Justice League - Will Gangster Squad's Disappointing Opening Affect the Movie?

Gangster Squad

, the star-studded and much-anticipated feature film from rumored Justice League writer Will Beall, opened at #3 in the domestic box office this weekend, bringing in only $17 million and being beaten out not only by Zero Dark Thirty but also A Haunted House, Deadline reports. Beall, a longtime Castle writer and story editor who made the jump to features with Gangster Squad, is attached not only to Justice League, but to a remake of Logan's Run and to Lethal Weapon 5, as well, according to his IMDb page. Those are all pretty big projects for a relatively inexperienced screenwriter whose first feature film opened soft. It's not just a matter of Zero Dark Thirty's seemingly insurmountable buzz, either; Gangster Squad is suffering with a dismal 34% rating on Rotten Tomatoes (which, for context, is lower than John Carter and tied with Battleship). The consensus there seems to be that the movie features "lackluster writing and underdeveloped characters, which doesn't bode well for some hotly-anticipated projects Beall is attached to. There's already been some speculation that, with a number of directors reportedly rejecting the Justice League job, there might be something wrong with the movie outline and script samples that have been making the rounds. If the problem with Gangster Squad is really the script, that might lend those reports some credibility. And if the film underperforms at the box office, what does that mean for Beall's Justice League script, which will be a years-long production that the studio will likely not be comfortable sending back for reshoots or changing halfway through production. There also doesn't appear to be any indication that Logan's Run or Lethal Weapon 5 will be ready to shoot before Justice League, suggesting there's not much chance of Beall generating a big hit between now and when serious money starts being poured into the DC Comics team-up film. That's got to make studio executives nervous unless, for whatever reason, they've got a truly impressive amount of confidence in Beall's current script. Of course, Gangster Squad has been saddled with additional baggage that's not necessarily any fault of Beall's. Following the mass shooting at a Colorado movie theater screening a copy of The Dark Knight Rises this summer, Gangster Squad was delayed to accommodate reshoots and rewrites that removed a reportedly-key scene that Warner Brothers, which produced and distributed both films, felt would be seen as insensitive. Whatever specific changes they made to the film haven't shielded Gangster Squad from criticism over on-screen violence, of course, particularly as Hollywood is being more generally criticized for those same issues. If history is any indicator, though, it's difficult to suggest the violent content affected the box office. If anything, it's likely the changes made to accommodate the studio's fears that damaged the film.