I thought 400 is at least in it, 600 it certainly deserved...but people shouldnt underestimate Home Media sells.
Yeah sure, the "experts" etc dont care, for them its just Box Office...but Home Media is what could make this movie break even and more.
What would interest me is the why.
I know that the Critics Agenda(Yeah im dying on that hill, there is no way this movie is worse than Thor Love and Thunder)can play a role convincing the General Audience something is "bad" but still, there has to be more to this.
If the General Audience doesnt show up for a Superhero Movie with The Rock as lead, things are really weird.
Is it because its NOT a Marvel Movie? Like, what is the reason this didnt manage to get stronger legs?
Im only gonna reply once because I'm just over doing that with people who are convinced there is some sort agenda for why movies don't do well. I'll just say these
1) Home media hasn't "saved" a movie ala Batman Begins in years. Home media sales are not that lucrative like that anymore. People can hope all they want. But that's not gonna save a movie that needed 500-600 mill to break even. For reference, according to The Numbers the highest grossing video sales of 2021 and 2020 (peak COVID) were 38m and 80m respectively. See here:
Top-Selling Video Titles in the United States 2020 - The Numbers. And that 80m one was Frozen II. They don't love Black Adam like that. I'm not saying it can't make some money back in video sales/rentals. But not nearly enough to write home about. And that's not being a doomer, that's just being logical. Unless you're a really really beloved movie/franchise, you're not gonna gross near 100 mill in home media anymore. At least not at a quick enough rate to call the a success. And even by some miracle BA does gross 100 mill, that's still only like 500 mill which is still not great for a 200m movie
2) You bring up that it's weird that people didn't show up to a superhero movie starring The Rock. But it's not really. Looking at his box office history for his live action films, other than F&F movies and Jumanji...he's not a high grosser for individual movies. His highest grossing movie other than those 2 franchises I listed was San Andreas back in 2015 and that made a little over 450 mill. Which is really good for an original IP and more than a lot of original IPs do, but still. He's not the type of guy you throw 200m budget at because, looking at the evidence, you won't make it back unless he's paired with huge IPs or other big stars. Black Adam isn't a huge IP, the DC film universe is well known but not necessarily a huge money maker like the MCU where any character can be a success, and none of the other stars in BA are huge money makers. There's probably a reason why all those movies they claim were the start of franchises stalled (Rampage, San Andreas, and Hobbs & Shaw were all supposed to be franchise starters). And I like The Rock, but he's not as big as a lot of people think he is. People have been talking about it for years. Film theorists, Anthony Mackie, Tarantino just brought it up and people got mad about it: the "movie star" as we knew it, is dead. It's all about the character/IP. Just look at Chris Hemsworth's career. Monster success in the MCU, outside of it? His performances are good but In the Heart of the Sea, MIB: International, Bad Times at El Royale, and more all underperformed or flopped. Zoe Saldana has been in more of the top grossing movies of all time than anyone else. Yes, she was blue and green in them, but still. People don't know her like that. Or at least more people would know her as "the woman who played Gamora". Bringing this back to The Rock. People know him, people like him. But is it enough to make him box office gold like how Will Smith, Tom Cruise, Julia Roberts, etc. were back in the 90s-00s? Nah.
3) Going to your conspiracy theories, I know there's no rationalizing with people like this. I'm just gonna say: there are way too many examples of movies that are loved by critics that do poorly and movies that aren't well liked by critics that do great to say "critics influenced the audience" with a straight face. And no critics didn't have it "out" for a movie. They have a different opinion than you and others. It's not a conspiracy. I think a big part may be marketing. DC has been marketing their movies really poorly. Shazam and BoP should've had waaaay better marketing campaign with how fun the main characters are. Black Adam looked dull from the marketing imo and looking at the box office maybe the audience too. If anything, my conspiracy thinking is that the way DC fans act is causing a lot of negative attention to the brand because some of the behavior has even been reported on places like CNN. And I think that behavior tainting the brand is doing more harm than anything critics say. And even that is not as important as DC just not making interesting movies (imo) or at the very least marketing them well.
