Warner Bros. laying some of the blame for ‘Shazam! Fury of the Gods’ bombing directly at James Gunn’s door

Sifting through the wreckage left behind by Shazam! Fury of the Gods doesn’t make for encouraging reading, with the superhero sequel suffering the distinction of going down in the history books as one of the biggest box office bombs the entire genre has ever seen.

There are a number of reasons as to why, with Warner Bros.’ lackluster marketing campaign definitely among them, while star Zachary Levi hardly did any favors endearing himself to the masses with some controversial comments on vaccination, before ruining any chance the SnyderVerse crowd had of paying for a ticket by trashing them in public.

Of course, there are many who pointed a finger squarely in the direction of James Gunn, seeing as the plans for an overhaul of the entire franchise were announced before Fury of the Gods had even released in theaters, which rendered the prospect of seeing a film that had already been deemed pointless in the grand scheme of things even more obsolete.

As it turns out, the studio appears to be in the exact same boat after The Wrap reported that WB bigwigs believed Gunn’s announcement of Chapter 1: Gods & Monsters helped to chip away at “general audience interest” in the Shazam! sequel.

Of course, that’s a problem entirely of their own making seeing as the slate was unveiled four months before David F. Sandberg’s sophomore outing landed on the big screen, so at the end of the day the company doesn’t really have anyone to name as the prime suspect other than itself.