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Madea thinks less of all of you.

Kim Hollis: Alex Cross, Tyler Perry's first attempt to anchor a film as a dramatic lead, earned $11.4 million this weekend. Why do you think it struggled? How much of the problem was in the marketing, how much was with Perry and how much can be blamed on procedural fatigue?

Matthew Huntley: When I first saw the title for this movie, the name sounded familiar. Oh yes, Alex Cross was the character made famous by Morgan Freeman in Kiss the Girls and Along Came a Spider. Now it was going to be filled by...Tyler Perry? Honestly, the idea made me laugh, which isn't to say Perry isn't capable, but I, like so many moviegoers, am only used to him dressing up in a wig and dress and playing Madea. But if Perry truly is an actor, he should be able to pull Alex Cross off and I'd be willing to see it. The problem is that most people probably are not, and I think it's because Perry made the leap from cross-dressing matriarch to action police detective too abruptly. There was no "segue" role, if you will, that allowed us to see what he could really do outside of his usual character.

Plus, Alex Cross just looks dull and conventional. It feels more like an episode of CSI than a fully realized story worth seeing in the theater. Granted, I haven't seen it, but that's my impression. I'm sure many people feel the same, hence its lackluster numbers.

Bruce Hall: Transitioning from Morgan Freeman to Tyler Perry is a bit like switching from Newcastle to Michelob Ultra. I just think that Perry is not an experienced enough actor to fill this role in the way it requires. He's used to inhabiting his own characters in his own creations, which are far more guilty of sticking to formula than even most police procedurals. It's no secret that I'm not a fan, but I do think that the true measure of his talent will eventually lie in whether he has the ability to convert material outside his comfort zone.

What may be more important here is that (director) Rob Cohen's vision for this material was probably not the most appropriate one, and the screenplay he's working with is uneven and gimmicky. The film simply doesn't present itself competently, and regardless of what you think of Perry as an actor, this suggests that the creative team behind the film was not the right choice. This was meant to be something of a franchise reboot, so it'll be interesting to see what happens next. Not going forward would be admission of a costly mistake, and Perry's brand will bear some of the stain. Trying again and knocking it out of the park would be a better idea, but it's going to have to be with another creative team, and Perry still has some growing to do as an actor.

Felix Quinonez Jr.: It's a combination of several things. The most important factor is that it just looked terrible. But Tyler Perry's casting sure didn't help either. Yes, he has an audience but this is not the kind of thing they want to see him in. And as has been mentioned before this looks like something that you can see on TV several times a week.

Edwin Davies: Felix is right to point out that part of the problem lies in the potential audience for the film. Tyler has spent the last ten years building a brand based on comedies and dramas with very strong moral messages. Alex Cross is pretty far removed from that, and whilst some of his audience probably followed him because they like what he does in general, clearly it did not appeal to enough of them to make the film a success. That a broader audience also didn't check out the film probably speaks to the lack of awareness of the character outside of people who read the books - I personally would not have known that this was the same character from those largely forgotten Morgan Freeman films had I not been following the film reasonably closely - and the fact that Perry is known as someone who straps on a fat suit, which makes his transition to hardboiled detective feel rather awkward. It doesn't help that the film looks terrible and generic, and by all accounts is exactly that.

It's probably worth pointing out that although this is a bad result in terms of opening weekends for Perry, it's not too far from what Good Deeds opened to back in February, which suggests to me that whilst the material and the shoddy way it was depicted probably didn't help the film, this is probably indicative that Perry as an actor is not a huge draw when he is not playing Madea. The key difference here, though, is that Alex Cross cost $35 million, which is more than the combined cost of Perry's last two directorial efforts. This probably means that this will be the first film Perry has been involved in that won't make back its budget, which is both indicative of how poorly the film has done so far and how shrewd a businessman Perry is most of the time.

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