James Gunn and Peter Safran’s DC Universe continues to grow. Following the release of Superman, the studio is now gearing up for the premiere of Supergirl\u00a0in a few months. Starring Milly Alcock and directed by Craig Gillespie (I, Tonya, Cruella), the film is an adaptation of Tom King and Bilquis Evelyn’s Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow comic book.<\/p>\n
Much like its source material, Supergirl\u00a0is expected\u00a0to be a sci-fi epic, seemingly remaining faithful to its roots, while introducing exciting new elements into the story, such as Jason Momoa’s space-based bounty hunter, Lobo. The thing about sci-fi epics is… they tend to be particularly expensive. For a brief period of time, it\u00a0looked\u00a0like Supergirl wouldn’t\u00a0be the\u00a0exception to the rule.\u00a0Forbes Australia<\/a> recently published a profile on Milly Alcock, where it\u00a0stated\u00a0the film came\u00a0with a price tag of $200 million. James Gunn, however,\u00a0has since debunked the information<\/p>\n When asked on Threads\u00a0if the number\u00a0was legitimate, Gunn simply responded<\/a>: “Not even a little bit true.”\u00a0Had it been accurate, though, the number\u00a0would have fallen into a fairly standard range for\u00a0comic book movies. For comparison, below\u00a0are budgets for superhero projects from recent years:\u00a0<\/p>\n Superman is a little more complicated to pin down in terms of budget, given that\u00a0there’s a debate regarding the final cost of the David Corenswet-led film. A purported Ohio tax filing<\/a>\u00a0stated\u00a0the project\u00a0had a gross budget of $363.8\u00a0million. James Gunn debunked this\u00a0on Threads<\/a>, stating:\u00a0<\/p>\n “I don’t know if it’s faked or if it’s just some weird form an assistant in the Cleveland office filled out putting random stuff in the blanks. I sent it to our accountants and financial producers when it first came out a year ago and no one knew what it was. I can just tell you it wasn’t anyone on our team!”<\/p>\n Later, though, The Hollywood Reporter reported<\/a>\u00a0the amount was somewhat\u00a0accurate. It’s worth noting that, even if the budget reported in the filing was\u00a0legitimate, a part of it was likely recouped through tax rebates. As of now, the most commonly accepted figure for the film is $225 million<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Looking at those numbers, Supergirl’s now-debunked budget would have not\u00a0only been common in the industry, it would\u00a0have actually been on the lower end of spending in the genre. Nevertheless, such a price tag\u00a0would have\u00a0put\u00a0its\u00a0profit benchmark at a high level. Superhero films typically don’t go below $100 million for marketing. Adding\u00a0that lower\u00a0amount to this recently shared budget,\u00a0Supergirl\u00a0could have come with a price tag of at least $300 million.<\/p>\n Using that number and going by industry standards of revenue participation, Supergirl would have had to roughly bring in $600 million to break even\u00a0(and that’s assuming the lowest end of marketing costs). Sadly, that’s become a tough bar to clear in recent years. With that in mind, it will be interesting to see how Supergirl performs in theaters. Regardless of the now-debunked $200 million budget, as a sci-fi epic, the film is unlikely (though not impossible) to come in on the cheap end.\u00a0<\/p>\n The superhero genre has experienced\u00a0a\u00a0decline in recent years. Movies that would have previously been guaranteed blockbusters like Superman and The Fantastic Four: First Steps performed only relatively okay. With Superman\u00a0“only” reaching approximately\u00a0$616\u00a0million, it’s somewhat difficult to imagine Supergirl doing better than that, given her relative obscurity when compared to her cousin.<\/p>\n Having said that, even if the film struggles theatrically, it will have other avenues to fall back on, like merchandising, home video sales and brand partnerships\u2014all of which\u00a0have proven fruitful for comic book projects. Furthermore, this question regarding profitability can be applied to any superhero movie starring a niche\u00a0character with a budget of over $150 million.\u00a0<\/p>\n Supergirl is specifically used in this case because it is arguably the most high-profile\u00a0superhero project\u00a0coming out in 2026 starring a relatively obscure hero. The rest of the year will see the release of movies starring Spider-Man and the Avengers, both proven brands. Clayface\u00a0is not considered for that category\u00a0given that, while its protagonist is unknown, the film is reported to have a budget of around $40 million<\/a>\u2014a fairly easy profitability benchmark to clear for a horror feature.\u00a0<\/p>\n This isn’t to say the situation is\u00a0looking dire\u00a0for Supergirl,\u00a0of course. While challenging\u00a0given the aforementioned circumstances faced by the comic book genre, there is very much a possibility that\u00a0Supergirl\u00a0will find\u00a0an audience at a level that other superhero projects\u00a0have failed to achieve. Alcock’s Superman cameo generated a lot of excitement for her\u00a0character. which could translate into better and brighter box office returns.<\/p>\n Out of all the comic book projects coming out in 2026, the Milly Alcock-led adventure looks to be\u00a0one\u00a0of the most exciting ones. It has a talented director at the helm and it’s\u00a0based on one of the most renowned comic stories in years. Taking that into consideration, the film\u00a0has a good chance of finding success with general audiences.\u00a0<\/p>\n Supergirl flies into theaters on June 26, 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"James Gunn and Peter Safran’s DC Universe continues to grow. Following the release of Superman, the studio is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":318974,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[3409,49,48,141771,5768,2013,75,867,869,337,871,5769],"class_list":{"0":"post-318973","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-budget","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-craig-gillespie","12":"tag-dc-studios","13":"tag-dcu","14":"tag-entertainment","15":"tag-james-gunn","16":"tag-milly-alcock","17":"tag-movies","18":"tag-supergirl","19":"tag-superman"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318973","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=318973"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318973\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/318974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}