8 Reasons Suicide Squad Became A Box Office Success (Despite Being Terrible)

1. It Is, Ultimately, An Event Movie

There’s a confusion in Hollywood that a big budget movie is the same as an event movie. Now let me clear with up: just because you funnelled a small countries GDP into some fantastical CGI adventure is no guarantee people will come out in droves because they feel they have to see it (unless you’ve put so much money that the wastefulness is spectacle itself).

This is where movies like Alice Through The Looking Glass failed – they had lots of marketer’s checkboxes ticked, but nothing about it was essential; it’s a sequel to a widely underwhelming movie that came out over six years ago.

Suicide Squad, however, is an event movie. For fans of superhero cinema it was a third chance for DC to prove they could get this shared universe thing right, but for general audiences there was appeal too, specifically the Joker. Remember when the film was announced? The biggest part of it was Jared Leto’s casting, and the production was subsequently dominated with annoying stories about his method acting. The part in the movie may have been cut down massively, but he’s still an essential draw, the first Clown Prince since Heath Ledger, and that makes the movie that bit more enticing.

It is an event movie; there's a reason to come out and see this unlike the rest of the dreck that's been shovelled into multiplexes. So of course it was going to be a success. Sadly.

Why do you think Suicide Squad was such a box office success? Let us know your take down in the comments.