psqidexslizer

I think there’s an handful of issues no one is really addressing. First, I think it’s clear that superhero fatigue is real. Superman might be the only CBM film from last year that turned a profit. Most MCU films have been flopping for the past few years. Maybe the DCU can turn that around, but I think it’s clear that the age of billion dollar superhero movies is over. And younger audiences especially seem less interested in superheroes and more in videogame movies. The second is the rise of streaming. Less people are going to the movies and opting to stay at home. That’s been a trend for years and it’s only going to get worse as streaming becomes more popular. WB either needs to work on cutting costs and expect streaming releases to become the norm or they need to really convince people to pay the $10000 to go see a movie in theaters. The third is the US has become much less popular globally. The highest grossing film of this year wasn’t a Hollywood release. It was a Chinese release that made the majority of its money from Chinese box offices. Hollywood movies, which were very much reliant on that Chinese box office, have not been playing well there. Superman in particular, probably thanks to how closely he has been tied to American culture, did poorly worldwide. The DCU may end up being a success, but it clearly has an uphill battle. I think next year will show if properties outside of Spider-Man, Batman, and maybe Superman can actually survive in this new environment (and, more importantly, how WB reacts when they fail) and Man of Tomorrow will be the real test if Superman made the impact with audiences that WB needs to carry the franchise. I think Lego sees the writing on the wall more clearly than the rest of us. That’s why they’ve cut down everything not Batman, Spider-Man, and Infinity Saga, as well as reduced the number of big sets to one per year between Marvel and DC. I think they know at this point that the golden era of superhero movies is over.

Correct. But we got hints to other Batman villains like Penguin, Scarecrow, and Riddler so I always just assumed Batman had a fully formed rogues gallery at this point (especially since he was 20 years into his career) and Two Face was probably among them.

Yeah, I remember that theory. The early DCEU theories were hilarious: Aquaman is being held captive in a tank in LexCorp, Deathstroke and King Shark are Amanda Waller’s secret body guards, Jimmy Olsen had his legs crushed by rubble during the Black Zero event, Lex Luthor has a tattoo of the Metropolis skyline on his back from his days in a street gang, Ben Affleck’s Batman is actually Slade Wilson and the ‘v’ in BvS is actually a Roman numeral denoting it being the 5th film in the saga (TDKT were 1-3), just to name a few. I always assumed the “how many stayed that way” line was a reference to Two Face.

I don’t know that “he only kills people when he gets really angry” is the argument you think it is.

Yeah, Joker still being alive while Batman is perfectly fine with bulldozing criminals never made sense to me. Especially a Joker who has brutally murdered Robin. He should have been the first one to die (and given how much TDKR inspired this time, I’m surprised he wasn’t).

It’ll be a big fig Rhino, but he’ll be Venomized. In all seriousness though, I’d assume this is the case. Which is disappointing given how long we’ve been waiting for a proper Rhino only for another mech.

With Superman and especially Wonder Woman, it depends on who is writing them. After all, these two are somehow the same character:

IMO, there’s four tiers of superhero killing rules. 1) Never kills. This group includes Batman (except in the movies) and Daredevil. They’re all ridiculously anti-kill with Batman being the worst offender of this lot (Joker wouldn’t survive five minutes with any other superhero). 2) Only kills as a last resort. This group includes Superman, Wonder Woman, Spider-Man, and Flash. They’ve all killed, (or attempted to kill in Spider-Man’s case), but it’s incredibly rare that they do and it’s always a big deal. 3) Kills, but tries to keep the number of casualties down. Most superheroes fall in this category. They kill pretty regularly but try to avoid killing without reason. 4) Probably a psychopath. This group includes Punisher, Hulk, and Wolverine. These guys have filled entire graveyards. I completely agree on Batfleck, btw. It’s pretty clear him killing is wrong (even if Zack Snyder and his biggest fans disagree) and his arc is about finding redemption and becoming a better man, which makes it much more acceptable than Keaton and Kilmer who just casually murder their enemies.

He’s like Wells from The Flash where a different version of him from the multiverse keeps popping up. This latest one is from the universe where Snyder fans successfully bullied the studio into restoring the Snyderverse.

Female Penguin was a great idea.

It’s ideas like this that make me thankful Lego doesn’t listen to their fans.

… why would you buy a movie you don’t like?

Complaining about Superman being OP, but not an ordinary human who has canonically survived a fall from outer space because “prep time” is hilarious.

The 50/50 split isn’t accurate. For one, studios take a higher cut of the box office during the opening weeks (sometimes as high as 90%) and then during the ending of the run, it levels out closer to 50/50, but only domestically. Internationally, theaters take a heavier cut than 50%, with theaters in China taking the highest cut. So, the 50/50 split isn’t accurate. And for a domestic heavy and opening weekend heavy film like Superman, the film doesn’t need as much to break even. Which is why articles like this https://www.forbes.com/sites/timlammers/2025/10/06/james-gunns-superman-ends-its-theatrical-run-how-much-did-it-make/, where the author (who specialized in interviewing celebrities, not analyzing box office) just applies the 50/50 split rule aren’t accurate, even if it does come from a reliable site like Forbes. I’d put far more faith in an articles like this: https://variety.com/2025/film/news/warner-bros-box-office-historic-streak-conjuring-last-rites-1236510864/, where the author actually covers box office earnings for a living and cites a company that analyzes box office earnings professionally, instead of just applying an arbitrary rule. So, per actual box office analysts, the film did turn a profit.

The film turned a profit in theaters, was the highest grossing comic book movie of the year, and is getting a sequel. By no metric did it fail. As for it being a “bad movie”, the audience and critic reviews say otherwise. This is the correct answer.

Lego finally makes sets for Superman (2025). However, each set has a smart brick and all the minifigures are smart minifigures. What would you guys do in this situation?

I can’t think of a more apt description for this set than a tombstone for the theme. Ironic that it’s also the celebration of the 20th (and final) anniversary.

I think you’re the only one getting the logo at all.

Buddy, we can’t even get villains in sets anymore. edit: unless you count Batfleck

This is what I’d expect, tbh. Obviously Lego isn’t going to make a minfigure scaled set that fully captures Minas Tirith. That would be far too expensive and they wouldn’t sell as many. But I also can’t see them just focusing on the Citadel. The shape of the overall city is too iconic and the three big scenes that take place at the Citadel are Faramir premature cremation, Denethor jumping, and Aragorn being crowned. Most of the big action scenes which people remember take place outside the city. Nor could they do a micro scale version. That’s not going to sell as well because it wouldn’t mesh with the last three sets. A downscaled lower section and disproportionately larger top is the best option, assuming they can actually pull it off.

Jokes on you. That’s Bruce Wayne. He’s just missing his hair.

What usual place? A padded cell?

I doubt even all these would be enough to convince anyone to buy a set based on The Hobbit trilogy.

Helm’s Deep or Orthanc. Aside from Moria, those are the only locations left that the general public would recognize and maybe buy sets for. And we just got a Balarog bookend set, so they’re not going to cannibalize the sales for that.

Yeah, I’d assume something like this with more detailing and maybe larger, similar to what we got for Barad-Dur. The shape of the whole city is too iconic for Lego to pass up on and I imagine more people will be disappointed if Lego fails to capture that than they will be if it’s not 100% minifgure scaled.