The box office delivered a shock this weekend, as “Justice League” is about to become the first installment of the DC Extended Universe to fall short of $100 million in its opening weekend.
With an estimated $96 million from 4,051 screens, it’s 44 percent lower than the series-best $166 million opening by “Batman v Superman” last year, and the lowest opening for a live-action Warner Bros./DC film since “Green Lantern” in 2011.
This film was supposed to be the high point for the DCEU, following off the momentum made by “Wonder Woman” earlier this year by having the popular heroine join forces with Batman, Cyborg, The Flash, Aquaman and a resurrected Superman. Instead, it’s falling well short of the $110-120 million projection target set by studios and won’t even register in the top 50 highest opening weekends of all-time.
CinemaScore audiences gave the film a B+ — a score equal to “Suicide Squad” — with 58 percent of the polling group male and 61 percent over 25. But that hasn’t translated into strong word-of-mouth, and critics have lambasted the film with a 39 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes. “Justice League” has grossed $281 million worldwide, with box office analysts telling TheWrap that the film will need to gross $700 million worldwide to break even.
“JL” should be able to reach that mark, and Warner Bros. will be fine in the short term with the box office revenue they’ve built from recent big successes like “Wonder Woman” and “It.” But this was supposed to be this franchise’s “Avengers,” and with Pixar’s critically-acclaimed “Coco” coming out next weekend for Thanksgiving moviegoers, “Justice League” could take a big second weekend drop similar to what “Suicide Squad” and “BvS” suffered after their openings.
On the flip side, there’s Lionsgate’s “Wonder,” a $20 million inspirational family film that’s beating expectations with $27 million from 3,096 screens. The film was projected to make around $10 million before the weekend, but the tracking didn’t factor in the elementary school crowd who don’t always have the biggest social media presence and who have read R.J. Palacio’s novel as part of their schoolwork. The film was also a smash hit with older female audiences, as it got an A+ on CinemaScore from opening night crowds that were two-thirds female and over 25. It has an 83 percent RT rating.
“Thor: Ragnarok” is in third place with $21 million in its third weekend, consistent in performance with the $22 million third weekend total posted by “Spider-Man: Homecoming” this past summer. The Marvel film has crossed the $700 million mark worldwide, and will cross the $250 million domestic mark on Monday. Last week’s releases complete the top five with “Daddy’s Home 2” making $14.8 million for a ten-day total of $50.5 million, and “Murder on the Orient Express” making $13.5 million for a $51.5 million ten-day total. Finally, Sony/Affirm’s “The Star” opened outside the top five but slightly above tracker expectations, with the faith-based film making $10 million from 2,837 screens against a $20 million budget.
15 Scenes in the 'Justice League' Trailers That Were Not in the Finished Movie
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
(Spoilers ahead for "Justice League") Given that the Joss Whedon-helmed reshoots on "Justice League" went on significantly longer than planned, it's not really a surprise that some scenes from the marketing didn't make the final cut. But it's still fun to take a look at what was meant to be and compare it to what we actually got. So let's do that right now. (Note: This post was originally published on Nov. 18, 2017)
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
This hero shot of Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot), Aquaman (Jason Momoa) and Cyborg (Ray Fisher) didn't make the movie -- and neither did whatever location they're standing in.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
This location appears to be a different version of the cross-shaped platform at the center of the abandoned nuclear reactor Steppenwolf works from in the movie, but it never ends up looking so thoroughly thoroughly alien in the finished film. This old version of that space may have been somewhere else -- like inside Steppenwolf's spaceship that he keeps teleporting down to Earth from but which we never actually see in the movie.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
There were two trailer shots that showed Victor Stone in his pre-Cyborg state, but none were in the movie.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
Here's Victor Stone playing football, another pre-Cyborg bit for him that didn't make it in.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
There is a big cornfield scene between Clark (Henry Cavill) and Lois (Amy Adams) in the finished film but either it's different from this one one -- in which Clark says that he'll take her wearing his engagement ring from "Batman v Superman" as a yes to his proposal -- from the trailer or this was a part of that scene that didn't make it in. The cornfield scene in the finished product, notably, is one of those where Henry Cavill has his "Mission: Impossible" mustache being covered up by CGI, and that is very obviously not happening in this shot here.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
Though the "Justice League" opening credits did feature a montage of people being terrible without the moral compass of Superman to guide them, this bit with the "WORLD WITHOUT HOPE" newspaper headline was not among those shots.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
There's a scene in which Alfred (Jeremy Irons) is talking to someone offscreen (it's implied that it's Superman) in the batcave. Based on the dialogue we'd guess that Superman visited Alfred to find out where the other Justice League pals had gone to fight the final battle -- Superman, as you'll recall, simply shows up midway through that fight.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
There was a bit in one of the trailers where Cyborg saves a man from being nailed by an exploding tank, but there were no tanks at all in the finished film so it's tough to guess where this fits in.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
Aquaman did spear a lot of bug people in the finished movie, but this bit where he spears two at the same time didn't make the cut
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
This trailer shot shows Cyborg sporting a helmet.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
The trailer implies this shot is of Cyborg flying above the clouds, and while we do see him fly around a few times we never got this particular bit.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
The Flash breaking a window while using his super speed was a cool visual that was nowhere to be found in the finished movie
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
Here we see the Flash (Ezra Miller) fighting an evil soldier. Curiously, that entire type of baddie was cut from the movie -- all of Steppenwolf's forces had wings but this guy looks more like a regular human, a la the soldiers in Bruce Wayne's nightmare in "Batman v Superman."
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
Not sure what this shot is, honestly.
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We’ve got a pretty solid amount of cut content to sift through here
This part, in which Wonder Woman knocks a couple bug guys off the Batmobile, actually is in the movie -- but the color pallette is dramatically different in the finished film, sporting a bright red hue instead.
