Board 8 > Movie and Box Office Topic: Prepping for Endgame

(+) Yeah! (+)

I've never seen this before. I opened RT to see the score, and it actually dropped a percentage point in front of me. I didn't refresh or anything.
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i have seen the theory that Dark Phoenix is a con to make people more appreciative of X3.
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The new releases this week will both likely be duds. Mojo is predicting a 50m+ take for Pets 2 and I just don't buy it. It will most likely debut at #1 but I feel like the figure will be closer to 40 than 50.
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v_charon posted...

It will most likely debut at #1 but I feel like the figure will be closer to 40 than 50.

That would be quite a decline from the first movie. I know SLOP doesn't have a great reputation among parents and general audiences, and the sequel's marketing has rested on its laurels, but Illumination is still a reliable brand, and SLOP 2 is the first movie with substantial appeal to kids in the market since Ralph Breaks the Internet. My personal prediction is $59.2 million.

As for Dark Phoenix, I can't see any realistic chance it isn't a dud. I went with $37.2 million (versus $50 million+ for all previous X-Men movies), and I'm starting to think that was an overestimate.
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It's a quiet time for the box office. I'll bump this thread with my domestic weekend predictions (from yesterday):

1. $25.7 million The Secret Life of Pets 2
2. $25.3 million Men in Black International
3. $18.8 million Aladdin
4. $17.7 million Shaft
5. $12.0 million Dark Phoenix
6. $9.1 million Rocketman
7. $7.6 million Godzilla: King of the Monsters
8. $5.4 million John Wick: Chapter 3 Parabellum
9. $4.5 million Late Night
10. $3.4 million Avengers: Endgame
11. $3.4 million Ma
12. $1.5 million Pokmon Detective Pikachu
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Is MIB trending that badly? That's sad.
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scarletspeed7 posted...

Is MIB trending that badly? That's sad.

Kinda depressing since MiB3 was a surprisingly fun movie.
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Dark Phoenix fell into 4th for Thursday's totals, falling behind Rocketman by a large margin.
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I think MIB will open at #1 for the record. Pets is fairly weak and shouldn't have that good of a hold. MIB has kinda been badly promoted but I think it can do better than 25. Previews gave it 3. I think it should hit 28 or so.
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v_charon posted...

Pets is fairly weak and shouldn't have that good of a hold.

With an A- CinemaScore and a 91% RT verified audience score, it seems to have good word of mouth. The last major animated sequel with Father's Day in its second weekend was Madagascar 3, which dropped 44%, though against even weaker competition. My 46% was probably a bit optimistic, but I have a hard time seeing its fall settle at Deadline's currently predicted 57% range.
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Looks like Pets dipped about 50%, which was just enough to let MIB debut in first. Still sub 30m, which has to be a disappointment for the series overall. Aladdin''s staying power has been impressive.

Oh, and lol Shaft. Yikes.
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Shaft got such poor marketing, and I don't think the franchise is really one that really demanded a sequel.
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kudos to us moviegoers for not paying money to see terrible films

will the studios learn the right lesson from this? probably not but whatever, bring on the inevitably disney+ monopoly.

Since this is also a topic for discussing movies, I finally saw Endgame last weekend.

Without delving into spoilers, the emotional moments, and general drama and character interplay really connected with me. Endgame is definitely a movie for the MCU fan, something which I happen to be.

On the other hand, I felt it didn't really work as a popcorn movie, which held it back from being truly great. Yes, that's partially the point (I'm certainly not saying its heavy, dramatic direction was a bad thing), but even the action just didn't measure up to past MCU movies for me. The time heists felt like an inferior riff on Inception, lacking its visual inventiveness and Nolan's distinctive direction, though revisiting past MCU movies was a neat twist. Meanwhile, the Thanos fights were compelling strictly for the dramatic moments rather than the action.

Here's my current MCU movie ranking:

Iron Man > The Avengers ~= Homecoming > GotG ~= GotG 2 > Civil War ~= Ragnarok ~= Ant-Man and the Wasp > Endgame ~= Ant-Man ~= Winter Soldier > Infinity War ~= Black Panther > Iron Man 3 ~= Doctor Strange > Age of Ultron > Iron Man 2 > Captain Marvel > The Dark World ~= The First Avenger ~= Thor > The Incredible Hulk

The first five are truly great, the next eight fall a bit short despite being quality in their own right, the five after that are inconsistent but nonetheless enjoyable, while the last four are just alright.

And my current MCU hero ranking (ranked using this link - https://sorta.app/q/1018):

Iron Man > Spider-Man > Ant-Man > Thor > Shuri > Captain America > Black Panther > Doctor Strange > Star-Lord > Rocket Raccoon > Nick Fury > Groot > Hulk > Mantis > Black Widow > Scarlet Witch > Drax the Destroyer > Captain Marvel > Hawkeye > Wasp > Falcon > Okoye > Nebula > War Machine > Wong > Gamora > Winter Soldier > Vision
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Star-Lord > Iron Man > Drax the Destroyer > Rocket Raccoon > Spider-Man > Mantis > Nebula > Captain America > Hawkeye > Hulk > Thor > Black Panther > Gamora > Nick Fury > Groot > Doctor Strange > Captain Marvel > Winter Soldier > Scarlet Witch > Vision > Black Widow > Wasp > War Machine > Wong > Ant-Man > Shuri > Falcon > Okoye

Fun link!
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Snake5555555555 posted...

Fun link!

Yep, and they also have one for MCU movies that I didn't use because I already have them all ranked in a Word document. https://sorta.app/q/1019

As for the box office, I was expecting a subpar debut from Men in Black, but Shaft's sheer weakness really blew me away. Even with WB's lacking marketing, high-profile African-American targeted movies usually find at least somewhat of an audience, and Shaft had a potentially appealing premise with its three generations schtick. Let's hope Toy Story 4 can improve on its current presales (just 61% of Incredibles 2 right now) and draw substantial walk-ups to boot, so we can see these box office blues fade.
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Incredibles had a much bigger buzz from audiences heading into its release. I think the marketing for TS4 is actually less than Cred2.
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MetalmindStats posted...

The time heists felt like an inferior riff on Inception, lacking its visual inventiveness and Nolan's distinctive direction, though revisiting past MCU movies was a neat twist.

This feels like such a weird comparison to me because they're like, nothing alike whatsoever. Inception is about going into dreams, which is why the visual inventiveness can flourish. The time heists are just... Them time traveling. You weren't going to get any crazy visual scenes because they're not like, actively bending reality or anything.
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Avengers: Infinity War > Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 > Avengers: Endgame > Guardians of the Galaxy > Iron Man > Iron Man 3 > Captain America: The Winter Soldier > The Avengers > Spider-Man: Homecoming > Captain America: Civil War > Captain America: The First Avenger > Ant-Man > Avengers: Age of Ultron > Thor: Ragnarok > Captain Marvel > Doctor Strange > Black Panther > The Incredible Hulk > Ant-Man and the Wasp > Iron Man 2 > Thor > Thor: The Dark World
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StealThisSheen posted...

MetalmindStats posted...

The time heists felt like an inferior riff on Inception, lacking its visual inventiveness and Nolan's distinctive direction, though revisiting past MCU movies was a neat twist.

This feels like such a weird comparison to me because they're like, nothing alike whatsoever. Inception is about going into dreams, which is why the visual inventiveness can flourish. The time heists are just... Them time traveling. You weren't going to get any crazy visual scenes because they're not like, actively bending reality or anything.

Yeah, I probably explained that poorly. I'm not asking for the same level of visual inventiveness as that movie or, say, Doctor Strange. It's just that, besides the interesting conceit of time traveling into the events of past MCU movies, I didn't feel there was anything to distinguish these scenes from the mildly engaging realm. That disappointed me, since I generally find the big action and plot beats of MCU movies more than just mildly engaging.
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My domestic weekend predictions for Toy Story 4 and the gang:

1. $146.4 million Toy Story 4
2. $18.0 million Childs Play
3. $12.6 million Men in Black: International
4. $10.1 million Aladdin
5. $9.7 million The Secret Life of Pets 2
6. $5.3 million Rocketman
7. $4.2 million Shaft
8. $4.2 million Anna
9. $3.7 million John Wick: Chapter 3 Parabellum
10. $3.7 million Godzilla: King of the Monsters
11. $2.8 million Late Night
12. $2.6 million Dark Phoenix

Better to play it safe and hopefully be pleasantly surprised than shoot for the stars and be let down, I say. With a reduced rush factor, I do think that Toy Story 4 will hold better than Incredibles 2, though, and have no trouble surpassing $500 million domestic.
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Being a little conservative eh?

I don't feel conservative about TS4 at all. Disney has proven to be virtually the only draw this year thus far, so I'll happily say that I think this opening could get even more massive. I'll jump in $160m even.
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Toy Story 4 is gonna do like $180million+ opening weekend (including thursday)

there's been like, nothing good for a whole month. it's got a massive marketing campaign and 100% on rotten tomatoes. it's going to fucking tear the box office up.
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Once this and TLK are out for a few weeks. Disney will own the top 5 movies of the box office year, foreign and domestic.
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scarletspeed7 posted...

Disney has proven to be virtually the only draw this year thus far, so I'll happily say that I think this opening could get even more massive. I'll jump in $160m even.

It could reach $160 million, for sure. $12 million on Thursday night isn't a great sign, though - that's only two-thirds of Incredibles 2, though I would also expect TS4 to be more backloaded.
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https://www.boxofficemojo.com/daily/chart/

Welp, Toy Story 4 isn't the savior the summer box office needs. If it plays like Incredibles 2 over the remainder of the weekend, it will crawl past $120 million; however, the latter opened over Father's Day weekend and was more backloaded as such.
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The fact that it's not beating records pretty much seals the deal for me that this is a terrible year for film.
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The thing is TS has never been a huge opening box office blockbuster. This was still the franchise's highest weekend gross.

I'm still impressed by Aladdin though, dipping less than 30% in its fifth weekend to remain in the top 3, against a 100m+ Disney competition.
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crazy that 120 million isn't considered a success

Endgame is getting a "re-release" this weekend with extra post credit stuff. A deleted scene and a tribute to Stan Lee, and some "surprises". It's pretty blatantly just to get the $40mil it needs to beat Avatar.

This feels like a pretty light update, but maybe it'll draw enough nerds like me out to see it. If they had added a little more juice I think it would work for sure, but I dunno about this. We'll see I guess.

Do you guys think this is cheating? Titanic and Avatar both had theatrical re-releases, so I don't think it's unfair to them. Though I guess that happened because people actually wanted to go see them still.
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wow, I'm actually shocked it didn't bring down the house. Thought for sure the people were dying to see something good after the long drought.

120 is still good though
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CoolCly posted...

Do you guys think this is cheating?

Box office records and statistics have always been all-in, counting as many re-releases as a movie gets. In other words, my opinion is no.

As for Endgame's chances of besting Avatar from this re-release, I agree that it's unlikely at best, because only the hardcore fans will care. It would very likely happen, though, if this re-release was also heading to China, where the government ended Endgame's run a month ago, while it was still filling theaters.

On Toy Story 4's opening: on the one hand, anything over Toy Story 3 is at least nominally good, since it's very difficult to achieve domestic growth with the fourth installment of any franchise. On the other hand, it's a substantial miss compared to industry tracking and expectations, and even behind Disney's own stated expectation of a $140 million debut (and distributors' stated expectations are notoriously conservative).

It's also about $15 million behind Finding Dory. While Finding Nemo is probably the single most beloved Pixar movie, the Toy Story series certainly has more brand equity, and people weren't crying out for a Nemo follow-up the way they were for, say, The Incredibles. On top of that, the summer box office being dead quiet last weekend naturally fueled greater expectations.
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Apparently Endgame beat Avatars original gross yesterday, can't check if that's legit right now but if so that puts it in even ground for the rerelease
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Domestic weekend predictions for the upcoming frame:

1. $59.7 million Toy Story 4
2. $18.1 million Annabelle Comes Home (3-day)
3. $13.0 million Yesterday
4. $10.0 million Aladdin
5. $6.1 million The Secret Life of Pets 2
6. $5.1 million Men in Black: International
7. $4.5 million Childs Play
8. $4.1 million Avengers: Endgame
9. $3.4 million Rocketman
10. $3.1 million John Wick: Chapter 3 Parabellum
11. $1.4 million Godzilla: King of the Monsters
12. $1.4 million Anna

After its Wednesday start, Annabelle will be the latest contender to fall short of what it should be making. Also, Toy Story 4 has not been holding well enough for me to feel optimistic about its second weekend decline.
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1. $69.5 million Spider-Man: Far From Home (3-day)
2. $30.4 million Toy Story 4
3. $10.9 million Yesterday
4. $9.8 million Annabelle Comes Home
5. $8.1 million Midsommar (3-day)
6. $7.0 million Aladdin
7. $4.5 million The Secret Life of Pets 2
8. $3.6 million Avengers: Endgame
9. $3.2 million Men in Black: International
10. $2.4 million Rocketman
11. $2.0 million John Wick: Chapter 3 Parabellum
12. $1.2 million Childs Play

It looks like Far From Home isn't going to set the box office on fire. Could this be explained by the box office doldrums, Spider-Man fatigue, people wanting a break from the MCU after Endgame, or even something else entirely? You be the judge. One thing's for sure: if The Lion King doesn't at least deliver on its lofty expectations, we'll have to chalk up this year (currently down almost 10%) as a loss.
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Because Tom Holland is still a nobody, a C- celebrity at best.

Venom came out in October and well...oh forget it it's 4th of July. I don't want to argue.

I mean the film set the largest debut for a Tuesday opening... I think a lot of people are just really hard to please or something.
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v_charon posted...

I mean the film set the largest debut for a Tuesday opening... I think a lot of people are just really hard to please or something.

Far From Home's Tuesday debut is 12% ahead of The Amazing Spider-Man. If it paces identically for the remainder of the six-day period, it will reach $153.6 million, versus $154.2 million for Homecoming's first six days. That's fine, but far from great for a movie that was essentially sold as Endgame 1.5. However, there's also reason to expect an MCU sequel to be more frontloaded than a non-MCU reboot. Plus, with every new tentpole that underperforms, expectations inevitably shoot higher and higher for the remainder, out of the hope that we can somehow close this deficit. That makes the openings merely in line with conservative expectations at best sting even harder.
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That's fine, but far from great for a movie that was essentially sold as Endgame 1.5.

wut

That makes the openings merely in line with conservative expectations at best sting even harder.

This is somewhat understandable, but its still dumb.
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I should clarify: by Endgame 1.5, I mean the direct follow-up to Endgame. In theory, given that movie's incredible audience and box office reception, Far From Home should have gained from it, like Iron Man 3, The Dark World, and The Winter Soldier gained on their predecessors thanks to the Avengers effect. It's also a sequel to a well-received movie; with the combination of those two factors, an opening merely in line with Homecoming is fine but a bit of a miss compared to what seemed possible.
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I love going to the movies and this Spider-Man movie is up my alley, but Endgame has made me feel like I need a break from comic book movies for a year.
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Mea culpa: Far From Home is pacing in a much more backloaded fashion than I expected, perhaps thanks to a combination of the factors I mentioned decreasing the immediate demand and discount Tuesdays (which weren't really a thing in 2012) deflating its opening day. It's looking to exceed $180 million for the 6-day period, which is a very healthy start.
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Endgame apparently set to do the re-release in India and other international territories now too, so there's still a slim chance it dethrones Avatar

22 million dollars is a huge amount to be short by at this stage though
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XIII_rocks posted...

22 million dollars is a huge amount to be short by at this stage though

It's even worse since Endgame's release is falling steeply in already-released territories, and since it comes out on VOD at the end of this month.

Domestic weekend predictions for the upcoming frame:

1. $52.2 million Spider-Man: Far From Home
2. $21.8 million Toy Story 4
3. $9.3 million Crawl
4. $6.4 million Yesterday
5. $6.1 million Stuber
6. $5.8 million Aladdin
7. $5.2 million Annabelle Comes Home
8. $3.7 million Midsommar
9. $3.0 million The Secret Life of Pets 2
10. $1.9 million Men in Black: International
11. $1.6 million Avengers: Endgame
12. $1.6 million Rocketman
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Stuber should tank pretty hard. Batista is just not the draw Cena is.
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That's a shame since I think Batista is more enjoyable. That said, I think Stuber will do "okay". It had a nice opening day and should exceed that prediction by a couple million. Crawl will likely crawl into the low double digits for its opening; we'll be seeing it Monday. It's currently rocking a 89% RT score.
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@MetalmindStats

Okay so...any movie that doesn't make 1 Billion opening weekend is a flop to you.

Okay irrelevant nobody on this site, I've never seen post here before.

v_charon posted...

That said, I think Stuber will do "okay". It had a nice opening day and should exceed that prediction by a couple million. Crawl will likely crawl into the low double digits for its opening; we'll be seeing it Monday.

Yeah, these two openers are looking to exceed my admittedly pessimistic predictions by a couple million each, at the cost of Far From Home dipping more steeply than I expected. It's still not great for either movie, though Crawl should at least break even eventually. It seems pretty clear to me that both studios treated them as dumpings with their position and marketing, even though they had real counterprogramming potential.
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About 7 million away now

So close yet so far?
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XIII_rocks posted...

About 7 million away now

So close yet so far?

It made just under $4 mil in the US last week, I'm pretty sure it'll squeeze over the line, especially once "Endgame is only $1 million away from being the biggest movie of all time" pops up on twitter and people decide to push it over the edge.
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