Welcome to the Box Office Oracle–where new movies are pitted against each other for box office supremacy and only one can claim victory. Each week, I will be doing a quick box office prediction for all wide new releases. Sorry, obscure indie films I’ve never heard of, but you aren’t going to be discussed here unless you become big.
This is also something I’m going to keep as free of “controversy” if I can. This means that if, I don’t know, Jon Voight is voicing an evil government agent talking bear in a DreamWorks movie, I’m not going to make a bunch of Trump jokes. If a Tom Cruise actioner comes out, I’m not going to make a bunch of Scientology cracks. You get the idea. I want for this to be kept fun and simple.
So, without any further discussion, let’s go into this weekend’s solo big release, Hobbs & Shaw.
Hobbs & Shaw
Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham are here for the Fast and Furious spin-off feature that probably no one was asking for, but hey, this looks like some gloriously stupid summer movie bliss, so I’m not going to complain. This time Johnson’s Hobbs and Statham’s Shaw are forced to join forces despite the fact that they really don’t like each other, (and hey, Shaw was the like the ultimate force of evil in Furious 7, but he survived having a fucking highway thrown on him, so I guess he’s useful to have by your side) with Idris Elba joining the franchise as…a genetically enhanced supervillain. That’s right, we’ve gone a long way since these movies were about mere street racing and whether or not Vin Diesel and Paul Walker had strong sexual chemistry with each other (they did, by the way).
Marketing promises fans exactly what they expect as this point, over-the-top car chases, fist fights, gun battles, and every single member of the cast being as sexy as fuck. Case in point: Vanessa Kirby joining the team as Shaw’s estranged sister. Playing a bigger factor in this installment is comedy, which is featured prominently in all of the trailers as Johnson and Statham seem to be playing off one another’s wisecracks quite well.
As solid as Hobbs & Shaw looks (even reviews are on board with this one, but then again critics in general have been pretty warm to this series since Fast Five), it’s still being sold as a spin-off, something which may not have been necessary given the back-to-back “spin-off in nature” films 2 Fast 2 Furious and Tokyo Drift. That’s going to have some impact on box office, as Vin Diesel’s presence is a big selling factor for these movies, Combine that with Universal going absolutely overboard with trailers–there was no need whatsoever for there to be three of them–and many people may feel like they’ve already seen the whole film by now (similar to what happened with the studio’s The Secret Life of Pets 2 earlier this year). Still, that’s all probably me being overly cautious with expectations, so let’s give Hobbs and Shaw a very good debut of $66 million and see where it goes from there.
Why Your Fortune Cookie Tells You To Go: We haven’t had a big action movie since Spider-Man: Far From Home, and the movie looks like it’s going to deliver in spades in terms of providing massive, dumb fun. Also Idris Elba.
Why Your Fortune Cookie Tells You To Stay Away: Again, Universal has done way too many trailers for a movie which most fans would’ve decided if they were game for or not after its initial Super Bowl TV spot. Plus we won’t get to enjoy the glory of Vin Diesel’s waxed up, glistening bald head until next year, when the “official” Fast and Furious 9 finally comes out.
Today’s Lucky Lotto Numbers: $66 million debut; $179 million total.
* Other fun stuff…
* Paul Walker’s death still makes me sad.
* The parody of the Fast and Furious franchise on American Dad! which re-imagines them as gay porno flicks works so perfectly and is one of my very favorite spoofs of this series.
* My Furious rankings: 6, 7, 5, 8, 2, 1, 3. (I like 2 Fast 2 Furious a lot more than many, apparently)
* Feel free to give me a pat on the back for refusing to refer to the movie by its “official” title Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw. That just rolls of the tongue, doesn’t it?
* The Lion King and Aladdin both recently became billionaires at the box office. Want to tell me again about how audiences are so sick of these Disney remakes?
* So what will you be doing this weekend? Fast cars? Tarantino? Lion and the King? Sound off in the comments!