(Still very slowly playing catch-up)
Could 2023 be the year audiences finally got tired of superhero movies? Certainly, they got tired of the DCU, as Shazam! Fury of the Gods and The Flash are arguably the two biggest bombs of the year, and the best you can say about Blue Beetle is at least it didn't embarrass itself. The MCU, on the other hand, seemed to be continuing to roll along as normal. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (which is technically part of the MCU, but is very much MCU-adjacent) and Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 3 are the 3rd and 4th-highest grossing films of the year so far, and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania had the biggest opening of any Ant-Man film. That all came crashing down, however, with the opening of The Marvels.
The 33rd entry in the franchise came crashing down, opening to a mere $46.1 million. That's the worst opening in MCU history, managing to come in below the $55.4 million opening of The Incredible Hulk, which was the second MCU movie ever and came out 15 years ago--with 2008 ticket prices. Even The Flash managed about that much in its opening weekend. Theories abound on what went wrong, but Disney has another worry it has to think about. Given how weak legs have been all fall, there's a realistic chance that The Marvels could become the first MCU movie ever to fail to top $100 million.
After two weeks on top, starter horror movie Five Nights at Freddy's fell to second with $9 million. Given that it grossed $80 million just two weekends ago, this is an incredibly fast fade. That said, since the movie was so cheap to make, it was probably already in the black by opening Saturday night, so Universal isn't minding it being a one-weekend wonder too much. Its total stands at a spooky $127.2 million.
In third is October's other big, fast-fading hit, Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour. The concert film grabbed $6.1 million to bring its total to $172.7 million. Again, the movie has been profitable since its opening weekend, so AMC Theaters is probably just enjoying the extra revenue right now.
Staying steady in fourth is Priscilla, Sofia Coppola's biopic of Mrs. Presley. The good news is that the film only dropped by 8%. The bad news is that it needed to nearly double its screen count to achieve that modest drop. The film has said "thank you, thank you very much" to $4.6 million worth of customers this weekend, bringing its total to $12.5 million.
Killers of the Flower Moon had a decent 33% drop for weekend #4, taking in $4.6 million for a total of $59.9 million.
After two weeks in limited release, Alexander Payne's boarding-school dramady The Holdovers went semi-wide this week, and arrived in the Top 10 at #6 with a gross of $3.2 million. The film, starring likely Oscar nominees Paul Giamatti and Da'Vine Joyce Randolph, has grossed $4.3 million.
Releasing a Christmas movie in early November is always a risk. For every Elf or The Grinch that thrives all the way through the season, there's films like Last Christmas and The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, which are largely forgotten by the time the day finally arrives. It looks like the Biblical musical Journey to Bethlehem will be in the latter group, as it opens to a dismal $2.4 million, or probably something like the salary they probably paid Antonio Banderas, the only famous cast member, to cameo as King Herod. Unless it develops strong legs though the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday, this one is likely to finish its journey short of $10 million.
Doing decent business at #8, Indian action thriller Tiger 3 pulled in $1.9 million. That said, given that Indian movies are usually one-weekend wonders, this one will likely finish below $5 million domestic.
The Mexican inspirational teacher drama Radical had a solid second weekend, though like Priscilla, that is partly because it expanded from its limited release last week. Still, it took in $1.7 million for a ten-day total of $5.2 million, a pretty good sum for a foreign language title in domestic release.
Rounding out the Top 10, with new family films finally on their way, it's time for Paw Patrol: The Mighty Movie to finally bow out. The animated action comedy brought in $1.7 million, for a total of $64.5 million.
The weekend before Thanksgiving usually brings a feast of major titles, and this year is no exception. Two titles will be looking to knock The Marvels from the top spot. It's been eight years since The Hunger Games franchise wrapped up, but Lionsgate is really into reviving dormant franchises this fall, so we have the prequel The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. This one follows a young, not-quite-evil-yet, future President Snow (relative newcomer Tom Blyth) as he participates in an early edition of the Games. The big names in this one are Viola Davis and Peter Dinklage. Audiences haven't been too thrilled lately about prequels not starring any members of the original cast lately (as the Fantastic Beasts series can attest), but this probably cost more than Expendables 4 and Saw X cost combined, so the studio really hopes this proves to be the exception. The first Trolls movie in 2016 was a moderate hit, but the second one became the first major movie to skip a theatrical release and just go straight to VOD during the 2020 Covid lockdown. Now, Universal and DreamWorks Animation hopes that audiences will be willing to come back to theaters to see Trolls Band Together, which sees everyone learn that Justin Timberlake's Branch was once part of a boy band (sound familiar, Justin?). Competing for spots farther down on the chart is Eli Roth's Thanksgiving, a slasher film expanded from the fake trailer he made way back in 2007 for Grindhouse, about a masked killer stalking Plymouth, Massachusetts during the holiday. Newly minted Sexiest Man Alive Patrick Dempsey stars. Taika Waititi's Next Goal Wins, based on an acclaimed documentary, stars Michael Fassbender as a washed-up soccer coach who accepts the one job he can get--coaching the bottom-of-the-barrel American Samoa team. This one has been on the shelf for a long while, mainly because a big chunk of the movie had to be reshot to replace Armie Hammer with Will Arnett. Will Ballad be a chart topper? Will Trolls be able to band together to take the top spot? Will Marvels have a marvelous second weekend to retain the top spot? We'll find out next week.
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