Super Hero Worship is a regular opinion column by IGN’s Senior Staff Writer Jesse Schedeen.
There was a time when one would have included the Batman franchise among the most dependable in Hollywood. Heck, The Dark Knight was the first superhero movie to cross the $1 billion threshold at the global box office, and Batman just became the first superhero to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. But in recent years, it’s become clear that Batman, along with the larger DC Universe, has lost some of the wind beneath his cape. Look no further than Joker: Folie à Deux, a sequel that is falling well short of its predecessor both critically and commercially.
What gives? Why does it seem like audiences are losing interest in Batman even as the character celebrates his 85th birthday? Is the DC brand simply irrevocably tarnished after years of lackluster film and game releases? Let’s discuss.
The Reception to Joker: Folie à Deux
It’s safe to say that 2019’s Joker was a smash hit for DC, becoming the first R-rated movie to gross over $1 billion (a feat that wasn’t repeated until Deadpool & Wolverine this year) and earning star Joaquin Phoenix an Academy Award. It was probably inevitable that DC and Warner Bros. would seek to follow up on that success.
But despite all of that, was anyone actually clamoring for a Joker 2? The first film works as a perfectly standalone supervillain origin story, one that remains just ambiguous enough in its portrayal of Phoenix’s mentally ill proto-Joker to not ruin the character’s mystique. It doesn’t leave audiences begging for more of Arthur’s story. We all know where Joker eventually ends up. The better play was probably for DC to use Joker as a foundation to craft other adult-oriented, villain-centric films, something director Todd Phillips once pitched to Warners.
Instead, the studio opted to bring Phillips and Phoenix back for a direct sequel, tossing in Lady Gaga’s Harleen Quinzel for good measure. They even turned the sequel into a musical, which is honestly the only thing about the whole announcement that piqued my interest. The first movie is slavishly devoted to Martin Scorsese’s filmography to a fault, so anything to help the sequel find a voice of its own.
Whether or not anyone really wanted a Joker sequel in the first place, it’s already becoming clear that audiences aren’t thrilled with the one they got. Reviews are middling, with IGN’s Siddhant Adlakha giving it a 5 out of 10 and the film currently sitting at an unimpressive 39% on Rotten Tomatoes (compared to the original’s 69%).
Worse, early tracking suggests that Folie à Deux is doomed to fall well short of its predecessor at the box office. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the film is forecast to bring in between $50-60 million during its domestic opening weekend, compared to the original’s $96.2 million haul. That’s not great, especially considering that the budget on the sequel was considerably higher.
This won’t be the first time in recent years that Warners bet big on Batman and lost. The Flash was another major critical and commercial misfire (one of several for the DC brand in 2023), despite having the huge selling point of being the first movie in 30 years to feature Michael Keaton as Batman. If the return of a cinematic superhero icon can’t put butts in seats, then something is seriously wrong with the DC brand.
The State of the DC Brand
There are any number of theories to explain why Joker: Folie à Deux is tracking so poorly (the lack of desire for a sequel, casual moviegoers’ aversion to musicals, etc.), but the fact remains that it’s both a follow-up to a hugely successful Batman universe movie and the only new DC movie to hit theaters this year. Why is there so much apathy surrounding Joker 2? Are audiences really that soured on DC as a whole right now?
At least on the theatrical side of things, the answer seems to be a resounding yes. Folie à Deux is just the latest commercial misfire in a steady stream of duds. The DCEU peaked with the release of Aquaman in 2018 (the only one in this cinematic universe to cross $1 billion globally), and it’s all been diminishing returns since then. You can’t judge 2020’s Wonder Woman 1984 and 2021’s The Suicide Squad too harshly considering that they debuted simultaneously in theaters and on Max due to the pandemic, but 2022’s Black Adam and 2023’s Shazam! Fury of the Gods, The Flash, Blue Beetle, and Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom all bombed to one degree or another. The latter film barely earned a third of what the original Aquaman did, a sad coda to the DCEU.
While The Suicide Squad and Blue Beetle are genuinely good superhero movies (to say nothing of Matt Reeves’ The Batman), the fact remains that Warners has done a depressingly thorough job of convincing audiences to stay away from DC movies. Far from establishing a proper rival to Disney’s Marvel Cinematic Universe, Warners has churned out a steady stream of mediocre, expensive flops. Even if Folie à Deux were more critically acclaimed, it’s enough to wonder if that would have made much difference. The DC brand is tarnished after years of subpar theatrical offerings, dating back to early DCEU disappointments like Batman v Superman and Suicide Squad (the one without a “The” in the title).
Things aren’t looking much better on the video game front these days. 2022’s Gotham Knights underwhelmed, failing to recapture the magic of Rocksteady’s Arkham games. For their part, Rocksteady badly fumbled Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, to the point where the game is practically on life support as the third season begins. The only ray of light on the horizon is Batman: Arkham Shadow, a VR game exclusive to the Meta Quest platform.
But looking elsewhere, DC continues to do just fine on the small screen. In terms of animation, My Adventures With Superman enjoys a solid following on Cartoon Network, and Prime Video recently debuted Batman: The Caped Crusader to strong critical acclaim. The Penguin is also quickly proving to be a bona fide hit. It’s got the critical acclaim Warners surely wishes Folie à Deux had (currently enjoying a 94% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes), and the initial ratings are looking strong. According to HBO, the series saw 10.4 million cross-platform views in its first 11 days, a figure that outpaces every other current HBO series apart from House of the Dragon and The Last of Us. Not bad for a spinoff of The Batman that doesn’t even feature Robert Pattinson’s Dark Knight.
What this tells us is that, as much as DC is struggling to pull in moviegoers, it doesn’t suffer the same poor reputation with TV viewers. This is a format where the company has always tended to succeed. Batman ‘66 and Batman: The Animated Series both revolutionized the franchise in their respective eras. The Arrowverse may not have been to everyone’s taste, but it spawned numerous shows over the span of a decade and changed our perception of what’s possible with superheroes on the small screen. And before Oz Cobb headed to HBO, the Watchmen series proved you can do true, Emmy-worthy prestige television using a DC comic as source material.
Will James Gunn’s DCU Change Things?
Clearly, in a time when even sequels to billion-dollar blockbusters are fizzling out, Warner Bros. faces a long, uphill battle in revitalizing the DC brand on the big screen. Reeves has been doing his part with The Batman and its various spinoffs, but Warners seems to be placing most of its hopes in James Gunn and Peter Safran’s basket. The co-CEOs of DC Studios are busy crafting an entirely new shared universe. This incarnation of the DCU technically kicks off with the animated series Creature Commandos at the end of this year, but the real test comes when Gunn’s Superman reboot hits theaters in July 2025.
Can Gunn and Safran turn things around? Will moviegoers take to David Corenswet’s Man of Steel in a way they never fully did with Henry Cavill’s Superman? It’s not going to be easy. Ignoring the long-term damage done to the DC brand, Superman is hitting theaters in a very competitive summer. In fact, it’s currently scheduled to open just two weeks before The Fantastic Four: First Steps, which will surely impact its box office performance.
Even if Superman itself is a hit, it’s one thing to succeed with one of the most iconic and beloved superheroes on the planet. It’s another to convince fans to turn out for some of the more esoteric projects Gunn and his collaborators have planned for the Gods and Monsters road map. DC couldn’t sell moviegoers on a Michael Keaton-heavy Flash movie. Why should we expect them to be able to pull off The Authority or Swamp Thing?
Still, Gunn deserves some benefit of the doubt. He transformed the Guardians of the Galaxy from obscure Marvel property to beloved big screen icons. Is there any reason to believe he can’t accomplish the same on a bigger scale, especially given the success he’s already found on the Peacemaker series?
And speaking purely anecdotally, there seems to be a level of enthusiasm around Gunn’s Superman that was completely nonexistent with recent movies like The Flash and Shazam! Fury of the Gods. Just look at the crowds that gathered around the closed-off set in Cleveland and the way fans have pored over every single paparazzi shot that’s leaked out.
Conventional wisdom says that the average moviegoer is completely oblivious to the sort of minutia we hardcore film nerds obsess over. They just want to go to the movies and have a good time. But more and more, I wonder whether that’s actually true. Casual audiences seem to comprehend the difference between an actual MCU movie and a Sony movie produced by Marvel Studios, hence why approximately 17 people turned out to watch Madame Web. So I wonder how much mainstream awareness there is about Gunn and Safran’s total overhaul of the DCU. How much did the knowledge of the impending reboot contribute to DC’s lousy box office run in 2023? Are casual audiences purposely sitting things out until Superman kicks off the new DC era, hence why even a Joker sequel struggles at the box office?
Maybe, maybe not. Either way, I’m optimistic that Superman can at least serve as the start of DC’s road to cinematic recovery. Sometimes all it takes is one great story to turn things around. Just look at the comics. I’m a lifelong DC reader who unhappily slogged through DC’s grim, depressing New 52 era. But when DC released DC Universe Rebirth #1 in 2016, I was immediately won over by the fundamental change in tone and direction that story brought with it. It was exactly the breath of fresh air DC’s ailing publishing line needed at the time. And maybe Gunn’s Superman can do the same for the movie line. What do they have to lose at this point?