10 Reasons The Flash Failed
2. A Non-Existent Marketing Campaign
With Ezra Miller's off-air antics making them persona non grata for many viewers, WB found itself with a predicament:
How do you market a movie without its star?
The studio decided that the best way to sidestep the Ezra issue would be to focus The Flash's trailers on the return of Michael Keaton's Batman. Keaton had not donned the cowl since 1992 and, with the mammoth success of Spider-Man: No Way Home, WB banked on Keaton-nostalgia to make up the difference at the box office. While Keaton acquitted himself well in the role, audiences at large greeted his return with a shrug.
James Gunn and David Zaslav also attempted to juice the box office by publicly proclaiming The Flash to be among the greatest superhero movies ever made - a claim that created unrealistic expectations.
When The Flash didn't match the hype, fans immediately called foul.
Further compounding these miscalculations, WB presented numerous free screenings of The Flash to fans in the hope to build hype. This gambit had the opposite effect of what they intended, eating away at the opening weekend box office and further contributing to the image of The Flash as a dud.