The Flash, a superhero adventure starring Ezra Miller, emerged victorious over Pixars Elemental in a battle of box office lightweights.
This weekends two new releases were once expected to ignite the summer blockbuster season; instead, both entirely missed the mark. The Flash stumbled with $55 million and Elemental collected just $29.5 million in their respective debuts. Both films fell short of already-low expectations. Worse, they were pricy endeavors, costing $200 million to make and roughly $100 million to market, so they are shaping up to be huge disappointments in their theatrical runs.
In the lead-up to The Flash, executives at Warner Bros. worked hard to convince the public that the film is one of the greatest superhero movies ever made, per newly minted DC Studios co-chief James Gunn. Directed by Andy Muschietti, the story picks up as Millers Barry Allen a.k.a The Flash travels back in time to prevent his mothers murder and inadvertently cracks open the DC multiverse. (Cameos abound!)
But a tepid B CinemaScore from opening weekend crowds suggests that the moviegoing masses didnt entirely agree with the lavish praise bestowed on the film by the people who made it. Without positive audience scores or strong word-of-mouth, The Flash will struggle to rebound in the coming weeks, especially as summer season heats up with the release of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny on June 30, Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One on July 12 and Christopher Nolans Oppenheimer on July 21.
This is a weak three-day opening for a superhero [film], says David A. Gross, who runs the movie consulting firm Franchise Entertainment Research. There have been similar openings that grew into big numbers, he adds, referring to 2015s Ant-Man, which opened to $57 million and ended with $519 million worldwide, as well as 2018s Aquaman, which debuted to $67.4 million and finished at $1.15 billion globally. But we do not see that here.
The Flash also stumbled at the international box office with $75 million from 78 markets, bringing its global tally to $139 million. Unless its box office fortunes rebound, The Flash looks to fall more closely in line with Dwayne Johnsons $200 million-budgeted Black Adam, which opened last year to $67 million and failed to reach $400 million globally, ultimately losing money in its theatrical run.
Analysts believe that several factors, one of them being those unenthusiastic audience reactions, are to blame for the films weak initial turnout. Another roadblock is that The Flash landed on the big screen without a traditional promotional push. Thats because Miller has become a controversial figure in recent years due to legal troubles and assault allegations. The actor, who has apologized for past erratic behavior and went to treatment for complex mental health issues, made a rare public appearance at Mondays premiere of The Flash but didnt engage with press or other publicity efforts that would be standard for a tentpole of this scope.
Also, The Flash is the second of four DC films to open in 2023 before the studios new overlords Gunn and Peter Safran take the comic book universe in an entirely new direction. Thats left The Flash and Shazam! Fury of the Gods, one of the biggest superhero misfires in recent memory, hanging in the balance. Its apparently hard to get comic book fans to care about an interconnected universe thatll soon be abandoned and rebooted in favor of different Spandex-clad heroes. Blue Beetle, starring Xolo Mariduea as a boy who bonds with an alien symbiote, opens on Aug. 18. Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom is set for Dec. 20.
Elemental, an animated adventure about opposites who attract, added a muted $15 million at the international box office for a global total of $44.5 million. Unlike The Flash, Elemental has been embraced by its audience, who awarded the film an A CinemaScore. So theres a chance that ticket sales could recover even slightly in the next few weeks, especially since there isnt much competition from family films on the horizon.
But theres no sugar-coating the debut of Elemental, which landed by far the worst start in modern history for Pixar, ranking below some of its more forgettable attempts like 2015s The Good Dinosaur ($39 million) and 2020s Onward ($39 million). The animation empire behind Toy Story, Up and Ratatouille hasnt been able to rebound from the pandemic, when several of its titles were sent directly to Disney+ and family audiences were trained to expect those movies at home.
Its been a difficult market for films with original stories like Elemental, which revolves around the relationship between the two seemingly different elements of fire and water. Brand recognition has been a big part in the success of recent family films, such as The Super Mario Bros. Movie and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.
Elemental is not based on established IP, notes Gross. Of the recent animation titles, this is clearly the most challenging to open.
Also this weekend, Lionsgates horror satire The Blackening opened in sixth place after earning $6 million in its debut. Directed by Tim Story, the film pokes fun at the common horror trope that Black characters are often the first to die. It follows a group of Black friends who gather at a remote cabin to celebrate Juneteenth. The film cost just $5 million.
Elsewhere at the box office, Sonys Spider-Man: Across the Spider Verse landed in third place, earning a mighty $27.8 million in its third weekend of release. The superhero sequel is already a big box office winner with $280 million in North America and $489.3 million worldwide. A third entry is scheduled for 2024.
In fourth place, Paramounts Transformers: Rise of the Beastsadded $20 million as ticket sales collapsed by 67% in its sophomore outing. Still, the tentpole managed to cross $100 million at the domestic box office with $103 million to date. With its $200 million budget, the studio needs the seventh Transformers installment to resonate at the international box office to justify that hefty price tag. Over the weekend, Rise of the Beasts generated $37.2 million from 68 markets, bringing its international tally to $174.3 million.
Disneys The Little Mermaid rounded out the top five with $11.6 million in its fourth weekend in theaters. The live-action remake has amassed $253 million in North America and $466 million to date, which would have been a good result had the movie not cost $250 million to produce. At this rate, The Little Mermaid is struggling to break even in its theatrical run.
In limited release, Wes Andersons Asteroid City,starring Scarlett Johansson, Jason Schwartzman, Maya Hawke, Bryan Cranston and dozens of other Anderson regulars and newcomers, collected $790,000 from six theaters in New York and Los Angeles. Those ticket sales translate to $132,211 per theater, ranking as the best average since 2016s La La Land ($176,220 per theater).
For Asteroid City, which takes place as a cosmic event disrupts a fictional desert town, the bigger obstacle will come when the film expands next weekend into 1,500 theaters. Thats been a huge challenge for other acclaimed indies, like Tr, Triangle of Sadness and Beau Is Afraid, all of which also scored notable arthouse openings but eventually failed to translate that interest to mainstream audiences.