Warner Bros. is one of the oldest movie studios around. It makes sense that they create and release the most original content in the business. They pride themselves on giving new films a chance and hoping for success. Forbes reports that last year, Warner Bros. released 21 films but didn’t see a full return on their investments. Warner Bros. released some of last year’s biggest box office flops which include Pan, In The Heart of The Sea, and Jupiter Ascending . With the anticipation of Batman v Superman releasing in 2016, Warner Bros. was hoping the film would be a financial ray of hope. Unfortunately, they may have been in way over their heads.
This is not necessarily about the failure of Batman v Superman . This is more about Warner Bros. not seeing the forest for the trees. Batman v Superman had a stellar opening weekend with $166 million in domestic sales. In a separate article by Forbes , by the second weekend , Batman v Superman , experienced a 70-80 percent drop in ticket sales. When the second weekend was over, the film had made less than $60 million dollars domestically. While having made good profits worldwide, the film is continuing to sink at the box office. At this rate, the film is unlikely to hit the $1 billion mark, which is what Warner Bros. had been hoping for.
“We’re not going to take a movie that’s supposed to be one thing and turn it into a copycat of something else.”
The Business Insider mentions that although the studio has denied any unexpected changes, the suspected plan is to release fewer films in the future. Namely reducing the amount of films with original stories. That would give them more time to focus on their DC comics movie universe, their Lego movies, and the Fantastic Beast and Where To Find Them series.
This new push could help them recoup their past losses. Right now, Warner Bros. cannot afford to be as risky as they once were.
One of Warner Bros. business partners noted how the money issue hurts them via The Hollywood Reporter.
“It’s not dramatic, but it is uncharted territory for them. They were always filmmaker-driven — that might now not be the case as much. They had a bad 18 months. How could there not be some kind of reaction to that? It’s a strange path to a greenlight now. It takes longer.”
Now this can mean several things. Screen Crush writes that the executives over at Warner Bros. were genuinely shocked by the overwhelmingly bad press and mixed fan reactions to Batman v Superman . They really thought the film would be their No. 1 hit of the year. With their film slate planned out through 2020, everyone is left to wonder what their next step will be. It’s only natural for them to evaluate what went wrong and fix things accordingly. But does this mean George Miller could be stepping into the director’s chair? Does this mean future Justice League films will be put on hold? That remains to be seen.
All is not lost for Warner Bros. They have some great and financially safe films to look forward to this year. Deadlinereports the Harry Potterspin-off film adapted from J.K. Rowling’s book, Fantastic Beast and Where to Find Them ,is slated for release in November. Then there is DC comics film Suicide Squadreleasing on August 5. In addition, the solo Wonder Womanhas been moved up to June 2, 2017, and the Andy Serkis Jungle Bookfilm has been pushed back to 2018.
Warner Bros. has a long way to go. They will be watching everything and everyone under a microscope. If they focus on quality content, they should not have a problem getting back to releasing original content.
[Image via Warner Bros.]
