No one expected Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse to debut as well as it did, with $120.5M. It also got excellent reviews and audience reactions, leading to repeat viewings. Paramount certainly didn’t anticipate that when it scheduled Transformers: Rise of the Beasts to open just the week after Spider-Man. But did their gamble pay off?
All weekend long, the two were neck-and-neck. Transformers was never expected to open hugely with projections being in the $47M-$52M range. It exceeded that. At the end of the weekend, only about $5 million separated the #1 and #2 movies with Transformers edging out Spider-Man with $60.5M versus Across the Spider-Verse‘s $55.4M. Part of Transformers‘ win came from the fact that it took over the larger premium screens which cost more.
My boyfriend is quite proud of the Optimus Prime popcorn container he paid $50 for at AMC.
It’s made out of real metal. The popcorn goes in the trailer part. The drink goes in the cab, and the wheels really move. So… that’s fun.
Critics did not like this film overall, with its Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer score being 53%. But audiences seem to be kinder. Most reactions that I have seen are that this is the second-best movie in the franchise, next to Bumblebee, which criminally underperformed at the box office. On RT, Rise of the Beasts‘ audience score is a rock solid 91%.
Via CinemaScore, Rise of the Beasts got an A- from exiting audiences, which is better than Rise of the Beasts‘ B+… seriously, how did that movie get a B+?! Via PostTrak, it has an 83% positive.
Across the Spider-Verse only dropped 54% which is healthy. And at #3, The Little Mermaid is still swimming in the double digits with $22.7M.
Unfortunately, neither Across the Spider-Verse nor The Little Mermaid are performing very well overseas, where cultures aren’t as diverse or as accepting of movies fronted by actors of color (unless their Will Smith).
On the other hand, foreign audiences eat up anything that’s a CGI spectacle or just straight-up action. Fast X which is essentially a bomb here in the U.S. and Canada, has been cleaning up globally. Here, it has dropped out of the Top Five.
Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 3, and Boogeyman round out the chart.
Top Five:
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- Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (Paramount) – 3-day $60.5M/ Wk 1
- Spider-Man: Across the Spider-verse (Sony) – 3-day $55.4M/ Total $225.4M/ Wk 2
- The Little Mermaid (Disney) – 3-day $22.7M/ Total $228.8M/ Wk 3
- Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (Disney), – 3-day $7M/ Total $335.4M/ Wk 6
- The Boogeyman (20th/Disney) – 3-day $6.9M/ Total $24.7M/ Wk 2
June will not let up. The theatrical onslaught continues next weekend and this time, it’s another big action flick going up against an animated film, but this time, they are both releasing at the same time.
Warner Bros.’ The Flash finally zooms into multiplexes after several previews which have been largely very well-received, although its RT Tomatometer score is just 71%, which isn’t bad, but isn’t glowing either. (Let’s be real, a lot of reviewers can’t separate this film from Ezra Miller‘s off-screen controversies.) But the DCEU has been steadily going down the toilet, with each movie from Black Adam to Shazam!: Fury of the Gods doing worse and worse at the box office.
Do moviegoers even care enough to turn out for this?
The Flash will be racing against Pixar’s Elemental which… looks cute. It looks cute. Right?
Currently, Elemental’s RT score is 78%, so that’s higher than The Flash. But there’s already an animated film on the market that’s cleaning up; Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. Will this release be able to steal away the family audience from that?
Well, as always, check back next week to find out!
