Back in March, I deemed Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice a truly unprecedented box office phenomenon given that it raked in blockbuster numbers (over $870 million worldwide) despite finishing with a Rotten Tomatoes score that was comparable to some of the superhero genre's biggest flops. Now, four months after that film hit theaters, Suicide Squad — which finished with a Rotten Tomatoes score even lower than its DC Cinematic Universe predecessor– is duplicating that feat as it continues to break box office records.
As reported by Deadline, the DC anti-hero film grossed $14.27 million on Tuesday, its fifth day of release, up 9% from Monday's gross and also a new record for a Tuesday in August. In fact, it leapfrogged over Guardians of the Galaxy's previous record $11.9 million Tuesday, and also beat Captain America: Civil War's $13.7 million back in May, Avengers: Age of Ultron's $13.1 million last May and Batman v Superman's $12.1 million this past March.
Bottom line: with $161.1 million domestically in just five days and a second weekend many are estimating will fall somewhere in the low-mid $50 million range — not to mention a healthy $133 million in foreign territories to date — Suicide Squad is proving to be just as critic-proof as Dawn of Justice, perhaps even more so; indeed, a $50 million second-weekend total would represent a much-better second-weekend drop than BvS's (63% to 69%). In other words, poor word-of-mouth doesn't appear to be slowing the film down as much as we might have expected when those awful reviews hit mid-last week.
I highly doubt Suicide Squad will be able to match Dawn of Justice's $872 million global tally — unlike BvS, it likely won't be granted a release in the increasingly-important Chinese marketplace — but it's nevertheless demonstrating considerably better legs than its predecessor, and that has to be counted as a success, all things considered.