Supergirl Box Office Second Weekend Drop Worse Than The Flash & Morbius

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Things have gone about as bad as they could have for Supergirl at the box office. Opening weekend projections for the DC Universe’s second movie were always on the soft side, but Supergirl wildly underperformed, bringing in only $37.1 million domestically. Almost immediately, there were reports that the film could be a $120 million loss for Warner Bros., and DC Studios co-head Peter Safran addressed Supergirl‘s disappointing performance in an official statement. What entered the summer as one of the more intriguing studio tentpoles on the schedule (and a potential sleeper hit) instead sparked discussions about what comes next for the DCU and the superhero genre itself. Sadly, things haven’t improved much in the film’s second weekend.

According to Deadline, Supergirl earned just $9.6 million domestically in its second weekend. That’s a staggering 74% decline from its debut, a steeper drop-off than infamous titles like The Flash (72.5%) and Morbius (73.8%). As a point of comparison, last summer’s Superman dropped 53.2% in its second weekend, an illustration of its strong legs. After coming in second place last weekend, Supergirl fell to fourth:

Supergirl Won’t Have Legs at the Box Office

Opening weekends are important (especially for big-budget studio tentpoles), but they don’t tell the full story. The real test for a film’s commercial viability is how well it holds in its second weekend. Earlier this summer, Star Wars spinoff The Mandalorian and Grogu got off to a solid but unremarkable start of $81.6 million. It then dropped 70.1% in its second weekend and has had a largely underwhelming run. On the flip side, Pixar’s Elemental had a soft debut a few summers ago ($29.6 million) but it ultimately grossed $496.4 million worldwide because it had strong legs over the summer and rode waves of positive word of mouth.

The odds of Supergirl having an Elemental-esque resurgence at the box office were low, but there were faint signs of hope for the movie. While professional reviews were very mixed (54% on Rotten Tomatoes), audience scores have been much higher (76% on Rotten Tomatoes). This indicates that those who have seen Supergirl have mostly enjoyed it, but that wasn’t enough to turn the tide. The film failed to make an impact for a few reasons. Not only were the reviews uneven, Supergirl released in an extremely competitive summer window, and comic book adaptations are not the guaranteed hits they were a decade ago. Spider-Man: Brand New Day is going to be a smash hit in a few weeks, but Spider-Man is one of the few superhero characters immune from any changing box office trends.

It’s only a matter of time before Supergirl starts losing screens, so it’s not as if it will be able to turn things around through the remainder of July. Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey arrives in just a couple of weeks, and Brand New Day premieres shortly after that. Anticipation for both of those titles is high, meaning Supergirl‘s theater count will be steadily declining this month as exhibitors make room for the last mega releases of what’s been an uneven summer movie season so far. Supergirl has earned only $100.5 million globally to this point in its run, so theaters have little incentive to keep it around for much longer.

This is an extremely unfortunate development for the DCU franchise, which got off to a strong start last year with Superman. Nobody involved with Supergirl set out to make a box office bomb, and now James Gunn and Co. will have to pick up the pieces and move on. Safran has said DC Studios remains confident in its overall long-term plan, which is the right approach to take. Right now, in the grand scheme of things, Supergirl is just one movie that underperformed — the DCU’s first real misfire. If upcoming DC projects like Lanterns, Clayface, and Man of Tomorrow turn out well, then Supergirl will just be a bump on the road. It doesn’t have to be a referendum on the DCU and Gunn’s vision, but it’s also something that can’t happen again.

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