Friday Midday: Crunchyroll is on a course to steal No. 1 at the box office with its anime sequel Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero which is looking at $8M-$10M today (including those $4M previews) for a $17M-$20M take at 3,130 theaters. Uni’s Idris Elba movie, Beast, is currently clocking $4.1M today, and a $10M 3-day at 3,743 locations.
A year ago, during weekend 33, Disney released the Ryan Reynolds 20th Century action comedy, Free Guy, to a great $28.3M (it legged out to $121.6M domestic); a reminder that it’s not the month that’s sluggish necessarily as kids return to school, rather the lack of product now, duh.
Sony’s Bullet Train at 3,781 is seeing $2M today, -47% from a week ago, and a $7M-$7.5M third weekend, -44% on the high end, for a $68.4M running total at the high end.
Warner Bros.’ DC League of Super-Pets is fourth at 3,537 sites, with an estimated $1.4M Friday, -29%, and $5.1M fourth weekend, -27%, with a $66.8M running total.
Paramount’s Top Gun: Maverick in weekend 13 at 2,969 locations, is eyeing $1.4M today, also -29%, and a $5M 3-day for a running total of $682.5M by Sunday.
Friday AM: We hearing from industry sources that Crunchyroll’s sequel, Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero, notched an estimated $4M in Thursday night previews, trouncing Universal’s Idris Elba lion movie, Beast, which did $925K at 2,900 theaters. Both began previews at 5PM last night. Crunchyroll is sending out an official update tomorrow.
Super Hero‘s start last night has a shot at getting it near $15M, while the fate of Beast, despite being 72% fresh among Rotten Tomatoes critics, is likely in the single digit range at 3,743 theaters. Ouch. Super Hero is on a 90-day theatrical window and booked in 3,100 theaters (3,900 screens) and has all the super powers of Imax, 4DX, Dolby and D-box.
Super Hero‘s Thursday night soars above the $2.88M Thursday grossed by Crunchyroll’s Jujutsu Kaisen 0 back in March at 2,003 theaters which resulted in a 3-day weekend of $14.8M and total weekend+previews figure of $17.6M. Super Hero is currently higher than Crunchyroll’s Demon Slayer from March 2020 which did $3.8M in previews, before a $21.2M opening.
Universal Beast‘s Thursday is just below the $1M earned by Paramount’s alligator horror title Crawl in its preview night, which translated to a $4.3M Friday, and $12M opening in July 2019. That said the Elba title is ahead of Universal’s Michael Bay movie, Ambulance, which ran up $700K on its Thursday before a lackluster $3.2M Friday, and $8.7M domestic start.
In regular ranked titles, Sony’s Bullet Train had a second Thursday of $1.25M at 4,357 theaters, -18% from Wednesday for a $19.9M second week and running total of $61M.
Paramount’s Top Gun: Maverick did $870K at 3,181, -10% in its 12th Thursday for a week’s take of $10.8M and running total of $677.5M.
Third on Thursday went to Warner Bros.’ DC League of Super-Pets with $710K at 3,803, down 15% from Wednesday and a third week of $10.5M, -39%, and $61.7M running cume.
Fourth belonged to Disney/Marvel’s Thor: Love and Thunder at 3,175 with a $580K Thursday, -6% from Wednesday and a sixth week of $8M, running total of $328M.
Universal/Illumination Entertainment’s Minions: The Rise of Gru at 3,068 saw a $570K Thursday, -14% from Wednesday, for a seventh week of $7.7M and running total of $346.5M, +1.2% ahead of the latter animation studio’s highest domestic grossing movie, Despicable Me 2 at the same point in time — however that sequel ended its stateside run at $368M.
