Birds of Prey Reactions

[CliffHanger2]

There's really no comparison between this and John Wick. Wick was on a very low budget with an unknown character. BOP was a big budget movie with a really popular character who was featured in a box-office hit.

[CRaymond]

Saw it. Liked it.

Notes:
Wanted more LaChapelle, Luhrmann, and McG cinematography influences.
Wanted more color grading — maybe to convey the individual BoP's motifs.
Wanted more Black Canary. Her action scenes were great, but she's the biggest mystery of the film.
Wanted a better costumer to design the final Birds' costumes.
Wanted Rosie Perez to find a blank mask in the post-credits scene.

[trooper_thorn]

The first John Wick movie made 15 million domestic on its opening weekend.... And the John Wick movies have Keanu Reeves. If we were talking about another action movie with females in the forefront, the 33 million opening would seem really good--THE RHYTHM SECTION would kill for those numbers. If THE KITCHEN had that opening, it would have been counted a success.

"John Wick" did only make $15M domestically opening weekend, but it only had a budget of $20M-$30M with an eventual take of $86M worldwide, although I don't recall anybody claiming it was a huge success rather I recall people just discussing how it exceeded expectations and made a small profit.

Anyway, of course the budget determines success where these films are concerned that's the whole point. You can make $230M on a film and still lose the studio over $50M if you make like GB16 and spend $144M to make it.

[ComicJunkie21]

There's really no comparison between this and John Wick. Wick was on a very low budget with an unknown character. BOP was a big budget movie with a really popular character who was featured in a box-office hit.

I think a fair comparison can be made with JW3 as it had a similar budget and R rating. JW3 grossed $326 million on a 75 million budget. In its first week it debuted to $57 million while BOP debuted to $84 million. Additionally, I'd argue that BOP is in a better position because it has little competition until March and could have good legs due to word of mouth. JW3 was knocked off by Aladdin its second week and didn't have the opportunity to let out.

[Jim Kelly]

Like I said, it's about managing expectations. If WB announced that they expect the movie to make 30 to 40 million on its opening weekend, they could claim victory on Monday. And that amount seems reasonable for this type of movie (especially as it's not really a sequel). By overestimating the box office, they played into the hands of those that have been gunning for this movie for months--now those folks can make the false claim that the movie failed because it's too "woke" or it's a feminist screed against men (which, I shouldn't have to say, it is not). Because WB telegraphed an expectation for the movie that it couldn't live up to, they lost control of the narrative.

[ComicJunkie21]

Like I said, it's about managing expectations. If WB announced that they expect the movie to make 30 to 40 million on its opening weekend, they could claim victory on Monday. And that amount seems reasonable for this type of movie (especially as it's not really a sequel). By overestimating the box office, they played into the hands of those that have been gunning for this movie for months--now those folks can make the false claim that the movie failed because it's too "woke" or it's a feminist screed against men (which, I shouldn't have to say, it is not). Because WB telegraphed an expectation for the movie that it couldn't live up to, they lost control of the narrative.

It will be interesting to see what happens this weekend as we could see it have better numbers than last weekend because tons of people go to the movies for valentines day. I also think releasing the film before valentines day hurt it and wasn't a smart move strategically. Warner should have just stated that they overestimated and blamed the underperformance on a bad release window. Right now they are definitely losing the narrative on a film that isn't actually bombing.

[titanfan]

A bigger comparison would be Oceans 8, which was Rated PG13, had a similar budget (around 70M) but worse reviews than BOP. It also had one big star (Sandra Bullock) It also suffered from being attacked as a "feminist movie", but not as much since it wasn't a comic book movie.

It went on to be a (box office) hit with 297M off it's 70M budget. (4.x multiplier) Despite opening at 41M. I think the PG13 rating does matter.

[Zero Hunter]

The simple fact is the target audience for this film is the teen girl set and making this rated R took all those potential tickets off the board. If they had made this PG-13 I can almost promise you the box office would have been 10 million higher. I don't see this having legs because even most of the positive reviews are not that glowing with most saying it is "Just OK". This movie was marketed so bad which also is one of the big reasons it has not done well. I mean can anyone honestly tell me they had any idea what the plot of the movie was from those horrible traliers? All I saw in them is Harley acting crazy and a bunch of other generic looking girl power archtypes standing around trying to look cool.

The marketing team on this movie failed in every way possible.

[80sbaby]

You're taking the crew's words way out of context and seem to be projecting quite a bit onto phantom 'others" who agree with you (without actually sourcing any of them, btw.) I'm not sure you get exactly what the "male gaze" is, either?

And teens have zero problem with "girl power" themes in their shows/movies.

[superduperman]

DC doesn't seem to get that a lot of us will never accept Harley Quinn. She is a criminal and a murderer. So to tack her onto a BOP movie that's supposed to be about heroes is a huge turnoff to a lot of people. This attempt to redeem Harley in everyone's eyes isn't going to work. I think they just assumed that anyone who is a fan of the BOP would come out for this movie. What they are doing is attaching two different fanbases to each other and assuming they're the same. Plus, she's just annoying. Even taking the murderer aspect out of the equation. Her dialogue is obnoxious. FFS, she was the main villain in the BOP TV show! Has everyone forgotten that? I have to wonder how this movie would have done without Harley attached to it. Instead if became Harley and her sidekicks.

[Otto Gruenwald]

Harley Quinn is DC's poochie.

[Slowpokeking]

You're taking the crew's words way out of context and seem to be projecting quite a bit onto phantom 'others" who agree with you (without actually sourcing any of them, btw.) I'm not sure you get exactly what the "male gaze" is, either?

And teens have zero problem with "girl power" themes in their shows/movies.

Actually, the "phantom " others have used their wallet to vote already, accept it. There are enough reviews pointing out this problem.

Teens have no problem with girl power. But "feminist SMASH" is a different thing and they are more interested in good looking person' romance/adventure. BoP is not the first to fail like it, but I hope it is the last.

[Slowpokeking]

DC doesn't seem to get that a lot of us will never accept Harley Quinn. She is a criminal and a murderer. So to tack her onto a BOP movie that's supposed to be about heroes is a huge turnoff to a lot of people. This attempt to redeem Harley in everyone's eyes isn't going to work. I think they just assumed that anyone who is a fan of the BOP would come out for this movie. What they are doing is attaching two different fanbases to each other and assuming they're the same. Plus, she's just annoying. Even taking the murderer aspect out of the equation. Her dialogue is obnoxious. FFS, she was the main villain in the BOP TV show! Has everyone forgotten that? I have to wonder how this movie would have done without Harley attached to it. Instead if became Harley and her sidekicks.

Harley Quinn has to be used right. Using BoP as her sidekicks by murdering their personality and appearance is one of the worst choices.

And she is nowhere close to be used for "girl power". Yeah she was the main villain in the 2002 series.

[superduperman]

Harley Quinn is DC's poochie.

Whenever Harley isn't on screen, everyone should be asking "Where's Harley?"

[titanfan]

I think they just assumed that anyone who is a fan of the BOP would come out for this movie.

BOP sold like 70k in it's prime? I mean this movie needs all the viewers it can get, but I think WB now regrets marketing the BOP at all, if anything the small but vocal BOP fans are all like "This isn't the classic BOP!" everywhere.