Taylor Trotter June 21st, 2023 - 10:32 PM
When The Flash premiered, the expectation was $100 million or more made at the box office, especially from the high praises from Warner Bros Discovery CEO David Zaslav. Unfortunately, what was the most anticipated film for the summer of 2023, The Flash was a box office miss when it first launched.
Months ago, Zaslav took the stage at CinemaCon in Las Vegas and spoke to the theater owners that The Flash was the best superhero picture he’s ever seen. Zaslav was heavily invested in The Flash that he even planned for Tom Cruise to watch the movie, which was a major talking point on the press tour. Along with Zaslav was DC Studios co-chief and top lieutenant James Gunn, as he favored The Flash as well, and spoke good things about the film. With these high praises for the movie, expectations were set high.
Unfortunately, the movie opened up to $55 million over the June 16-18th weekend. Hollywood Reporter got an insight source that commented on The Flash’s box office downfall. “It is unfathomable to me why Zas and James Gunn promise how wonderful any picture or new plan will be months into the future. The public doesn’t care and isn’t aware of their prognostications.” The source continued, “Let the product talk.”
The product did talk; The Flash was expected to make $58 million on the three-day weekend and $70 million on the four-day Juneteenth holiday weekend based on estimates issued by Warner Bros. In reality, the earnings were low on the final weekend with $55 million for the three-day weekend and $61.3 million for the four-day weekend.
What didn’t help The Flash’s prospects was the poor word-of-mouth spread. In the end, The Flash was given a B CinemaScore, which is similar to a C or worse. To make matters worse, the audience and critics disagreed with Zaslav and Gunn’s rating as their reactions were indifferent, leading to a score of 66% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Check out the top 10 movies in the domestic box office this past weekend:
- The Flash – $55M
- Elemental – $29.6M
- Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse – $27M
- Transformers: Rise of the Beasts – $20.7M
- The Little Mermaid – $11.1M
- The Blackening – $6M
- Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 – $5.3M
- The Boogeyman – $3.6M
- Fast X – $2.1M
- Asteroid Citry $853K
