Hollywood’s “Woke” Blockbusters Falter at Box Office

Knowledge Nuggets:

• Highly anticipated films, The Flash, Elemental, and The Blackening, significantly underperformed in their opening weekends both domestically and abroad, failing to meet even the lowest box office projections.
• Warner Bros.’ The Flash, starring Ezra Miller, had a global debut of a mere $138 million, while Disney’s Elemental managed to garner a meager $44.5 million globally.
• Lionsgate’s The Blackening, a horror-comedy laced with Black Lives Matter dialogue, bombed at the box office with an earnings of $6 million.

This weekend witnessed the surprisingly underwhelming performance of three blockbuster hopefuls: Warner Bros.’ The Flash, Disney’s Elemental, and Lionsgate’s The Blackening. Expected to be massive hits, these films fell drastically short of box office projections both in the United States and globally.

Promoted as the “greatest superhero movie ever made”, The Flash, with Ezra Miller in the lead role, was projected to gross $80 million domestically. However, it merely managed to amass $55 million, with the global earnings reaching only $138 million. Despite massive international coverage across 78 countries, the movie’s performance remained lackluster overseas, raising questions about the influence of controversies surrounding its leading actor.

Meanwhile, Disney’s latest Pixar offering, Elemental, which carried a massive production and promotion budget of $300 million, also met with an embarrassing domestic debut of $29.5 million. The international market proved no kinder to Elemental, with only an additional $15 million. This dismal performance has led to speculation about the potential long-term impact on Disney’s brand, especially amidst allegations of inappropriate content.

Lionsgate’s The Blackening, a horror-comedy influenced by Black Lives Matter themes, barely managed to scrape together $6 million, falling short of its modest projection of $7 million. The movie has been criticized for its monolithic portrayal of racial perspectives and the inclusion of controversial dialogues.

In summary, these three releases, meant to dominate the box office, instead witnessed an unexpected setback, pointing to a potential fatigue with “woke” cinema and raising questions about Hollywood’s current narrative directions.

Clear Thoughts:

As a proud American, I look at the recent Hollywood flops not with shock, but with a gratifying sense of validation. The box office failures of The Flash, Elemental, and The Blackening are not merely unfortunate outcomes for the studios but the triumph of consumer choice. These are not just figures. They are a powerful message from movie-goers rejecting the aggressive ideological leanings being pushed through mainstream entertainment.

The Flash, for instance, was peddled as a groundbreaking superhero movie. The reality? An expensive dud, undermined by casting a controversial figure like Ezra Miller, flaunting divisive identity politics. You see, Hollywood underestimated the common sense of the average viewer who saw past the veil of propaganda, and simply said ‘no’.

Elemental, another disaster for Disney, was revealed to contain inappropriate content, presumably under the guise of progressive storytelling. Consumers wisely saw through the facade. The truth is, Disney’s foray into ‘woke’ narratives could very well be their downfall.

Finally, The Blackening from Lionsgate fell flat with its heavy-handed injection of political dialogue into what was meant to be an entertaining horror-comedy. Rather than being a platform for a nuanced conversation about race, it offered stereotypical and divisive perspectives that the public found lacking.

In essence, these box office failures are proof that audiences crave stories that unite rather than divide, that entertain rather than preach, and that respect the integrity of their viewers.

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