Birds of Prey Is Now Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes

Birds of Prey is finally hitting theaters, and it’s safe to say that the film has had something of an uphill battle to get here. After the bad taste of Suicide Squad was left in DC’s fans mouths – and the larger DC Extended Universe seemed to come apart at the seams – there was a lot of skepticism that Birds of Prey would work. Sure, Margot Robbie‘s turn as Harley Quinn has received almost universal acclaim, but the adaptation of other Batman lore (from the Birds of Prey team to Ewan McGregor’s Black Mask) had fans skeptical. However, that skepticism has quickly transformed into enthusiasm, as Birds of Prey is officially “Certified Fresh” on Rotten Tomatoes!

At the current time of writing this, Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) currently holds a nice 83% score on Rotten Tomatoes. That puts Birds of Prey somewhere in the middle of the DC Movie franchise, in terms of score; films like Shazam and Wonder Woman outrank it (with scores of 90% and 93%, respectively), but it’s definitely doing better than the lowly days of the Zack Snyder DCEU films, like Man of Steel (56%), Batman v Superman (28%) and Justice League (40%). For a more direct comparison, this Birds of Prey spinoff is trouncing its predecessor Suicide Squad (27%), which may just confirm beyond any doubt that Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn was the only real “win” that movie delivered for the DCEU.

Now that Birds of Prey is a hit with critics and audiences alike (a nice 88% audience score to go with that Certified Fresh!), the question now is: will the good reviews equate to box office success?

There’s not a lot of consistency when it comes to DC movies review scores vs the box office earnings. Suicide Squad might of gotten shredded in terms of review score, but it also earned $746 million worldwide on a $175M budget. Aquaman is the most recent DCEU release; it only mustered a 66% review score, but managed to swim off with $1.1 billion in box office earnings. So, even though Birds of Prey is coming out of the gate strong with reviews and reactions, it remains to be seen if it can earn what it needs to. Early Birds of Prey projections have the film estimated to earn between $49 – 55 million in opening weekend, which is a modest but solid start for the February release window.

Upcoming DC movies include Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) now in theaters, Wonder Woman 1984 on June 5th, The Batman on June 25, 2021, The Suicide Squad on August 6, 2021, Black Adam on December 22, 2021, Shazam! 2 on April 1, 2022, The Flash on July 1, 2022, and Aquaman 2 on December 16, 2022.