Weekend Wrap-Up: Solo’s $100 million Opening still a Disappointment
May 30, 2018
Memorial Day long weekend is off its peak and its been a while since it was breaking records regularly. (Half of the top ten three-day and four-day records are a decade old or older.) That didn’t change this year, as Solo: A Star Wars Story missed expectations with $84.42 million / $103.02 million during its opening weekend. You can’t even claim it missed expectations because Deadpool 2 stole its thunder, as that film also fell faster than anticipated. Overall, the box office fell 13% from last weekend down to $182 million. This is still 29% higher than the same three-day weekend last year. If you include Monday, the weekend pulled in $226 million, which is about 27% higher than last year. Year-to-date, 2018 has a 8.3% / $370 million lead over 2017 at $4.79 billion to $4.42 billion. That lead will shrink in the next couple of weeks, but overall, 2018 is looking really healthy.
Solo: A Star Wars Story opened with $84.42 million / $103.02 million over the weekend, which isn’t a great start, but it isn’t a disaster either. I’ve seen some people claim it is franchise ending, which is ... No. No it’s not. Disney might decide to release a Star Wars film every other year from now on, and not 3 of them within an 18-month stretch, but I don’t think the franchise is ending any time soon. There are some good signs going forward. For instance, the film’s weekend haul rose from $101 million from Sunday’s estimates to the finals. Additionally, its reviews are good, but not great, while it earned an A minus from CinemaScore, which is again good, but not great. Had the film not needed extensive reshoots, this could have been enough to break even.
Deadpool 2 fell faster than expected to $43.46 million / $53.83 million over the weekend for an 11-day total of $218.54 million. This makes $300 million domestically a little less likely, but still a solid goal to reach. This is also more than enough to cover the film’s $110 million production budget and with an even larger international total, the film is very likely profitable already.
Infinity War added $17.29 million / $22.45 million over the weekend to its domestic total, which now sits at $627.65 million. The film is just over a week away from entering the top five on the all-time domestic chart and should rise to fourth place before it is done.
Book Club earned $10.07 million / $13.12 million over the weekend for a two-week total of $35.33 million. The film remains on pace for $50 million domestically, which might be more than its combined production and advertising budgets. Even if it fails to find an audience internationally, it will break even on the home market.
Life of the Party rounded out the top five with $5.38 million / $6.88 million for a three-week total of $40.86 million. It is also on pace to reach $50 million, barely. However, it might lose too many theaters too quickly to get there.
The only other film in the sophomore class was Show Dogs, which fell faster than expected plummeting to $3.27 million / $4.33 million over the weekend for a two-week total of $11.93 million. It needed about that opening weekend to be a financial success.
- Solo: A Star Wars Story Comparisons
Filed under: Weekend Wrap-up, Avengers: Infinity War, Solo: A Star Wars Story, Deadpool 2, Life of the Party, Show Dogs, Book Club, Star Wars