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Originally posted by Raven:

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Originally posted by Tommy C:
TOY STORY 5 should gross at least 150 M domestically for the weekend, when it opens this Friday.

It is expected to crush everything for a few weeks, including SUPERGIRL which opens June 24.

This idea that blockbuster movies must be Summer movies is counterproductive. It pits them all against each other and even if they take #1 on the opening weekend, which is not guaranteed, by the next weekend someone else appears and the box office drops 60%. There is no time to be left alone and make good theatre money.

If "Project Hail Mary" can come out early and make a lot of cash for a movie not many people knew of before, why couldn't "Supergirl" come out in the Spring or in the Fall? Doesn't DC have enough trouble without going head-to-head with everybody's big movie? If we can figure this out, how come the smart studio executives can't see the logic? Sometimes I think they try to fail on purpose.

It was pre-COVID, but The Force Awakens made obscene amounts of money when it released in December. To be fair, it was the first of "new" Star Wars and likely would have done as well releasing at any time.

Warner Bros/DC Comics has the Batman villain movie Clayface coming in Oct. Now there are reports that the studio is reducing the number of theaters which will be showing it, which is not a good sign.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Tommy C,

Add Spielberg's Disclosure Day to the list of summer flops. Should reach about 75 M domestically in its second weekend. Probably won't make much more after that. Film cost at least 120 M to produce.

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Originally posted by Tommy C:
Do you remember the summer of 1989 when BATMAN, the third INDIANA JONES film, and LETHAL WEAPON 2 crushed everything else ?

I was a teenager then and I remember it like it was yesterday. Those films blew away almost every other summer blockbuster, including STAR TREK V, the James Bond film LICENCE TO KILL, as well as KARATE KID III. They also hurt the box office for GHOSTBUSTERS II to some extent.

It certainly didn't help that Licence To Kill, Karate Kid III, Star Trek V, and Ghostbusters II were all lousy movies.

"Honey, I Shrunk The Kids" opened along with "Batman" and also did blockbuster numbers, in part because so many showings of Batman were completely sold out. We went to Hollywood opening night, and couldn't get tickets to Batman, but we at least got to see Burgess Meredith in person as he was attending a screening of the 1966 Batman movie that one of the smaller theaters was holding.

Toy Story 5 has done even better than expected, with a 160M domestic take and a franchise record of 312M globally on opening weekend.

From what I have gathered, I think it's because the script is really smart at a time when the message may resonate even more with the parents than the kids. This time it's the old school dolls of our childhood up against the AI wonders that are the babysitters of our grandchildren. Everybody can relate to that dilemma on some level, and it taps into all that nostalgia and guilt going around with new technology.

I will definitely see it. I just don't know if I want to brave the theatre or wait till streaming. Depends on if I can grab my friend's kid as I still wouldn't want to show up without one.

I think the only true summer hits aside from the horror films released in May, will be Toy Story, Moana,Spider Man and the next Minions coming in a week or two.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Tommy C,

Looks like "Michael" will fall a little short of the 1 billion worldwide mark, so "Super Mario Galaxy" is still the only movie this year to hit it. We'll see if any others can join it. Certainly, Toy Story 5 is off to a great start at 312 million total in 3 days.

There were 4 billion+ movies last year: Avatar 3, Zootopia 2, Lilo & Stitch live-action, and Ne Zha 2 (which made 99 percent of its 2.2 billion outside of the US).

Total USA box office the last few years:
2023: 8.9 billion
2024: 8.57 billion
2025: 8.65 billion
2026: 4.4 billion

Next week will be the halfway point, so it'll be on-pace to top the recent high from 2023, but it may never again hit the 11 billion mark it hovered around in the 5 years prior to Covid. The all-time domestic high remains nearly 12 billion, set in 2018.

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Originally posted by chesspieceface:
Next week will be the halfway point, so it'll be on-pace to top the recent high from 2023, but it may never again hit the 11 billion mark it hovered around in the 5 years prior to Covid. The all-time domestic high remains nearly 12 billion, set in 2018.

Yes to that. It's true that the fast advance of the streaming business has changed the entertainment industry, but the whole Covid period that started in January 2020 and really didn't let up until late 2023 was the key driver. Years from now historians will be examining the ways the pandemic uprooted modern society and effected people's way of thinking forever. It's still too soon. Things are still being denied, and information remains hidden.

But some day the picture will be made clearer and things we never thought about will turn up, but for now we already know that some stuff will never peak again. I think movie attendance is one of them. Not necessarily the money, which goes up on its own, just the number of seats occupied to watch a film on movie night.