Warner Bros. Pictures via CNN

Directed by David Ayer, “Suicide Squad” stars Will Smith, Jared Leto, Margot Robbie, Joel Kinnaman, Viola Davis, Jai Courtney, Karen Fukuhara, Jay Hernandez, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Ike Barinholtz, Scott Eastwood and Cara Delevingne. According to predictions, total amount will include $20.5 million in Thursday-night previews, the Imax locations was able to raise $2.4 million, or 12 percent. If you like chaos and tough action, join the squad.

And succeed they did, also raking in $132 million overseas for a $276.1 million total, earning back the CGI-heavy film’s pricy $175 million budget.

Suicide Squad rocked the Friday box office, grossing $65.1 million for a projected $145 million-$150 million weekend, the top opening of all time for an August release and ending days of angst for Warner Bros.in the wake of withering reviews.

The movie, from Warner Bros. and DC Entertainment, didn’t just break the record – it blew away the previous record-holder, “Guardians of the Galaxy”, which opened to $94.3 million in 2014. However, that meant that millions of dollars had to be spent on additional photography to get the movie where Warner wanted it.

“Squad” now has a 26% rating on Rotten Tomatoes (lower than what “Batman v Superman” had at the time of its release) so the prospect of the movie having a big drop in sales next weekend is probable. The only other new picture was Nine Lives, via EuropaCorp which placed sixth with $US6.5 million.

“Suicide Squad” fans are getting less hopeful on the box-office outcome of the DC Extended Universe film, according to Time.

Fan support has been strong with almost 4 million followers for the “Suicide Squad” Facebook page. The story of a ruthless executive (Kevin Spacey) who gets transformed into a cat made $6.5m after scoring even worse reviews than Suicide Squad.

Whether that initial success can be sustained, however, remains to be seen – after all, Batman v Superman’s strong opening was rocked in its second week at the box office in the wake of critical backlash and poor word of mouth.

Men accounted for 54% of Suicide Squad’s opening weekend audience, with more than half of the audience clocking in under 25.