1) Justice League
The franchise: Financially, the DC Extended Universe is doing extremely well – this year’s Batman V Superman pulled in just shy of $1 billion while Suicide Squad exceeded expectations and made almost $800 million worldwide. Unfortunately, the box office doesn’t represent those movies’ reception from fans, as both were incredibly divisive, with some very vocal detractors and supporters.
Going forward, Warner Bros. will be hoping to get critics onside and they have two chances to do so coming up – Wonder Woman, arriving in July, and then the highly anticipated Justice League movie. While there’s a lot of excitement for WW as well, it’s JL that will really make or break the franchise.
[zergpaid]The movie: If we’re going by the trailer alone, Justice League looks to be a very different beast from Zack Snyder’s previous DC movies. Swapping the gloomy introspection for good-humoured superhero banter, the film looks to be a taking a page out of Marvel’s playbook – and that isn’t necessarily a bad thing if they can do it right.
Of course, the trailers for Suicide Squad promised a great time as well, and we all know how that turned out. Nonetheless, the thrill of seeing the likes of Batman, Wonder Woman and The Flash teaming up will hopefully keep things enjoyable. At least, we sure hope so, as at this point, it’s crucial for the studio that Justice League opens to a warm response.