Back in 2011, DC released Green Lantern as the first movie in their universe. With grand plans to make a $200 million budget-packing movie an epitome of success, they hoped to compete against the evolving MCU. They pushed a young 35-year-old Ryan Reynolds to the center, giving him the bludgeoning onus of creating an ambitious superhero movie. Contrary to what they expected, the movie tanked in the theaters, miserably. And surprisingly, this is a movie from the same studio that made the likes of The Dark Knight. 

While DC’s 2023 film replaced Reynolds’ in the lackluster run, it was because of reasons that were purely unintentional. On the other hand, the 2011 mistake by Warner Bros could have been easily avoided if they had learned from past lessons. 

The maiden hero and the painful responsibility

The budget bungle will definitely remain one of the top reasons for the movie’s failure. Even though they made a whopping $220 million in box office collections, they were still shy in terms of their profit. Their miscalculation with Superman’s budget pulled $270 million to $300 million. In addition, their budget was as big as already established mega superheroes like its preceding 2008’s Iron Man 2. Even Marvel chose to stick with $140 million in its pocket for the 2011’s Captain America: The First Avenger. 

Not only did Reynolds make his superhero debut, but he carried the duty of being a starter film for the universe. Looper pointed out how DC already had 30 movies in the universe. Sadly, Warner Bros. took a huge gamble and forced the green hero to help make viewers understand it all.  

While the sets of the movie led him to the love of his life, Blake Lively, it otherwise proved to be wrought with errors. The movie’s over-the-top attempt with sci-fi and poor mapping of it gave it another blow. But there was huge reason behind the movie’s failure.

Ryan Reynolds’ movie got shuffled between a sea of producers

The world was still alien to watching intense sci-fi concepts come live on screen. Although the audience was quite warm to technologically advanced superheroes like Batman, and Iron Man, Green Lantern was simply ambitious. Movies before James Gunn’s magic were more “grounded“. Heroes had a believable humanized story backdrop. The cherry on top was DC’s usual lack of a movie plan.

Since the start, MCU has always impressed its fan with the storylines merging like butter. They have always been well thought out in advance, all thanks to Stan Lee and their execution. But the Free Guy actor suffered from having twelve producers working on the film.

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