The OtherArena

[jdw]

Fri
$81,558,505 Batman v Superman
$64,893,248 Suicide Squad
$38,800,000 Justice League
$38,247,254 Wonder Woman

Sat
$50,657,088 Batman v Superman -37.9%
$38,578,832 Suicide Squad -40.6%
$35,253,398 Wonder Woman -7.8%
$33,050,000 Justice League -14.8%

Sun
$33,791,754 Batman v Superman -33.3%
$30,210,168 Suicide Squad -21.7%
$29,750,819 Wonder Woman -15.6%
$24,150,000 Justice League -26.9%

To me the key ones are (i) Friday and (ii) Sun.

This movie badly needed to open in the range of Suicide Squad at the very least. The predications were that it wasn't, and instead would be down in the WW levels. That would have been bad on it's own since the DCU movies other than WW have all been massively front loaded.

That it comes in near WW for the opening Friday is a disaster because it has zero chance of matching WW's legs... not even remotely close to the chance.

Then Sunday is a total disaster as it dropped a worse % on Sunday than SS.

I don't think the % drop relative to BvS on Sunday is terribly relevant this weekend as BvS had pocketed $132M by Saturday compared to $71M that JL pulled in.

But relative to SS, it's really bad to fall behind like that already. SS had $103M in the bank through Sun, which is more than JL made the whole weekend. Yet despite that frontload, it still had a better % drop than JL.

SS pulled in $27M on the coming Mon-Tue before starting its decline. I suspect that JL will beat SS over Wed-Sun, but it won't be close to enough to make up for the whole it will have dug. Worse, if it has close to the level of a typical Bad DCU Movie opening (which is all of them other than WW, the only Good DCU Movie), it's going to drop anyway never weekend by a bad number.

[Steve Yohe]

They should just have the Marvel people do their movies for them. Or reboot Batman....if this isn't killing Batman.--Yohe

[Bob Morris]

Pretty clear the DC Cinematic Universe in in serious doubt.

They're better off focusing on properties that audiences have shown an interest in rather than worrying so much about building the shared universe.

Wonder Woman did well as a solo flick, so they can do a sequel. Aquaman has already finished production. so they can roll it out and see if audiences like it. If they do, they can plan a sequel. If not, move on from it.

They can still do the Shazam film, but do it as a solo film not tied to another film.

I'd hold off on Batman for the time being, but revisit that, along with Superman, down the road as new franchises entirely. Suicide Squad is probably best not revisited, but who knows -- there may be interest in doing Harley Quinn as a solo property because her comic book is liked by DC fans.

They can revisit a Justice League film much later on if they get enough individual properties that people like. But it's pretty clear DC/WB bungled this from the start, and not solely because of Zack Snyder's vision. They really needed to get solo films going first, then build to the team-up.

And they had no excuse for not doing so because WB owned the rights to every DC property.

[Bob Morris]

Coco appears to be en route to $70M for Thanksgiving weekend. It's already past $40M for Wednesday through Friday take. Will be interesting to see if this one has enough legs to get to $200M -- it's been a pretty well received Pixar film.

Justice League pulled in $35M for that same three-day period. Likely will finish with $55M for the full weekend. That will put it past $150M. Looks like $200M is going to be its ceiling, though. No chance at $300M -- it doesn't have the legs.

Thor 3 was past $267M as of Friday, so it looks like a safe bet to get to $300M. I don't know if it will have enough to reach $350M before Last Jedi hits theaters, though.

[Dave Dymond]

Yes, Coco bumped Justice League out of the top spot at the Box Office already. I read an article today that suggested that (considering the cost to produce the film, and the crazy promotional/advertising budget) it's entirely possible that Justice League will only break even, at best. That's pretty unreal, and a huge misfire for DC and WB, no matter how you look at it.

[Bob Morris]

Coco passed $110M after its second weekend. Mojo is running a comparison with Tangled, another animated film released during the Thanksgiving weekend

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/showdowns/chart/?id=tangledcoco.htm

Tangled did $200M and Coco already has a $14M lead on it. Even with Last Jedi coming out, there's a chance for Coco to get to $200M, given how well it's been received. It also has one more weekend ahead before Last Jedi comes out and the only new release is Just Getting Started, which is a comedy, so it's not likely to draw away the audience.

Justice League will pass $200M by this coming weekend, but with Last Jedi coming out, that film is going to lose any steam after that. Maybe it's a $210M film, but that's nowhere near what the studio was looking for.

Thor 3 is at $291M. Thor 2, which was released in early November as Thor 3 was, had about $13M left in the tank at this point, so if Thor 3 gets that, it will finish above $300M. Given that's it done better business than Thor 2, it's possible Marvel will want to leave it in theaters longer to see how far past $300M it gets. On the other hand, Last Jedi will take business away from Thor 3, so who knows how long it will stick around.

Still, it's another big win for Marvel Studios.

[Bob Morris]

Mojo updated its comparison for Coco to include Moana.

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/showdowns/chart/?view=daily&id=tangledcoco.htm

Moana had a bigger opening than Coco and, though Coco is slightly ahead of Moana's pace in recent days, I don't think it's going to catch it. But it's a good sign that Coco could close in on $225M.

[Bob Morris]

And since The Last Jedi will hit theaters this coming weekend, I'll throw out a question:

Will Last Jedi draw $1 billion domestic?

Force Awakens drew $936M and the initial buzz for Last Jedi is that it's really good.

On the other hand, the first Star Wars drew $307M upon its initial release, while Empire Strikes Back drew $209M upon its initial release. Empire's number was still strong for its time, but it didn't come close to the first film.

I suspect a lot will have to do with how much interest Force Awakens has generated in those who saw the Star Wars franchise in theaters for the first time. It's also going to be the last film featuring Carrie Fisher, so I'm sure people will wonder what's going to be Leia's fate.

I think Last Jedi should be a safe bet for $900M domestic. But it's going to be interesting to see how much further it can go past that.

[jdw]

I think $800M is safe. Not sure about $900M or $1B. There was such a wait and desire and build up to SW7. We've had just one year since a SW movie (Rogue) and only two years since SW7.

The buzz is strong, and people who saw the premire loved it. But they loved the first one as well.

It would be great if it does $900M or $1B. But the second movies always day less than the first. Granted the last second one sucked, but the first second one was awesome.

[jdw]

[Bob Morris]

[Bob Morris]

Per Mojo, Last Jedi drew $45M from Thursday previews. Not as high as Force Awakens but above Rogue One.

On its way to a $200M opening weekend, though likely to fall short of Force Awakens.

But we'll see how it does over the long haul.

[jdw]

$57M SW7
$45M SW8
$29M R1

SW7 did $936M. R1 did $532.

R1 was less front loaded into Thu and Opening Weekend than SW7. SW8 is likely going to need to be closer to the front load % of R1 than SW7 to get to $800. I think that's possible, though I don't think is as much of a "safe" as I did on Sunday. How the weekend plays out will tell more.

[Bob Morris]

Mojo's estimates are that Last Jedi will draw $220M for its opening weekend.

Comparing each day's box office to Force Awakens (LJ on left, FA on right, LJ is estimates at this point).

$119.1M vs $104.7M
$68.2M vs $63.9M
$60.5M vs $51.2M

The estimates show a slightly lower drop from Friday to Saturday for Last Jedi, though it remained behind Force Awakens. The projected Sunday number would be a slightly higher drop from Saturday.

We'll see what Last Jedi's legs are like -- that's the critical part to determining how far it will go.

[Bob Morris]

Here is the showdown Mojo has for Last Jedi, which includes Force Awakens, Jurassic World and Avengers.

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/showdowns/chart/?view=daily&id=openingweekendshowdown.htm

The key matchup is with Force Awakens, obviously. Force Awakens dropped about 34% from its Sunday to Monday number, then held steady until it delivered a strong Christmas weekend.

Rogue One's daily chart:

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?page=daily&id=starwars2016.htm

While Rogue One dropped further percentage-wise from Sunday to Monday, it picked up again on Christmas and New Year's weekends and showed better legs after that, allowing it to get well past $500M.

Ideally, Last Jedi will want to follow the Force Awakens path to have a shot at $900M. A Rogue One path probably puts it short of that mark.