Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League Called Out in Warner Bros. Earning Call

Video Games

How big a failure was Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League? According to a recent Warner Bros. earnings call (via Video Games Chronicle), it was big enough to sink their entire financial quarter. During the call, Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav blamed the “decrease in revenue” on the difference in sales between last year’s highly successful Harry Potter video game Hogwarts Legacy and this year’s Suicide Squad. According to CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels, Suicide Squad’s failure resulted in a “$200 million impact to EBIDTA [earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation] during the first quarter.” That’s… a lot. Forbes adds that the sales for Kill the Justice League were “lower than even the worst-case scenario expectations,” with the author speculating that Rocksteady Studios may not be around much longer.

What an utter disaster. And to illustrate how unnecessary a failure like this was (which, I suspect, was part of why he did this),  David Zaslav touted the many advantages of having IPs like DC Comics and its legion of characters right before getting into how much money Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League had cost Warner Bros. How’s that for irony? By most accounts, the game sucks in general, but it’s almost certain that the way it treats some classic DC heroes – especially Batman – was the major reason for its rejection, and most are pointing the finger at consulting firm Sweet Baby Inc. And while they’re one manifestation of a larger problem in gaming, for better or worse, they’ve become the face of it. It’s been getting bad for them since Kabrutus and his Sweet Baby Inc. Detected curator shone an even brighter light on them, but having one of their highest-profile games called out by the CEO of Warner Bros. as having been most directly responsible for the company’s recent revenue loss is devastating for them. And Zaslav’s larger point is right; they have all the opportunity in the world to make a killing with various forms of entertainment, but they’re hiring the wrong people to tell stories about Superman, Batman, and the rest. It’s astounding that this could have happened while the game was under the care of the studio that gave us the Arkham series, particularly those first two, but here we are. It’d be great if they could right the ship and put out some video games worthy of DC’s legacy, and if the movies turn out well, too. People want to love this stuff, but they’re done sopping up any gruel they’re thrown.