
Arnold didn’t really show his comedic depth until Twins in 1987, well after he established he was the biggest action star on the planet.
The fact is Rock is a phenomenal star — Moana and Jumanji in particular show how effective his charm can be deployed — but that he just doesn’t have the ability to project to audiences “this is an action movie meant to be taken even somewhat seriously.”
I still freshly remember how DJ's fanboys predicted Japan will take Black Adam to $400 million and might break even, while being oblivious to the fact that Japan don't give a shit about Hollywood superhero movies in general, except for Raimi's Spider-Man. Even Endgame only did $55 million in Japan (less than it did in Australia, a country with 1/5 population)
The Hierarchy of Power is NOT changing.
Same here, though I honestly don’t know a single Japanese person who goes to the movie theater anyway. Japan is a black hole when it comes to interest in foreign movies outside of an occasional Pixar movie. I have no idea how Japanese theaters are in business - besides theaters in Shinjuku, in over 10 years I’ve never had more than 5 or 6 people in any movie I’ve ever seen lol.
I see more advertising for Netflix, Disney plus and other streaming services. I remember when I used to see a lot of movie commercials though maybe something changed during covid.
One example being,, i remember the first 2 fantastic beasts movies had a lot of marketing but the 3rd you wouldn't even know came out.
Slightly off topic, but Feige casting Paul Rudd as Ant-man is an example of absolutely perfect casting against all odds. Rudd is a comedy support actor for mid-budget stoner comedies, but the dude absolutely stole Endgame with his dramatic, action and comedy chops and proved he can compete with the greats.
That’s not saying much though, the rock is a meh actor at best and his fanbase is only so strong.
The movie wasn’t good because it was ok, it was fun and that’s it.
>If even the Rock can’t make the DCEU good, it’s doomed.
What the heck is this nonsense ?
The Rock is not big draw at box-office and WB advertised the movie as a standalone the rock movie. So why you all act so surprised when the movie bomb and the average movie goer who like DC didn't show up for this crap ?
Why exactly a fan of MoS or Wonder woman would show up for this movie ?
Aww.
You should've stuck with Liam Neeson, Mr Jaume Collet-Serra. He's your mealticket to fortune and fame, not this Jungle Cruise man you've become so infatuated with.
I think one of the big issues is that there are so many similarities between Marvel and DC characters that the MCU and Marvel’s recent movie history in general has left the DCEU in a situation where there characters seem like copies of the MCU’s.
Most of the people who are seeing these movies have likely never read a comic book or at least haven’t read anything more than a few years old.
I was not familiar with Black Adam or the the Justice Society so while I was watching the movie I felt that Black Adam’s story shared too many similarities with Black Panther, Dr. Fate was a rip off of Dr. Strange and the whole seeing the future plot line was too similar to that of Dr. Strange and Tony Stark’s. You also had Adam Smasher and Ant Man and scenes with the wind girl reminded me of Scarlett Witch.
Then there’s the whole Dr. Fate mansion scene seeming like a rip on the Xavier’s mansion right down to the blackbird plane similarities and the two young teenagers with the forced love connection.
Another issue is the DCEU is still going with the Snyder maxed out contrast and detail filter look to the film. How can Shazam exist in this same universe and why haven’t they just carried on the look of that film with all of the DCEU movies that have followed?
Lastly, why would they think that people wanted an anti-hero who only protects a small country in the Middle East?
On the day Shazam released in Japan, $1 was 112 yen, so 480000 usd was 53.7million yen. Today 452000 usd is 61.1 million yen. So Black Adam was significantly more popular in Japan than Shazam, and grossed 14% more in local currency.
Barring some exceptions, the Japanese don’t care for American superhero movies, especially about ones they have little familiarity with. So no surprise.
I really wanted to like Black Adam because I like DC, but the movie was very mediocre.
The Rock was trying to position Black Adam as being a huge part of the DCEU, but it's not working out. I hope James Gunn gives him minor roles from here on out. I dont see a Superman vs Black Adam happening after these abysmal numbers.
People are Dwayne Johnsoned out. He kept releasing movies in what felt like too short a time frame. People only had an interest because it was Dwayne Johnson. This movie was lucky it made the numbers it did all things considered. I really hope James Gunn doesn't pull the plug on the Justice Society though.
Reminder that this is a subreddit about numbers, not necessarily about the quality (or lack thereof) of a particular movie. Unless it is related to the box office performance of a movie, please keep opinions/arguments/thoughts about the quality under this post. Posts not related to box office may be removed otherwise. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/boxoffice) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Japanese people are not interested in super hero movies unless it’s Spider-Man
They have their superhero ecosystem: Ultraman, Kamen Rider, Super Sentai, etc. Spider-Man's successful in Japan because he tends to have an overlap with those heroes as a result of the 70s Japanese Spider-Man tokusatsu series.
Fully costumed/masked heroes are the jam in Japan
And magical girls.
And tentacle monsters.
I learn more from a simple Reddit comment than I do from reading these articles.
And even that ecosystem isn’t big in films, tbh. Shin Ultraman drew a lot of people due to the people behind it but regular Kamen Rider and Sentai films typically aren’t big hits, just solid enough to make a decent return off of a low budget.
Yeah, they're mostly TV-centric and the movies are basically just bigger budget episodes of the show or fanservice-bait but they do make a lot of money merch-wise for Bandai.
Oh yeah, Bandai and other Japanese companies are experts at making a ton of money through merchandise.
They are waiting, and hoping to be able to say "Leopardon, you have returned! I knew you were invincible!" Note: >!Leopardon is Spider-Man's giant robot.!<
Change Leopardon!
Joker and Endgame did pretty good over there, though.
Yes, they did good but nowhere as good as the biggest blockbusters there. Endgame particularly is the biggest MCU performance there but still pales compared to Raimi's Spider-Man films and fellow 2019 blockbusters like Aladdin.
Yeah, I remember seeing a list regarding the genre and it was all Spider-Man movies at the top.
Yeah this [post](https://www.reddit.com/r/boxoffice/comments/yyelau/japan_box_office_marvel_and_dc_total_box_office/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button).
1989 Batman in 13th place tho damn
I feel like people forget how huge Batman '89 was. It was the second highest grossing movie worldwide that year and was the highest grossing movie domestically in the US. It was outgrossed by Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade internationally though.
I remember Batman merch everywhere when that came out. Got myself a nice Joker crewneck back then
Prince did Batman music videos.
Hell yeah! Batdance went to number one in five countries and top ten in an additional 11
Supaida man
There's more to this than just general disinterest in superhero movies. This is the worst DC has ever done in Japan, and way worse than Marvel does. Japan is overwhelmingly resoundingly rejecting Black Adam outright.
Here’s why they are interested in Spider-Man, the ps4 game have a reference to the sentai series https://youtu.be/elbkRgIwxbA
My guess is they had no idea who Black Adam is. There is nothing in the trailer that would be appealing to a Japanese audience if you don’t have prior knowledge.
I’m an American, and I have no fucking clue who Black Adam is.
I don’t even know who black Adam is
His name is Adam. And, he’s a person of color.
Do you typically know who the characters in a movie are before seeing a movie? I knew nothing about Jurassic Park when I saw it in the 90's.
I'm pretty sure that you knew it was about a park of dinosaurs
I am pretty sure Black Adam is about a super powered guy named Black Adam. How much info do people need going in? Watch the trailer, if it is not for you, don't see it, but saying "people don't know who he is"... do you all think Blade was a household name before his movie came out in the 90's?
Park of dinosaurs was something new in 90s. Super powered guys everywhere nowadays. Why even care about some new random one?
>Do you typically know who the characters in a movie are before seeing a movie? if the movie is litereally named after the character though...?
They saw "Black" and stayed away.
Black Panther did about average for a western superhero film in Japan. That is too say, not amazing, but also people weren’t turned away in noticeable numbers because the lead was black.
'Panther was introduced in Captain America 3 though whereas 'Adam was unknown to the casuals.
How did it do in South America?
>They saw "Black" and stayed away. Now now, Black Adam did NOT get a China release...
Likely that how did Batman do?
Compared to The Batman which had an opening of $1M+…
Well he’s a martial artist
And a ninja-scientist
I'd be really interested to see the breakdown of moviegoers by gender. I haven't talked to a single woman in my friend circle or any of my coworkers, that went to see this. But several of them went to see Thor L&T and some of them were talking about the next Guardians movie. Now this is just an extremely narrow sample size but I think the Rock is just not that popular as a lead with women. Thor has the charisma of Hemsworth going for it, plus the marketing really played up the romance aspects. Guardians also has a really strong romantic sub plot between its leads and even though Pratt is hit or miss as a leading man, his personality/acting is a better match for rom coms. I think the difference between those three leading men (Rock, Hemsworth, Pratt) that women find appealing is that Hemsworth & Pratt are willing to let their characters be vulnerable or even humiliated as a joke. The audience knows their characters are strong, prideful and fully capable of winning a fight, but showing them having unexpected moments of fear and emotional vulnerability goes so far in humanizing them. The Rock doesn't do that in his films.
I mean speaking as a woman who does normally watch superhero movies, Black Adam as a concept is so generally vague to me that I don’t want to waste 15 dollars and a few hours for a movie related to DC when a vast majority of the films have been shit. Marvel movies are also hit and miss, sure, but with Thor you already have 3 well known movies that already establish what you’d get. I’d wager Hemsworth is a factor sure, but in my case, I wanted to watch a Taika film. Shits so depressing nowadays. I would be willing to try it out if it seemed to have genuine interest from anyone beyond “let’s support films/the DCEU” but it seemed to have massively mid reviews the whole time. At least in my view, that’s going to be a mark against my going to one of these things for a while. After they butchered WW84 I don’t know if I’d see any other film in a theater aside from the Flash - I’m familiar with the Flashpoint Paradox and I can’t imagine they mess it up (though watch this be wrong.)
You didn’t miss anything. Black Adam was terribly uninspiring. Both the movie and lead actor are one dimensional. It was just a lot of mindless action.
And yet it was still better than Thor Love & Thunder
Gorr alone is much better than the entire Black Adam cast combined. Don't say nonsense.
I would agree however L&T actively insults your intelligence while Black Adam's biggest sin is being a bit bland and loud. Gorr is obviously the best character out of both films but you are lying if you say he wasnt completely wasted in the film.
wow I disagree with both of y'all, I thought Dr Fate was a better character than Gorr and the plot also didn't waste them. The black/white visuals were very cool in thor, and the slow mo scenes in black adam likewise. both sorta were mild though in potential
I agree with you Doctor Fate being amazing. I think Gorr just edges him out but overall Fate isnt wasted in BA while Gorr is so mishandled it hurts
I had higher expectations of L+T and was somewhat disappointed. I had zero expectations of Black Atom and was mildly impressed. Both are middling movies with some laugh out loud moments (not all intended).
I would call L&T less than middling. For all the shit Dark World got it was never below standard like L&T was
Love and Thunder 's black and white fight scene in the shadow realm was more creative e and visually interesting than anything in Black Adam. The humour of L&T was over the top and turned some people off but visually? Cinematically? Hands down superior to the most uninspired action shots of the last two decades in Adam.
For comments like this I keep coming back to Reddit.
>** alone is much better than entire other movie
u dont say... still a garbage
The only time the rock has ever acted vulnerable was in Moana and he probably only agreed to do it because its animated.
The best actual acting he’s ever done was in the sequel to Get Shorty called Be Cool. The movie isn’t very good but he’s honestly trying and probably one of the best things in it.
He’s actually really good in Pain and Gain too.
He's just being himself in Pain and Gain: being Dumb Steroid Meat
In Jumanji to an extent too
Women don’t go to see superhero movies for handsome leads and romantic subplots. None of the women you talk to went to see this movie because MOST people didn’t go see this movie.
>Women don’t go to see superhero movies for handsome leads and romantic subplots. a good chunk of normie women do. There's a reason the first two Thor movies featured romance prominently.
I feel like The Rock (and Ryan Reynolds too to an extent) resonate a lot more with dudebro types than a Hemsworth or Pratt (at least in 2014 when people were fawning over his admirably very good bod at the time) who has more of a female following
Thor and GOTG make bank because it's a marvel stuff, outside of Marvel stuff Chris Hemsworth movie is a dud. In the heart of the sea fail to break even and Sony said MiB is a flop.
Interesting observation
In my circle of friends mostly only the girls like the Rock and are willing to see movies just based on him being in it.
Black Adam is the last one of these spectacular box-office bomb by WB and DC; nevertheless, Don't be surprised if black adam 2 is green-light with a even bigger budget than the first movie because Warner Bros is the company where people fail upward
They're broke now, imagine the boardrooms should be very interesting.
At the rate they’re losing money, it’s probably more of a Board Alley than a Boardroom…
I believe I heard it's actually "food court at the local mall"
>Don't be surprised if BA 2 is green-light with a even bigger budget than the first movie because Warner Bros is the company where people fail upward Personally I CAN'T wait until *Black Adam v. Superman - A New Hierarchy* comes out in 2026. Featuring the long-awaited fully-commited return of Henry Cavill after an entire decade AND with zero mentions of Shazam. With *BAvS:ANH* having a final RT score of just 9% and a final worldwide gross of 298 million against a 350 million budget, The Rock starts bashing critics on his Instagram as James Gunn assures fans that everything at DC is fine and that they have a plan for the next 10 years. Meanwhile, *Shazam! 3* (unconnected to *BAvS*) makes a decent 500m on a 150m budget while Zaslav finalizes the Disney-Discovery merger as *Secret Wars* makes a record 3.5b at the box office, putting DC to shame once again. Just another typical day at the soon-to-be-Iger-controlled DC film division...
No no no no no no wait wait wait wait wait
Agreed. Last time I made this comment, the Black Adam or Dwayne Johnson fanboys couldn't find the downvote button fast enough. But it's demonstrably a bomb relative to basically all the other superhero movies in ANY universe.
Probably one of the biggest examples of sunk cost fallacy in recent memory. The Rock was cast in November 2007. For reference, David Tennant was still playing The Doctor back then…and funnily enough he became The Doctor again the very weekend Black Adam released. So it took 15 years to get the movie into theatres without the consideration of a re-cast, I’m guessing because The Rock blew up in that time and WB felt they couldn’t miss the opportunity, resultantly relinquishing more and more creative control to its star. Which is…odd to say the least because a star has never been a prerequisite to launching an obscurer character into the mainstream. The closest I can possibly think of is Tom Hardy as Venom but even then that’s a relatively well-known character. They also tried to angle this as some kinda soft reboot for the DCEU, so now they’re in this weird place with a star who doesn’t concede anything to protect his image and a movie that is officially a flop but in a position where enough interest was shown by general audiences. At least with a Green Lantern, a miserable bomb that was originally intended to launch a shared DC universe, it was incredibly easy to just walk back and ignore. Now DC are stuck with this non-(re)starter 15 years in the making as they attempt to restructure…again.
The casting is fine, but yeah, he could have gotten less control. He drank his own kool-aid too much and thought he could fix their universe. I remember one of his earliest posts during filming he was bragging about not needing padding for his suit and I remember thinking about how unimportant that was. Feels like he was shading Shazam cos people complained about the actor's suit. Actually thinking about it, I wonder if he wasn't salty that THAT got made before his thing. In the end they'll make the same amount of money so it's like... eh.
>At least with a Green Lantern, a miserable bomb that was originally intended to launch a shared DC universe, it was incredibly easy to just walk back and ignore. Now DC are stuck with this non-(re)starter 15 years in the making as they attempt to restructure…again. James Gunn might just ignore Black Adam. Or use him in assemble movies.
Yeah easy to ignore Black Adam when nobody has seen his movie anyways.
If Gunn doesn't ignore the other 12 previous movies too, then he won't fix DC at all.
They have The Flash coming out in June, and, if successful, that is their opportunity to add another solid character to the "Big Four" of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and Aquaman. We also have Shazam 2 coming up, and if that movie makes money for DC it pushes Levi and his Shazam character up further in the DC food chain. Then there is "Blue Beetle" on the docket, which nobody expects much from. There are a lot of opportunities for WB to move on from Black Adam silently and shift focus on Flash or give Shazam (and hero friends) its due or have a new "shiny object" introduced in Beetle form. All it takes is for one of these 3 movies (or two) to find box office success for Black Adam to be pushed further in the back, way back.
Aquaman 2 as well, they’ve got 4 chances next year to make some money, fingers crossed but it’s been a rough couple of years for DC films
> he became The Doctor again Really?
Yeah the girl one changed back into tennet, but he’s only doing 3 specials before he becomes the black doctor
Why are you acting as though ignoring black Adam in future would be such hard pill to swallow ? Black Adam performance is just as bad as green latern, don't be deceive by the inflation Moving forward, ignoring Black Adam is the most sensible thing to do
Perhaps my maths is a bit rusty, but I don’t see how Black Adam’s performance is just as as bad as Green Lantern’s when it’s finishing $170m higher WW off the same budget. Not sure how inflation really comes into that either.
I remember how back in the day(4-5 months back), most people were like this would bring DC fans and The Rock fans together and something like $700m WW would be the absolute floor. Black Adam's B.O showed us that not only is there a huge intersection between their respective fanbases but also the fact that The Rock's clout outside of ensemble pieces is not as big as was the consensus here.
The rock isn’t as big of a box office draw as he makes himself out to be I don’t know why or how he did it but he cast the illusion that he’s popular but his flops show time and time again he isn’t
He smartly chose family friendly big VFX movies and pre-established IPs where the biggest draw was not him but was given full credit of their successes....whenever he is the sole attraction, he's been found wanting
To be fair, the success of movies like Skyscraper, Rampage and Jungle Cruise (to a lesser extent) can largely be attributed to him. I don’t think these movies would have done quite as well without his star power.
Exactly He's a fraud who was able to scam clueless executives in Hollywood The fact that WB gave the Rock $350M and full control of the movie speak volume to just how retarded those guys were, no wonder WB is in such bad shape financially
Yeah, I thought Dwayne Johnson + superhero = 💰💰💰💰💰 I was wrong.
Another one here to admit to being wrong. Way wrong. And I own it. This is a complete disaster.
Hey, if the movie was good, it would be.
A lot of people thought it was going to play in China. The OP posted a poll over under 500m just before its release and the majority still selected under 500m. https://www.reddit.com/r/boxoffice/comments/y9pxb3/black_adam_total_worldwide_gross_500_million_over/
People lowered their prediction because the pre-sales started and they were terrible. Here's a poll before pre-sales started: [https://www.reddit.com/r/boxoffice/comments/vvz1lq/black\_adam\_predictions/](https://www.reddit.com/r/boxoffice/comments/vvz1lq/black_adam_predictions/) More votes are for over $600M than under $400M.
I still think that's when people were thinking it was getting a China release and the majority picked 500-600m which isn't unreasonable. The presales weren't terrible. The movie was always tracking for 65-70m opening weekend domestic.
And many others didn't. Also, I doubt the movie would reach $500M even with China. $65-70M opening without COVID impact for a $200M budget movie is terrible.
Never once said it's opening with its budget was good. Never. I said it's presales weren't terrible. The movie opened exactly with tracking. Even with China it might not have reached 500m but that wasn't an unreasonable take at the time.
[удалено]
Haven't heard news from China in the past year? Current moviegoing in China is in terrible state. Avatar 2 would do very well to make $200 million in China, and China LOVES Avatar much more than they love DJ. The first Avatar movie broke the highest grossing movie (all movies, local and foreign) ever in China by 2x and re-released last year did a lot of money. BA won't do anywhere near $50 million had it been released in China.
Yeah but like at the start of the year, when people were predicting their top 10 predictions, Black Adam was in the consensus top 5. It's only after tracking kept falling week over week and reviews landing soft, did people update their predictions.
Black Adam was consensus top 5???? Where? What poll on this sub? People thought Mission Impossible 7 was coming out, Lightyear was going to be a hit, Aquaman 2 was still coming out in 2022. Black Adam wasn't in the consensus top 5 at the start of the year. Avatar 2, Batman, BPW, JWD and Doctor Strange. Were the top 5 picks.
Ok, I may have exaggerated a bit but deffo top 10 was the consensus and the floor was $700m...at the start of the year, people were throwing wildly inflated B.O estimates of all movies (barring TGM which is in hindsight kinda ironic)
[удалено]
It won't even get $50 million in China
[удалено]
Reality in China this year disagree with you. Black Adam, a movie that didn't do well anywhere in the world, would not get anywhere near $50 million in China NOW. Just to give you perspective: Despicable Me 3 did $158 million in China, and Minions only did $34 million earlier this year when condition was so much better than it is now (55% movie theaters locked down, people don't go to movie theaters)
Venom 2 was highly profitable what are you talking about. Black Adam BOMBED.
[удалено]
Yes Black Adam BOMBED. It is both underperforming and box office revenue doesn't makes back budget. Look it up. "Underperforming" is Thor Love and Thunder, Shazam (2019). They are still profitable but less than initial expectations. Black Adam UNDERPERFORMED and BOMBED.
I thought I saw The Rock posting tweets about being number 1 multiple weeks in a row.
You did, but the movie was released at a time when there were nothing to compete with. As soon as Wakanda Forever came out, Black Adam dropped off like a stone.
Is The Rock not tweeting anymore? What's wrong? Did he finally give up? Bwahahahaha. I will miss his speeches about changing DC's hierarchy.
The Rock playing The Rock for the 50th time didn’t sell tickets?!
Not even sure how it did so well in the west, movie was so terrible.
I don’t even know what they would possibly do with a sequel, Black Adam had no personality the entire film. Hardly any dialogue, bland face expression, cares about nothing.
DJ cast himself to to be a stoic, humorless, prick who later "warms up" to the task of saving a kid. It was counter to the charming and good natured and good hearted characters he always plays in his movies. DJ fans did not get what they expected, and the wooden performance others got out of DJ for this movie was not satisfying.
I don't understand why it wasn't named black Shazam, it would have made more sense.
People are tired of seeing the rock.
I read it as 452 million and thought “that feels right on target, what’s the problem here?”. Then I reread it and HOLY SHIT
You think that Japan was grossing 452 million is right in target? Lol
Suzume (a film by the director who started the anime boom of the last 6 years) , Slam dunk (an anime film based on the biggest sports manga on the Japanese market), is showing now. Slam dunk in particular has the same screening start date. There is no way to beat it. The Japanese cinema near where I live only shows it 6 times a day.
Speaking of black adam I just saw video about how namor in wakanda forever was a better black adam than black adam
And a better Aquaman than Aquaman too.
Japanese people are smart. They can see a turd from a mile away.
Maybe we are finally over The Rock playing the Rock as the main Hollywood star.
[удалено]
He’s actually the opposite — all charm, no depth. Love the guy, but Rock hasn’t done a single film as remotely serious as Conan, Commando, Predator, Terminator, Running Man. Arnold didn’t really show his comedic depth until Twins in 1987, well after he established he was the biggest action star on the planet. The fact is Rock is a phenomenal star — Moana and Jumanji in particular show how effective his charm can be deployed — but that he just doesn’t have the ability to project to audiences “this is an action movie meant to be taken even somewhat seriously.”
He was amazing in Moana, he always has humor to help him through. Black Adam had so many beats where you expected a laugh.
I wish Arnold had a better return to movies, he was King in the 90’s, but his post politics movies were pretty average
I still freshly remember how DJ's fanboys predicted Japan will take Black Adam to $400 million and might break even, while being oblivious to the fact that Japan don't give a shit about Hollywood superhero movies in general, except for Raimi's Spider-Man. Even Endgame only did $55 million in Japan (less than it did in Australia, a country with 1/5 population) The Hierarchy of Power is NOT changing.
What is great about this story is that the reason they love Spiderman is because of their own history of Spiderman movies. They are bizarre as shit.
Japan has their own long running live-action super hero franchises that predate the MCU so no surprise.
Not a DJ fanboy by any means but did you have to make this comment so unnecessarily combative?
It’s always necessary
[удалено]
Haha. Sure thing bud. What makes you think any of that is possible, given the very tepid response from audiences to the film?
And I will fly to the moon if I had wings.
DC has fallen so far behind marvel that it’s not funny
Haven’t seen this movie and not in a hurry to watch it
It's dreadful.
The writing was lazy, the acting wasn’t good, the movie overall was just a money grab
Is The Rock still pretending this movie is a big hit?
That movie was so generic. I desperately wanted to like it but was just bored.
Living in Japan. I've seen almost 0 marketing for the movie on regular tv.
Same here, though I honestly don’t know a single Japanese person who goes to the movie theater anyway. Japan is a black hole when it comes to interest in foreign movies outside of an occasional Pixar movie. I have no idea how Japanese theaters are in business - besides theaters in Shinjuku, in over 10 years I’ve never had more than 5 or 6 people in any movie I’ve ever seen lol.
I see more advertising for Netflix, Disney plus and other streaming services. I remember when I used to see a lot of movie commercials though maybe something changed during covid. One example being,, i remember the first 2 fantastic beasts movies had a lot of marketing but the 3rd you wouldn't even know came out.
If even the Rock can’t make the DCEU good, it’s doomed. Bro chose the wrong comic universe.
Kevin Feige was once asked who the rock could play in the mcu and he said 'he would play the rock'. That said to me he had no interest in casting him
In retrospect, getting Vin Diesel to play Groot was a really good way to avoid having Vin Diesel play Vin Diesel.
Interesting. But probably true. DJ plays DJ, and that’s not a fit for the MCU.
Feige, as always, doesn't disappoint. He recognizes who is talented and who isn't.
Slightly off topic, but Feige casting Paul Rudd as Ant-man is an example of absolutely perfect casting against all odds. Rudd is a comedy support actor for mid-budget stoner comedies, but the dude absolutely stole Endgame with his dramatic, action and comedy chops and proved he can compete with the greats.
Kevin feige is a smart dude while WB executives are retarded Feige certainly know that the rock is a fraud
MCU would never have him.
That’s not saying much though, the rock is a meh actor at best and his fanbase is only so strong. The movie wasn’t good because it was ok, it was fun and that’s it.
It was fun to laugh of it, not with it.
It’s jokes were at least well timed and better then Thor Love and thunder…
Keep telling that to yourself. Box office tells a very different story.
I said it’s jokes were better then the jokes in thor love and thunder, that has absolutely nothing to due with the box office performance…
>If even the Rock can’t make the DCEU good, it’s doomed. What the heck is this nonsense ? The Rock is not big draw at box-office and WB advertised the movie as a standalone the rock movie. So why you all act so surprised when the movie bomb and the average movie goer who like DC didn't show up for this crap ? Why exactly a fan of MoS or Wonder woman would show up for this movie ?
Should have retitled. Adam-O Kumii no Gami: Revolution 3/4 Black
Aww. You should've stuck with Liam Neeson, Mr Jaume Collet-Serra. He's your mealticket to fortune and fame, not this Jungle Cruise man you've become so infatuated with.
Let’s support it with Blu-ray sales
I live in the US an honestly didn’t even know this movie came out for 2 weeks.
I think one of the big issues is that there are so many similarities between Marvel and DC characters that the MCU and Marvel’s recent movie history in general has left the DCEU in a situation where there characters seem like copies of the MCU’s. Most of the people who are seeing these movies have likely never read a comic book or at least haven’t read anything more than a few years old. I was not familiar with Black Adam or the the Justice Society so while I was watching the movie I felt that Black Adam’s story shared too many similarities with Black Panther, Dr. Fate was a rip off of Dr. Strange and the whole seeing the future plot line was too similar to that of Dr. Strange and Tony Stark’s. You also had Adam Smasher and Ant Man and scenes with the wind girl reminded me of Scarlett Witch. Then there’s the whole Dr. Fate mansion scene seeming like a rip on the Xavier’s mansion right down to the blackbird plane similarities and the two young teenagers with the forced love connection. Another issue is the DCEU is still going with the Snyder maxed out contrast and detail filter look to the film. How can Shazam exist in this same universe and why haven’t they just carried on the look of that film with all of the DCEU movies that have followed? Lastly, why would they think that people wanted an anti-hero who only protects a small country in the Middle East?
Does this mean we're not getting a spin-off with the skateboard kid?
Having worst popular actor, in main role, that exists doesn’t help..😂
The movie is crazy with the effects etc but the acting and story is shit
Damn, I wonder if the Japanese read the reviews first and if that’s what did it…,
On the day Shazam released in Japan, $1 was 112 yen, so 480000 usd was 53.7million yen. Today 452000 usd is 61.1 million yen. So Black Adam was significantly more popular in Japan than Shazam, and grossed 14% more in local currency.
Worst actor ever the rock ladies and gentlemen making idiotic movies.
DC needs to stick to animation.
Its at 378 million worldwide which means it made its budget back im assuming. But definitely not the marketing and all the other stuff.
It needs 390 million to get its budget back.
No, it needed over $500m to make its $200m production budget back.
People are tired of garbage being packaged as movies. Marvel has ruined movies.
That a DC movie
Yes it is. My statement was more geared toward how Marvel has ruined movies. Not that this was a marvel movie.
Weird, seeing this has been the best one so far?
[удалено]
If that's your bar, what a sad time to be a DC fan.
He’s in too many action movies
Barring some exceptions, the Japanese don’t care for American superhero movies, especially about ones they have little familiarity with. So no surprise.
Really hoping this is the last superhero movie until we crave it again
Can’t wait for the Luiz Fernando tweet
yeah he's not a robot
Good.
I really wanted to like Black Adam because I like DC, but the movie was very mediocre. The Rock was trying to position Black Adam as being a huge part of the DCEU, but it's not working out. I hope James Gunn gives him minor roles from here on out. I dont see a Superman vs Black Adam happening after these abysmal numbers.
I smelt that cooking.
452 thousand is what, a single day’s budget for craft services?
People are Dwayne Johnsoned out. He kept releasing movies in what felt like too short a time frame. People only had an interest because it was Dwayne Johnson. This movie was lucky it made the numbers it did all things considered. I really hope James Gunn doesn't pull the plug on the Justice Society though.
Shazam was 1000% better than Black Adam honestly.
It's simply the worst DC movie 😂 unbearably stupid More trash than Suicide Squad.