Joker 2 viewers are generating wild theories about why the new film has become such a flop.
When the follow-up was first announced by writer-director Todd Phillips, it was assumed that the project would be one of the year’s biggest hits considering how much of a splash the original made.
Released in 2019, Joker made more than $1bn (£765.3m) at the box office and received 11 Oscar nominations, winning two.
The reality is much different: Joker: Folie à Deux, which features Joaquin Phoenix’s Arthur Fleck recounting the plot of the first film in musical form, has been mostly mauled by critics and has an even lower Rotten Tomatoes score than noted superhero flops Morbius and Madame Web.
It also received a CinemaScore of D, which is claimed to be the lowest rating for a film based on comic book characters.
Adding salt to the wound is the film’s box office figures. While the first Joker amassed an opening weekend of $235.2m (£179.9m), the DC sequel managed just $121.1m (£92.6m).
The announcement of these takings followed a weekend of cinemagoers sharing screenshots that showed just a smattering of bookings for numerous screenings around the world – an almost unbelieveable turn of events for a sequel to an immensely successful film.
Joker fans are now trying to work out what went so wrong. A common, yet rather unlikely, theory that has been widely shared on X/Twitter is that Phillips, known for directing the Hangover films, intentionally torpedoed the film as a response to the controversy surrounding the original.
At the time of Joker’s release, the comic book villain origin story received a political backlash and was accused by left-leaning writers of pandering to incel culture due to its sympathetic treatment of the central character, a societal outcast turned violent killer.
Phillips has shared his disdain for this viewpoint, asking: “Isn’t it good to have these discussions about violence? Why is that a bad thing if the movie does lead to a discourse about it?”
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He called the controversy “eye opening”, adding: “What’s outstanding to me in this discourse in this movie is how easily the far left can sound like the far right when it suits their agenda.”
Its because of this that people are wondering whether Phillips intentionally wanted to make a film that fans of the original would despise, with one Reddit user calling it “supreme incel ragebait”.
Elsewhere, The Film Stage said the film “pulls a prank on incels”, with one social media user chiming in: “After watching #JokerFolieADeux, I can say that this is exactly what Todd & the cast wanted. An outrage over the movie, because it completely destroys the fantasy that the first movie creates.”
Another post read: “The film is designed to annoy fans of the first film,” with one viewer saying the absence of “murders, explosions and fire” has mad “the joke” on die-hard fans of the original
While people are coming up with wild theories about why the film has flopped, there is a contingent of supporters who believe the film to be a “misunderstood” sequel that’s receiving far too much hate.