“Birds of Prey” didn’t have the best opening weekend so now the film is being re-titled to focus more on the lead character — Harley Quinn…
Maybe a Harley Quinn solo movie wasn’t such a bad idea after all.
This past weekend “Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)” opened to weak numbers at the box office, pulling in just $33 million domestically after the film was expected to draw somewhere north of $50 million during the first few days in theaters. The $33 million opening is the worst for a DC Comics film since 2010’s “Jonah Hex” did just $5.3 million during an opening weekend.
As a reaction to the poor opening, Warner Bros. has decided to change the title of the film to focus more on Margot Robbie’s character of Harley Quinn, who is central to the theme of the entire film despite the movie being billed as a team up.
So now major theaters like AMC, Cinemark and Regal have the film listed as “Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey.”
It’s an interesting move but one that speaks to the studio hitting the panic button after a bad opening weekend for what was expected to be a solid hit for Warner Bros and DC. Robbie’s debut as Harley Quinn in 2016’s “Suicide Squad” was the high point of that film and while the movie was critically panned, it still went onto gross more than $746 million at the box office.
Plans for a direct sequel to “Suicide Squad” were later scrapped but Robbie was retained to portray Harley Quinn in her own film, which eventually became “Birds of Prey” where she teamed up with several more comic book characters including Black Canary and the Huntress.
Unfortunately it appears Warner Bros. is concerned that perhaps audiences weren’t that enthusiastic about seeing a “Birds of Prey” movie but instead would have preferred a focus on Harley Quinn. So the new title reflects her name in the lead of the movie.
While “Birds of Prey” — or should we say “Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey” — did pull in $79 million in total box office profits worldwide, it’s expected that the film will have to make somewhere between $200 to $250 million to break even with production and advertising costs for the movie.
For what it’s worth, we rated “Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey” as a solid popcorn flick while receiving 2 1/2 on the Skolnick Scale — and you can read our full review for the movie here.
H/T: EW.
