‘Suicide Squad’ Grosses Over $135 Million At The Box Office As Critics Continue Downplaying The Film’s Success

Suicide Squad has received some of the harshest comments from critics since Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice. Controversy arose around the film with DC Comic book fans coming to the defense of the film, even though they had not seen it at that time. The movie had not even been released when the social media war over it broke out. Now though the votes are in and the box office is good, with record-breaking sales.

Rotten Tomatoes, a film critic site, took the brunt of the Suicide Squad fan’s wrath, as DC Comic book lovers were out for blood, but settled for a little tomato juice. They started a Twitter movement they called “Crush the Tomato,” and the squad threatened to shut the site down, according to The Slate. Fans were just angry, though, and no one is shutting anything down. No critics have been harmed while reviewing this flick.

Suicide Squad, despite critic predictions, did very well in its first weekend, grossing $135.1 million in estimated sales, which is a record for any motion picture ever released in the month of August, according to USA Today. The squad also beat out Deadpool by a tiny fraction. Deadpool opened in February with $132.4 million in first-weekend box office sales.

Rotten Tomatoes gave Suicide Squad a 29 percent rating last week, just two points above the 27 percent rating they gave Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice before it opened. Comparatively, they gave Deadpool 84 percent according to USA Today. The rotten reviews raised the ire of DC Comic fans.

Suicide Squad, though, must have delivered what fans wanted to see. Not only did moviegoers turn out in droves to see the flick, but the movie got a B+ Cinemascore, according to Forbes. That is really not a bad score considering all the votes are averaged together. Those who hated it and those who loved it were averaged together, so there must have been some A+ votes to average out those who agreed with all those critics.

Rotten Tomatoes has not recanted. In fact, they have lowered their Tomatometer to 26 percent. That is the percentage of approved Tomatoes reviewers who liked the movie. Still, they have to concede that 73 percent of the audience like it.

Suicide Squad is enjoying some controversy, with critics hating it and many moviegoers loving it. Controversy may be giving the motion picture a bit of a boost, as everyone would like to weigh in soon on the overall quality of this film. Perhaps it will become a cult classic like Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, a motion picture that was so bad it was actually perceived as fabulously fun back in the 1980s.

Rotten Tomatoes represents fairly well what most of the critics are saying about the movie. Many do not like it. Now that the first weekend has proven to be a massive success, most of the theater chair experts are predicting interest to die out quickly. It doesn’t have legs they say, or at least it might not.

Suicide Squad’s box office performance was one for the record books. Forbes confirms the film represents the ninth-biggest superhero movie ever, at least in terms of the first weekend. It is also the fourth-biggest DC Comics opening ever, bowing only to the last three Batman movies. It is also the second-biggest non-sequel debut ever, only being exceeded by The Hunger Games. The Hunger Games grossed $152 million in its first weekend. It also ranks nineteenth among all Friday through Sunday film debuts ever, so again it’s nothing to sneeze at.

Rotten Tomatoes critics seem to have a bit of egg on their faces right now, and so do all the other critics who didn’t like the movie, still they are entitled to their opinion. It seems there is occasionally a huge gap between the tastes of those who consider themselves connoisseurs and what average people are willing to pay to see. Movies are all about fun and what people enjoy seeing. Perhaps there is no such thing as good taste in films, only what people enjoy.

Suicide Squad fans and Rotten Tomatoes critics do not have to agree on the DC Comics film and it is likely they never will.

[Photo by Ilya S. Savenok/Getty Images]