Spiderman Shakes Bad Reviews for Strong Sales Week

The bad reviews have been published.

The people who love “Spider-Man” apparently aren’t reading them.

Last week, the notoriously problematic musical was pummeled by extremely poor reviews, which is an oddity for Broadway in recent years. Even so, “Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark” tickets sold well and even sold better than they did prior to the reviews being published.

Based on information from playbill.com, the Spider-Man musical sold $1.33 million in tickets this past week. This is up by $33,000 over the week prior to the reviews coming out. The show, which is directed by Julie Taymor and is highlighted by music from U2’s Bono and the Edge, was second in sales behind “Wicked” and beat out other popular shows such as “The Merchant of Venice” and “The Lion King.”

“Spider-Man” has a price tag of $65 million, which is the highest cost of any Broadway musical ever. Its opening night is on March 15; however approximately 12 famous critics decided to review the musical before it actually premiered, which is highly irregular. The critics used the play’s several delays as justification.

The reviews for “Spider-Man” were unquestionably poor. It was derided as a “shrill, insipid mess” by The Washington Post. The Los Angeles Times wrote that it was “an artistic form of megalomania.” Finally, New York magazine called it “underbaked, terrifying, confusing.