‘The Flash’ disappoints with $55 million debut, Pixar’s ‘Elemental’ flops with $29.5 million in battle of box office lightweights

Rebecca Rubin
Updated

“The Flash,” a superhero adventure starring Ezra Miller, emerged victorious over Pixar’s “Elemental” in a battle of box office lightweights.

This weekend’s two new releases were once expected to ignite the summer blockbuster season; instead, both entirely missed the mark. “The Flash” stumbled with $55 million and “Elemental” collected just $29.5 million in their respective debuts. Both films fell short of already-low expectations. Worse, they were pricy endeavors, costing $200 million to make and roughly $100 million to market, so they are shaping up to be huge disappointments in their theatrical runs.

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In the lead-up to “The Flash,” executives at Warner Bros. worked hard to convince the public that the film is “one of the greatest superhero movies ever made,” per newly minted DC Studios co-chief James Gunn. Directed by Andy Muschietti, the story picks up as Miller’s Barry Allen a.k.a The Flash travels back in time to prevent his mother’s murder and inadvertently cracks open the DC multiverse. (Cameos abound!)

But a tepid “B” CinemaScore from opening weekend crowds suggests that the moviegoing masses didn’t entirely agree with the lavish praise bestowed on the film by the people who made it. Without positive audience scores or strong word-of-mouth, “The Flash” will struggle to rebound in the coming weeks, especially as summer season heats up with the release of “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” on June 30, “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One” on July 12 and Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” on July 21.

“This is a weak three-day opening for a superhero [film],” says David A. Gross, who runs the movie consulting firm Franchise Entertainment Research. “There have been similar openings that grew into big numbers,” he adds, referring to 2015’s “Ant-Man,” which opened to $57 million and ended with $519 million worldwide, as well as 2018’s “Aquaman,” which debuted to $67.4 million and finished at $1.15 billion globally. “But we do not see that here.”

“The Flash” also stumbled at the international box office with $75 million from 78 markets, bringing its global tally to $139 million. Unless its box office fortunes rebound, “The Flash” looks to fall more closely in line with Dwayne Johnson’s $200 million-budgeted “Black Adam,” which opened last year to $67 million and failed to reach $400 million globally, ultimately losing money in its theatrical run.

Analysts believe that several factors, one of them being those unenthusiastic audience reactions, are to blame for the film’s weak initial turnout. Another roadblock is that “The Flash” landed on the big screen without a traditional promotional push. That’s because Miller has become a controversial figure in recent years due to legal troubles and assault allegations. The actor, who has apologized for past erratic behavior and went to treatment for “complex mental health issues,” made a rare public appearance at Monday’s premiere of “The Flash” but didn’t engage with press or other publicity efforts that would be standard for a tentpole of this scope.

Also, “The Flash” is the second of four DC films to open in 2023 before the studio’s new overlords Gunn and Peter Safran take the comic book universe in an entirely new direction. That’s left “The Flash” and “Shazam! Fury of the Gods,” one of the biggest superhero misfires in recent memory, hanging in the balance. It’s apparently hard to get comic book fans to care about an interconnected universe that’ll soon be abandoned and rebooted in favor of different Spandex-clad heroes. “Blue Beetle,” starring Xolo Maridueña as a boy who bonds with an alien symbiote, opens on Aug. 18. “Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom” is set for Dec. 20.

“Elemental,” an animated adventure about opposites who attract, added a muted $15 million at the international box office for a global total of $44.5 million. Unlike “The Flash,” “Elemental” has been embraced by its audience, who awarded the film an “A” CinemaScore. So there’s a chance that ticket sales could recover even slightly in the next few weeks, especially since there isn’t much competition from family films on the horizon.

But there’s no sugar-coating the debut of “Elemental,” which landed by far the worst start in modern history for Pixar, ranking below some of its more forgettable attempts like 2015’s “The Good Dinosaur” ($39 million) and 2020’s “Onward” ($39 million). The animation empire behind “Toy Story,” “Up” and “Ratatouille” hasn’t been able to rebound from the pandemic, when several of its titles were sent directly to Disney+ and family audiences were trained to expect those movies at home.

It’s been a difficult market for films with original stories like “Elemental,” which revolves around the relationship between the two seemingly different elements of fire and water. Brand recognition has been a big part in the success of recent family films, such as “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” and “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.”

“‘Elemental’ is not based on established IP,” notes Gross. “Of the recent animation titles, this is clearly the most challenging to open.”

Also this weekend, Lionsgate’s horror satire “The Blackening” opened in sixth place after earning $6 million in its debut. Directed by Tim Story, the film pokes fun at the common horror trope that Black characters are often the first to die. It follows a group of Black friends who gather at a remote cabin to celebrate Juneteenth. The film cost just $5 million.

Elsewhere at the box office, Sony’s “Spider-Man: Across the Spider Verse” landed in third place, earning a mighty $27.8 million in its third weekend of release. The superhero sequel is already a big box office winner with $280 million in North America and $489.3 million worldwide. A third entry is scheduled for 2024.

In fourth place, Paramount’s “Transformers: Rise of the Beasts” added $20 million as ticket sales collapsed by 67% in its sophomore outing. Still, the tentpole managed to cross $100 million at the domestic box office with $103 million to date. With its $200 million budget, the studio needs the seventh “Transformers” installment to resonate at the international box office to justify that hefty price tag. Over the weekend, “Rise of the Beasts” generated $37.2 million from 68 markets, bringing its international tally to $174.3 million.

Disney’s “The Little Mermaid” rounded out the top five with $11.6 million in its fourth weekend in theaters. The live-action remake has amassed $253 million in North America and $466 million to date, which would have been a good result… had the movie not cost $250 million to produce. At this rate, “The Little Mermaid” is struggling to break even in its theatrical run.

In limited release, Wes Anderson’s “Asteroid City,” starring Scarlett Johansson, Jason Schwartzman, Maya Hawke, Bryan Cranston and dozens of other Anderson regulars and newcomers, collected $790,000 from six theaters in New York and Los Angeles. Those ticket sales translate to $132,211 per theater, ranking as the best average since 2016’s “La La Land” ($176,220 per theater).

For “Asteroid City,” which takes place as a cosmic event disrupts a fictional desert town, the bigger obstacle will come when the film expands next weekend into 1,500 theaters. That’s been a huge challenge for other acclaimed indies, like “Tár,” “Triangle of Sadness” and “Beau Is Afraid,” all of which also scored notable arthouse openings but eventually failed to translate that interest to mainstream audiences.

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