‘Birds of Prey’ Gets Rebranded With New Title
After a disappointing opening weekend, it appears that a rebranding — if not an out-and-out title change — is underway for Warner Bros.’ Birds of Prey. Several people noticed that the websites of most major movie theater chains have stopped referring to the film by its original title, and are instead now calling it Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey.
Sure enough, when I look at the websites of all the biggest chains in the country that’s what I see. Here is what AMC’s website says:
This is what you find when you search Regal for Birds of Prey:
And this is currently what you see at Cinemark:
All three have changed over to Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey. According to ScreenRant, “WB mandated theaters to change the name.” (At least one other theater we contacted had not been told to change the title yet.)
The attempt to shift the marketing towards Harley Quinn (played by Margot Robbie) makes sense — not only because Robbie is the movie’s biggest star but because her character had already appeared in a previous DC Comics movie, Suicide Squad. (The film’s previous full title, Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn, did include her name.) This move recalls when the Tom Cruise sci-fi thriller Edge of Tomorrow got renamed Live. Die. Repeat. — previously the film’s tagline — during its theatrical release. (Most home video releases of the film use the latter title.) Warner Bros. distributed both of these movies.
Given that Birds of Prey is a fairly unknown DC team, and Harley Quinn’s a whole lot more famous, this title makes more sense. Maybe it should have been called Harley Quinn and the Birds of Prey all along. Whatever it’s called Birds of Prey or Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey is now playing in a theater near you.
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