Box office: ‘Shazam’ is surrounded by comic book movies and family films

In one of those odd situations where news breaks just after I drop a post related to that news, Lionsgate announced yesterday that Hellboy will be moving from January 11, 2019, to April 12, 2019. That’s a four-month delay, and it frankly doesn’t mean much in terms of the David Harbour/Milla Jovovich/Ian McShane/Daniel Dae Kim comic book reboot. The film is a Millennium production, which means it’s probably a lower-budget (at least compared to the Guillermo del Toro fantasies) effort that is aimed at overseas audiences (including China) who like grindhouse horror action.

So, no, it may not mean much for DC Films’ Shazam opening on April 5, 2019. But that film already faces some ironic competition. The David F. Sandberg-directed superhero saga comes out of New Line as well as Warner Bros. So, the Zackery Levi comedy about a young kid who becomes an adult superhero (think Big with capes) may not be quite as expensive as the likes of Man of Steel or Suicide Squad. Nonetheless, before the Hellboy date change, the DC Films flick was positioned the preordained event movie for the month of April, opening a month after Captain Marvel and a month before the domestic debut of Marvel’s Avengers 4.