Ryan Reynolds’ ‘Green Lantern’ director blames flop on “scrapped” ending lost to budget constraints

nme.com:

Green Lantern has blamed the film’s failure on his alternate ending being “scrapped” due to budget constraints.The 2011 movie starred Ryan Reynolds as Hal Jordan, a test pilot who is chosen to be the first human member of the intergalactic police force Green Lantern Corps.

Blake Lively, Peter Sarsgaard, Mark Strong, Angela Bassett and Tim Robbins also starred.The film struggled on release, grossing only $237million (£187million) against a budget of $200million (£158million), with its failure causing Warner Bros.

to abandon plans to use it as a launching pad for their DC Extended Universe. In the end, 2013’s Man Of Steel served as the official start of the universe.It was directed by Martin Campbell, best known for his work on the James Bond films GoldenEye (1995) and Casino Royale (2006).

He has given an interview with Variety in which he spoke about the difficult experience of releasing Green Lantern, revealing that he believes the alternate ending he had in mind might have helped the film’s performance.“While all the characters were part of the story…part of the comics basically, I think the story was left wanting.” he said. “I had a totally different ending to the movie, or the last third of it, all of which was scrapped in the interest of budget.”He went on to make clear, however, that he takes responsibility for the film’s rough ride at the box office. “Listen, I’m not making any excuses,” he added. “When you direct and people don’t like it, you suck it up and you say, ‘Well, I’m the director, so that’s my fault’.