Despite being released day and date on Peacock, Emma Tammi’s Five Nights at Freddy’s had a massive theatrical opening with $80 million over three days, and it broke a few records along the way. Ironically, in addition to having a killer theatrical opening, it also became the most-watched title on Peacock.
This marks the fifth-best October opening after Joker ($96.2M), Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour ($92.8M), Venom: Let There Be Carnage ($90M), and Venom ($80.2M).
This also marks the highest opening for a female-directed horror film, besting Nia DaCosta’s Candyman ($22.002M); the best opening for a PG-13 horror movie, beating The Mummy Returns ($68.139M); this year’s best opening for a horror movie, topping Scream VI ($44.4M); best Blumhouse opening over Halloween ($76.2M); and best Halloween weekend opening over Puss in Boots ($34M).
Five Nights at Freddy’s is also the third-highest opening for any horror movie, trailing only behind IT ($$123.403M) and IT Chapter Two ($91.062M) and the second-best opening for a video game adaptation behind Super Mario Bros ($146.3M), besting Sonic the Hedgehog 2 ($72M).
Exiting audiences gave Freddy’s an A- via CinemaScore. This is excellent for a horror movie… especially a kind of tongue-in-cheek one. Through PostTrak, audiences gave it 77% positive and four stars. On Rotten Tomatoes, its certified audience score is 88%. This movie was made strictly for fans who grew up playing the game. As a result, adult critics loathe it, as its Tomatometer score is a dismal 29%.
This picture could have made more if it hadn’t been released day and date, especially considering how many views it received. Some speculated that Freddy’s could have even made $100M or more at the box office. But Peacock doesn’t have that many subscribers, at around 28M. It may have been worth the sacrifice for Universal to spur potential growth for the streaming service.
Here is the rest of the Top Five:
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- Five Nights at Freddy’s (Universal) – 3-day $80M/ Wk 1
- Taylor Swift: Eras Tour (AMC) – 3-day $14.7M/ Total $149.3M/ Wk 3
- Killers of the Flower Moon (Apple/Paramount) – 3-day $9.3M/ Total $40.6M/ Wk 2
- After Death (Angel) – 3-day $5.06M/ Wk 1
- Exorcist: The Believer (Universal) – 3-day $3.1M/ Total $59.3M/ Wk 4
Freddy’s will stay at #1 next weekend, even though Halloween is over because Warner Bros. pushed Dune: Part II to next year. There won’t be any real competition.
Did you check out Five Nights at Freddy’s, and if so, did you head to the cinema or stream it?
