Tuesday, May 26, 2026

Box Office: Critically Praised “Suicide Squad” Bombs with $26 Mil Opening, Over $100 Mil Less Than Original

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Very, very disappointing.

There will be a lot of Monday morning quarterbacks discussing the fate of James Gunn’s “The Suicide Squad.”

The second SS movie, and far better than the first, was a dud at the box office. Just $26 million opening weekend, over basi$100 million less than the original film.

The news is frustrating because people are missing a really fun film.

But confusion or boredom concerning the the title– almost the same as the original– may have played a part in the failure. Or fear of going to theaters in light of rising pandemic numbers again. Or basic dislike of the brand after the first one scored a huge opening but became derided over time.

Others will say the R rating kept kids away, it should have been a PG-13. A few snips would have remedied that, and Gunn could have had an R rated DVD release later.

And Warner Bros. doesn’t give numbers for HBO Max, where “TSS” was also playing.

Somehow I think this movie will grow as a cult film over time. But time is not what it has at the moment.

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Roger Friedman
Roger Friedmanhttps://www.showbiz411.com
Roger Friedman is the founder and editor-in-chief of Showbiz411. He wrote the FOX411 column on FoxNews.com from 1999 to 2009 and previously edited Fame magazine and wrote the "Intelligencer" column at New York magazine. His bylines have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, the New York Daily News, the New York Post, Vogue, Details, and the Miami Herald. He is a voting member of the Critics Choice Awards (Film and Television branches), and his movie reviews are tracked by Rotten Tomatoes. is articles have appeared in dozens of publications over the years including New York Magazine, where he wrote the Intelligencer column in the mid 90s and covered the OJ Simpson trial, and Fox News (when it wasn't so crazy) where he covered Michael Jackson. With D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus, he co-produced the 2002 documentary "Only the Strong Survive," which screened at Directors' Fortnight at the Cannes Film Festival.

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