David F. Sandberg and Rachel Zegler blast critics of “Shazam! Fury of the Gods” on Twitter.
The superhero sequel from New Line Cinema and Warner Bros. opened in theaters last weekend and grossed a disappointing $30.5 million, falling short of relatively modest expectations of $35 million.
This makes it one of the worst opening weekend performers in the DC Comics franchise, ahead only of “Wonder Woman 1984” and “The Suicide Squad.” both came out during the pandemic and were available to stream immediately upon release.
On Rotten Tomatoes, the critics score for “Tomatometer” was 53% on Monday afternoon, while the audience score was 88%.
Rachel Zegler, who plays Anthea, Atlas’ youngest daughter, in the “Shazam” sequel, responded to this weekend’s poor box office performance by urging people on Twitter to give the film a chance.
“Hey, our movie is really, really good!” Zegler tweeted Saturday. “but most of all I loved doing it and the people I met while doing it 🙂 Go check it out! Give me a chance. we have an 85% audience score for a reason.”
“Some people out there and just being…meaningless mean”, She continued. “and it is unnecessary. and I know, I know, ‘if you can’t stand the heat…’ and all that nonsense, and you’re right. but our film is really very good. It’s cool to hate fun nowadays. Alright. we’re ok.”
On Monday, director David F. Sandberg similarly lamented the response to the film, tweeting that it had just earned its “lowest critical score” on Rotten Tomatoes and “highest audience score for the same film.”
“I wasn’t expecting a repeat of the first movie from a critical point of view, but it still surprised me a bit because I think it’s a good movie. Oh well”, the Swedish filmmaker tweeted.
The first “Shazam!” The film made $53.5 million during its opening weekend in 2019.
The director of “Annabelle: Creation” concluded his Twitter thread saying that he did not regret doing “Shazam!” movies “even for a minute,” but he hoped to disconnect from the stress of “online superhero discourse” and return to the horror genre.
