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Five years ago, DC Comics’ Suicide Squad made its theatrical debut in theaters, and now Task Force X is back on the big screen, this time from the “horribly beautiful mind” of Guardians of the Galaxy filmmaker James Gunn. The tenth DC Extended Universe movie sees a huge lineup of new faces alongside a scattering of familiar ones embarking on a dangerous mission that’s simultaneously gruesome and hilarious. The Suicide Squad opened in theaters on Thursday night, so how did it fare at the box office that evening?
According to Deadline, The Suicide Squad opened to the tune of $4.1 million in Thursday night preview screenings, the biggest financial haul for an R-rated movie during the pandemic. It slightly surpassed the $4 million 2020’s Birds of Prey raked in when it opened mere weeks before COVID-19 forced movie theaters to close down. Other R-rated movies that have opened to big bucks on their first night include Funimation’s Demonslayer: Infinity Train with $3.8 million, and Universal Pictures’ The Forever Purge with $1.3 million.
In other words, The Suicide Squad is off to a good start, so now we wait to see how its opening weekend turns out. Recent predictions place the latest DCEU movie earning anywhere between $30-$40 million during its first several days. Let’s also not forget that like the rest of Warner Bros’ 2021 film slate, The Suicide Squad is also being made available on HBO Max (which you can subscribe to with this link) at no extra charge to subscribers for 31 days, a sharp contrast from Disney+ charging $29.99 for subscribers to watch movies like Cruella and Black Widow on the Premier Access tier. So that will surely affect The Suicide Squad’s commercial total, but if the estimations are correct, it should still perform solidly while in theaters.
Critically speaking, The Suicide Squad has received primarily positive reviews from critics and is currently tied with 2017’s Wonder Woman as the highest-rated DCEU movie on Rotten Tomatoes with a 93% score, with 2019’s Shazam! coming in second place at 90%. The Suicide Squad follows eight months after Wonder Woman 1984, the last DCEU theatrical release, which was met with more mixed reception and ranks at 59% on Rotten Tomatoes. Zack Snyder’s Justice League fared better at 71%, but it premiered exclusively on HBO Max (and will be released on home media in the U.S. and Canada on September 7).
Whether you’ve already seen The Suicide Squad or will catch it sometime this weekend either in theaters or the comfort of your own home, one thing should be made clear: James Gunn’s time contributing to the DCEU won’t be a one-and-done affair. Next January, the Peacemaker spinoff series will premiere on HBO Max, and DC Films president Walter Hamada recently revealed that there’s “more stuff planned” involving Gunn. In the immediate future though, Gunn has hopped back to the Marvel Cinematic Universe to work on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 and the Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special, the latter of which will play on Disney+.
Be sure to read CinemaBlend’s review of The Suicide Squad, and for those of you who’ve watched the movie, feel free to look through our breakdown of the end credits scene. And as always, keep checking back with CinemaBlend for the latest news on upcoming DC Comics movies.
