The Batman Movie

[Alpha]

That's some interesting logic, people who saw the movie liked it but that doesn't matter because there are hypothetically many who weren't interested in seeing it.

I'm not sure I'm understanding that one. Even if not a lot of people saw it the few who did liked it, for comparison the Uncharted movie opened lower than The Batman in China and has a 6.1 Maoyan score even though it's the kind of lighthearted big spectacle movie everyone says China loves. Being seen by a small amount of people didn't help Uncharted, The Batman is well received there, the word of mouth should hopefully spread to those who haven't seen it and help the sequel breakout there.

You got a link to predictions being low even before all those theaters shut down? I'm regularly on box office forums and don't recall there being projections before the shutdowns. All I remember is fans speculating it would open low because it's not the kind of movie China typically goes crazy over.

Think of Blade Runner 2047. Great reviews, not a lot of people saw it. I'm saying that the people who wanted to see it seemed to really like it, but it doesn't mean that many do want to see it, even if the word of mouth is great.

[Korath]

Think of Blade Runner 2047. Great reviews, not a lot of people saw it. I'm saying that the people who wanted to see it seemed to really like it, but it doesn't mean that many do want to see it, even if the word of mouth is great.

I'm definitively NOT interested in seeing it. There was a huge temporary price fall for cinema tickets and I didn't go see it because it's absolutely not what I want in a Batman movie from the look of the trailers. Perhaps I'll see it someday, but not in theatres, that's for sure.

[DarkKnight85]

Think of Blade Runner 2047. Great reviews, not a lot of people saw it. I'm saying that the people who wanted to see it seemed to really like it, but it doesn't mean that many do want to see it, even if the word of mouth is great.

This is such a good counter point actually. That movie was a great movie, prob not as good as the original, but a very well made movie and not a lot of people took interest to it. That type of movie literally doesn't get made anymore and somehow the studio allowed it to go through. It was like the anti-hollywood movie that doesn't check off any boxes and just focuses on the source material.

[The True Detective]

I didn't bring up No Time to Die, because I literally didn't have enough knowledge about the situation. I didn't follow it's box office when it released. So anything you're telling me here is informative.

I do think you're putting too much faith into China though. You can't really count on the Chinese market anymore for consistent and stable box office earnings. The Chinese government is being far more selective when it comes to US movies being released in that country. That and they are also trying to promote their own domestic films and are kind of trying to distance themselves from US films. What's interesting is I don't even think TDK was released in China, and the TDKR only shows about 50 million from China. With Batman v Superman at about 100 million. I think this makes the TDK saga box office even more impressive that they basically did that well without them and if anything, had the same handicap that the Batman now has that you are referring to.

Well now that you know about No Time to Die's situation would you classify it as a disappointment too? Like I said Bond is bigger than Batman at the box office and NTTD was the last Daniel Craig Bond movie, it had more going on for it box office wise than The Batman did but Batman should be able to surpass it. We can't be selective here, if Batman's brand is supposedly damaged and his movie in on pace to do more than a Bond movie released under similar circumstances Bond is damaged too.

I'm not putting too much faith in China, there's a bare minimum superhero movies tend to make there. If The Batman has a better audience score than No Way Home does in China that shows they liked the movie well enough. Even superhero movies they didn't like like BvS do at least $90m, if all theaters were open I don't see why this couldn't have done similar business.

You keep comparing this to 2 sequels and It's never going to work, wait for the next movies before you do that. When Batman Begins only made $373m I guarantee you NOBODY expected the followup to make $1b. Spider-Man: Homecoming didn't make a billion but it's sequels did, no reason to believe The Batman's sequels can't do the same.

[The True Detective]

Think of Blade Runner 2047. Great reviews, not a lot of people saw it. I'm saying that the people who wanted to see it seemed to really like it, but it doesn't mean that many do want to see it, even if the word of mouth is great.

That would be a good counterpoint if The Batman didn't come out with so many theaters shutting in China, BR2049 didn't have that problem anywhere, it just isn't the type of movie that's going to do big numbers. The last solo Batman movie in China did over $50m, more than The Amazing Spider-Man that very same year. The Batman will be lucky to hit $25m in China, kind of obvious COVID is the reason for the low total.

And I asked you for any links to professional journalists or outlets predicted a low opening for The Batman in China before the theater closings, you just deflected to Blade Runner.

[Alpha]

By the way, the audience rating for The Batman in China dropped more than expected when more people saw it, which is what I expected. They just aren't the type of audience interested in this movie (their loss since the movie was actually better than it seemed).

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/mo...id-1235112446/

"the latest tracking suggests an opening of just $15 million to $20 million, down from earlier projections in the $25 million to $30 million range."
For comparison, Far From Home and Aquaman opened to 95 Million in China and Spider-man Homecoming opened to 70 Million

[The True Detective]

By the way, the audience rating for The Batman in China dropped more than expected when more people saw it, which is what I expected. They just aren't the type of audience interested in this movie (their loss since the movie was actually better than it seemed).

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/mo...id-1235112446/

"the latest tracking suggests an opening of just $15 million to $20 million, down from earlier projections in the $25 million to $30 million range."
For comparison, Far From Home and Aquaman opened to 95 Million in China and Spider-man Homecoming opened to 70 Million

Yes, it has dropped from a 9.0 to a 8.1 which still beats NWH's 7.9, for a movie like that a 8.1 is a good score. In the US a Cinemascore below a B+ is considered not great to bad but for R rated or horror movies for example it's great. Joker had a B+ score but had great legs anyway, because that's a good rating for a super dark R rated movie. The article you linked mentioned 30% of the theaters being closed so of course the projections went down. By the time it actually came out even more theaters closed.

I know those movies opened bigger in China, I never expected this to open higher than any of them but none of them would've made as much as they did in the current climate in China. Green Book of all movies made $71m in China, do you really think The Batman couldn't have done at least that if COVID wasn't an issue? My argument this whole time is this could've done decent by comic book movie standards in China with no pandemic. Star Wars is even less popular there than Batman is but The Force Awakens still made $125m there.

[Alpha]

No Way Home wasn't released in China so I don't understand how it has an audience score.

8.1 is probably good. But it's a major drop, and as you know, not many people have seen it in China yet, so I continue my point that just because it had a great rating for the few people that saw it early (because they really wanted to see it) doesn't mean that the larger population is very interested in it.

In fact, the major drop indicates that there really is a discrepancy between the major fans in china and the rest of th population. And we don't know if 8.1 will be the final score.

The earlier predictions I cited of 25-30 million, even if it takes into account 30% cinemas closed, is still less than half of what Homecoming made, which isn't at all proportional.

[DarkKnight85]

Well now that you know about No Time to Die's situation would you classify it as a disappointment too? Like I said Bond is bigger than Batman at the box office and NTTD was the last Daniel Craig Bond movie, it had more going on for it box office wise than The Batman did but Batman should be able to surpass it. We can't be selective here, if Batman's brand is supposedly damaged and his movie in on pace to do more than a Bond movie released under similar circumstances Bond is damaged too.

I'm not putting too much faith in China, there's a bare minimum superhero movies tend to make there. If The Batman has a better audience score than No Way Home does in China that shows they liked the movie well enough. Even superhero movies they didn't like like BvS do at least $90m, if all theaters were open I don't see why this couldn't have done similar business.

You keep comparing this to 2 sequels and It's never going to work, wait for the next movies before you do that. When Batman Begins only made $373m I guarantee you NOBODY expected the followup to make $1b. Spider-Man: Homecoming didn't make a billion but it's sequels did, no reason to believe The Batman's sequels can't do the same.

I had to do some quick research as I haven't tracked like any of the Bond films recently. I looked at the box offices for Skyfall, Spectre, and No Time to die and they consistently dropped in financial revenue as they went on. This makes sense to me though because Skyfall was Daniel Craigi's best received bond film behind Casino Royale. Looks like diminishing returns due to quality to me. I know not a lot of people were thrilled with Spectre. It prob did get hurt a little bit by the pandemic, but to me I think the movie's financial performance did okay considering the climate in which it released and was just a little held back by maybe how good of a film it actually was. Looking at these numbers though, I wouldn't use James Bond as a franchise to constantly be in the 1 billion dollar club, and that anything under be considered a failure. It seems that Skyfall was just a really really good film and was the pinnacle of the Craig era and was the only film to go over 1 billion. So in that regard, NTTD did fine given everything.


I also want to be clear, I don't think Batman's brand is damaged and I've actually been arguing the opposite of that. My whole argument was that I thought the Batman brand was so strong that I'm a little shocked that this movie didn't easily get 1 billion, or even over that. I did however agree and still agree that DC's movie franchise brand is damaged and I'm sure that's factored in somewhere. But being that this movie is a stand alone film and not in a shared universe whatsoever, I expected the Batman brand to be a powerhouse here. This movie had a huge advantage of having ten years of great batman material before it to keep the hype going. Along with Arkham games and always the best comic runs by the best comic writers in the business. The brand is crazy strong. So Yea, I am scratching my head with the numbers it's pulled in so far. I wouldn't even be so sure there will be such a huge jump in revenue from this movie and it's sequel. I think it will make more yes, but I don't see it doing what happened between Begins and Dark Knight percentage wise.

[The True Detective]

No Way Home wasn't released in China so I don't understand how it has an audience score.

8.1 is probably good. But it's a major drop, and as you know, not many people have seen it in China yet, so I continue my point that just because it had a great rating for the few people that saw it early (because they really wanted to see it) doesn't mean that the larger population is very interested in it.

In fact, the major drop indicates that there really is a discrepancy between the major fans in china and the rest of th population. And we don't know if 8.1 will be the final score.

The earlier predictions I cited of 25-30 million, even if it takes into account 30% cinemas closed, is still less than half of what Homecoming made, which isn't at all proportional.

Piracy exists, that's how they saw NWH in China in fact in Asia in general NWH had oddly mediocre audience reactions. I know in Japan it did a lot less than it was forecasted to do. Some speculate it's because the Raimi movies weren't huge there so they didn't get much enjoyment from Tobey and his villains but I don't know how true that is.

That $25-30m was still from a heavily COVID affected country, you're downplaying how much of an impact it's had. Do you think Homecoming would've had the same opening in 2022 as it did in 2017?

[The True Detective]

I had to do some quick research as I haven't tracked like any of the Bond films recently. I looked at the box offices for Skyfall, Spectre, and No Time to die and they consistently dropped in financial revenue as they went on. This makes sense to me though because Skyfall was Daniel Craigi's best received bond film behind Casino Royale. Looks like diminishing returns due to quality to me. I know not a lot of people were thrilled with Spectre. It prob did get hurt a little bit by the pandemic, but to me I think the movie's financial performance did okay considering the climate in which it released and was just a little held back by maybe how good of a film it actually was. Looking at these numbers though, I wouldn't use James Bond as a franchise to constantly be in the 1 billion dollar club, and that anything under be considered a failure. It seems that Skyfall was just a really really good film and was the pinnacle of the Craig era and was the only film to go over 1 billion. So in that regard, NTTD did fine given everything.


I also want to be clear, I don't think Batman's brand is damaged and I've actually been arguing the opposite of that. My whole argument was that I thought the Batman brand was so strong that I'm a little shocked that this movie didn't easily get 1 billion, or even over that. I did however agree and still agree that DC's movie franchise brand is damaged and I'm sure that's factored in somewhere. But being that this movie is a stand alone film and not in a shared universe whatsoever, I expected the Batman brand to be a powerhouse here. This movie had a huge advantage of having ten years of great batman material before it to keep the hype going. Along with Arkham games and always the best comic runs by the best comic writers in the business. The brand is crazy strong. So Yea, I am scratching my head with the numbers it's pulled in so far. I wouldn't even be so sure there will be such a huge jump in revenue from this movie and it's sequel. I think it will make more yes, but I don't see it doing what happened between Begins and Dark Knight percentage wise.

Again very few franchises start off a new installment with $1b, Spider-Man's arguably more popular than Batman and his MCU solo debut with Iron Man, No pandemic and riding the success of his debut in Civil War and the MCU in general couldn't get there. Unless you truly think Batman is a lot bigger than Spider-Man I don't see why you'd expect a new iteration of his movies to do $1b out the gate with COVID.

[DarkKnight85]

Again very few franchises start off a new installment with $1b, Spider-Man's arguably more popular than Batman and his MCU solo debut with Iron Man, No pandemic and riding the success of his debut in Civil War and the MCU in general couldn't get there. Unless you truly think Batman is a lot bigger than Spider-Man I don't see why you'd expect a new iteration of his movies to do $1b out the gate with COVID.

I do think Batman as an IP might be a stronger brand than Spiderman in North America. Not internationally, but it's a coin toss domestically. As for the other thing, I'm not going to keep going in circles here. I don't view covid at this point in time as a major factor affecting movies, given that the specific movies in question have an appetite to be seen. Covid affected the box office a lot differently in the timeline over the last two years. People are starting not to care anymore.

[bat39]

This is such a good counter point actually. That movie was a great movie, prob not as good as the original, but a very well made movie and not a lot of people took interest to it. That type of movie literally doesn't get made anymore and somehow the studio allowed it to go through. It was like the anti-hollywood movie that doesn't check off any boxes and just focuses on the source material.

Funnily enough, I was watching the Atlantic's podcast (or rather reading its transcript) recently discussing The Batman. (link here: https://www.theatlantic.com/podcasts...timism/627119/). And they raised an interesting point that Matt Reeves is the kind of filmmaker who'd love to make the kind of big-budget prestige films that Hollywood doesn't like to fund anymore. So he made his prestige film under the banner of superhero entertainment since that's the kind of project which Hollywood does fund.

[The True Detective]

I do think Batman as an IP might be a stronger brand than Spiderman in North America. Not internationally, but it's a coin toss domestically. As for the other thing, I'm not going to keep going in circles here. I don't view covid at this point in time as a major factor affecting movies, given that the specific movies in question have an appetite to be seen. Covid affected the box office a lot differently in the timeline over the last two years. People are starting not to care anymore.

But it clearly is affecting the box office, we went from multiple billion dollar movies a year pre 2020 to No Way Home being the 1st and only billion dollar grosser since 2019. You don't see a glaringly obvious reason why that is? The Matrix Ressurections only made $37m domestically, it never would've made such an embarrassingly low amount before the pandemic.

Spider-Man and Batman are neck and neck in North America, about equal in Europe and Latin America, Batman has the edge in the UK and Spider-Man has a big edge in Asia. What specific movies are you talking about? Other than NWH every movie is either underperforming or doing about what they'd normally would in North America but not overseas. NWH is the only movie to wildly exceed expectations.

[DarkKnight85]

Funnily enough, I was watching the Atlantic's podcast (or rather reading its transcript) recently discussing The Batman. (link here: https://www.theatlantic.com/podcasts...timism/627119/). And they raised an interesting point that Matt Reeves is the kind of filmmaker who'd love to make the kind of big-budget prestige films that Hollywood doesn't like to fund anymore. So he made his prestige film under the banner of superhero entertainment since that's the kind of project which Hollywood does fund.

Well in that regard, I guess it's definitely mission accomplished for Matt Reeves! Because that definitely looks like what he did. Kind of win for both the studio and himself I guess. Both got what they wanted.