Getting burned by unwarranted hype is an occurrence that’s become way to regular, with The Flash being greeted with decidedly less enthusiasm then we’d been led to believe.
After all, Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav touted it as one of the greatest comic book adaptations of all-time, feelings that were echoed by DC Studios boss James Gunn. Obviously, those two are obligated to hype it from the rooftops in an effort to generate maximum box office dollars, but surely Tom Cruise wouldn’t lie to the public?!?
Well, “lying” may not be the operative word, but “exaggerating” certainly could be. At the time of writing, The Flash currently holds a Rotten Tomatoes score of 72 percent, and while that’s a million miles away from being an unadulterated disaster, it isn’t even good enough to crack the Top 20 DC movies on the aggregation site.
As mentioned, it’s not really the end of the world, but it just goes to show how we can all still fall for buzz that may not be entirely deserved. The Flash is currently the fifth top-rated installment in the DCU to put it squarely in the middle, while it hasn’t managed to exceed the RT ratings of such titles as Birds of Prey, Superman Returns, V for Vendetta, or even Adam West’s 1966 Batman movie.
In fact, it’s tied with Dwayne Johnson’s DC League of Super-Pets at the moment, and that film’s failure helped get The Rock booted out of the DCU altogether, so maybe the future for Ezra Miller’s title hero isn’t as much of an ironclad guarantee as many would have been thinking this time last week.
