So you agree it’s not really about how popular Supergirl is as a character, it’s about a different sort of movie appetite?
It’s both, Spider-Man and Batman films continue to be big business, and Superman last year did well (maybe add in Fantastic 4 last year as well, are they A-list comic characters?). But there’s not really much appetite now for the B-list/C-list characters unless they benefit from the grandfather clause. It’s the same way that original animated films now top out at $400 million box office at best as a rule, but you put Inside Out 2 or Zootopia 2 out there and they’re clearing that total in a weekend or two.
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You make the film well enough and it will still pull in an audience. But I don’t think the answer is to only make films about known types.
The difference here is I’m not hearing anyone that into this film. Contrast that with MotU which also bombed but had good feedback. So it feels like Supergirl just isn’t that great a film and probably, given the lack of big main star energy and big name director energy, it needed to be.
It doesn’t feel like, “this film is amazing but no one’s going to see it because it’s Supergirl,” it feels like no one’s really bothered enough for it to generate a buzz.
It’ll be interesting to see how the next few bigger ones go, e.g. the new Spidey, Avengers and Batman films.
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I saw it yesterday as as someone who likes Marvel comics/MCU but is indifferent to DC generally and didn’t really watch much DCEU apart from Wonder Woman and Suicide Squads and also wasn’t much into the Superman film last year… I actually thought it was fine.
Alcocks good and carrys the film, it’s very Guardians of the Galaxy in tone and I guess thats the James Gunn influence. I always like Jason Momoa and whiles he’s decent in this Lobo didn’t really work. What may have looked ‘badass’ and ‘edgey’’ in the 80s is now just dated and he looks like a Kiss tribute act on steroids.
I don’t know if there’s been much the incel/hate anything with women in that seems to prevade a lot of nerd culture nowadays or it’s just Superhero fatigue (and tbf this does nothing new) or people know these more family films will appear on streaming in 3 months so save themsevles £100 for tickets/snacks and wait for that.
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Some of it is definitely consumer trends. Like, the first Suicide Squad - which was hot garbage - took $750m globally in 2016, which is more than any superhero film released in the last two years (and more than most for a longer period).
But equally cinema is just generally limping along. The worldwide top 10 grosses each year are a shadow of what they were before 2020. In 2019 nine out of the top ten films took over $1bn globally. In 2025 it was four, and the 1 was a Chinese film that took like 99% of its gross there.
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yeah, the trurh is that the film industry is really struggling. Disney makes billions on a few animated film, whilst other studios are realyl struggling. WB this year is getting washed left right and centre - and even now, Dune 3 is their best bet and is going up aginst Doomsday of all films - though, we will see if Disney blinks on that one.
for ebtter or worse endgame killed super hero films. the last few years of them have been CGI nonsense, with really im my view only Batman doing anything different.
Honestly I think they probably don’t think the IMAX thing is worth it or else the only way they’d get it now is going to be a big loss of Christmas so they’ll live with it. Get the impression they know it won’t hit the huge highs in returns. I have to presume there’s a whole accountancy in the background that shows people will pay for D+ to watch these films, and accounting probably means they make a lot more off the back of that.
There are signs of recovery, though it will only be partial. Audiences are rejecting a lot of he stuff committee designed to be a blockbuster - MOTU, Mando, Supergirl etc but are looking to other things - Backrooms, Obsession, some thrillers aimed at women have quietly done well.
There has been a situation where animated sequels with long intervals since the last instalment are doing crazily well: Inside Out 2, Zootopia 2, Toy Story 5 but newer animation is struggling. I think Hexed! will be a damp squib this year from DSA but next year’s Gatto from Pixar will hopefully break out.
I don’t know if Endgame killed the SH genre, it was inevitable that MCU interest was going to diminish after it. I think the piecemeal nature of the MCU afterwards, combined with poor quality movies and oversaturating things with the Disney+ were nails in the coffin. All the while DC has honestly just repeatedly fucked things up, further tarnishing and devaluing the whole genre and those Sony Spiderman villain films just cheapened it more.
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Could also have gone in Cursed Images, a rare win for Jesus against DC
Looks like Supergirl will end up doing similar numbers to MotU and Blue Beetle. OK there’s only been two movies but so far the DCU seems to be as plague-ridden as the DCEU was. I really liked the first season of Creature Commandos, not seen Peacemaker, have heard the first series is good and the second less so.
Porting some characters over from the DCEU is just confusing things and this happening after The Suicide Squad (which was great) was both a reboot and sequel to the first one just compounds things.
But still v enjoyable
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i’m definitely going to check it out on streaming, really enjoyed the milly alcock cameo bits in Superman
Oh I’m sure the film producers who spent millions making this will be grateful to hear that.
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