The Batmans box office triumph hails a new dawn for DC

Date:
Mon, 07 Mar 2022 11:23:32 +0000

Description:
As The Batman storms to a huge opening weekend at the box office, does it signal a brighter future for DC on the big screen?

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The Batman may bring audiences to a particularly grotty version of Gotham City, but theres no raining on the parade of the movies performance at the global box office.

Matt Reeves take on the Caped Crusader has stormed to the second-biggest opening weekend of the pandemic era (behind only Spider-Man: No Way Home ), earning $128.5 million in the US and $248.5 million worldwide.

No Way Home scored an almighty global debut of $587.2 million on its way to becoming the fourth biggest movie of all time, but The Batmans early commercial success marks a similarly impressive triumph given the turbulent reception endured by many DC movies in recent years.

Its surprising, too, that Robert Pattinsons Dark Knight is performing so well irrespective of those mixed reactions to previous DC features like Justice League and Wonder Woman 1984. Not only does a near three-hour runtime make
The Batman the longest Batman movie ever made, but Reeves version of the screen legend is rain-soaked, leather-clad and wholly unlike any superhero flick before it.

If critical reception is anything to go by, that approach has proven to the movies credit in our own review , we said The Batman achieves unique blend
of detective noir, horror, psychological thriller though its unconventional aesthetic was far from a guaranteed win for Warner Bros. studios (despite the similarity expectation-defying success of 2019s Joker).

In fact, The Batman often plays more like a Hitchcockian horror movie than crowd-pleasing comic book adventure a deliberate choice, director Reeves
told TechRadar , and one evident in the films extensive marketing material prior to release which makes its box office credentials all the more surprising.

So, could The Batman finally be the DC movie to kick-start a new era for the DCEU? The (real) dawn of justice?

It certainly looks that way. Reeves detective epic is, at the very least, guaranteed to kick off a new Batman franchise while the movies ending doesnt necessarily hint at the events of future Pattinson-led instalments, the director himself had already expressed an interest in shooting a follow-up movie before The Batman had registered its impressive box office debut.

Speaking to reporters at The Batmans LA premiere (via the Bat_Source Twitter fan account), Reeves admitted that he and studio Warner Bros. have started talking about another [Batman] movie. So Matt is already planning out the sequel for #TheBatman pic.twitter.com/22pkbxh89p February 23, 2022 See more

But we know that other projects set in Reeves Batman universe are in development, too. Colin Farrell has confirmed hell be returning in a serialized Penguin spin-off on HBO Max , while a further Gotham-based series (from Giri/Haji creator Joe Barton) is also headed to Warners streamer.

Its not yet clear how The Batman will play into wider DCEU projects we know that the movie doesnt exist in the same timeline as those featuring the Justice League heroes though weve seen Marvel successfully pull off some franchise-hopping hijinks of late (a trend set to continue with Doctor
Strange 2 ).

With former Batman star Michael Keaton confirmed to appear in the upcoming
The Flash movie, too, its not beyond the realms of possibility to imagine
that Robert Pattinson and co. could traverse DC universes in some form or another (though don't expect R-Batz to face Joaquin Phoenix's Joker any time soon).

Whats more, after the surprising success of James Gunns The Suicide Squad and its sister show, Peacemaker , the next few years mark an ideal time for DC to make critical gains towards reclaiming its comic book crown from Marvel (a battle just as likely to be fought on HBO Max and Disney Plus as it is in theaters). How to watch the Marvel movies in order



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/news/the-batmans-box-office-triumph-hails-a-new-dawn -for-dc/


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