America might be in total disarray, but Captain America is doing just fine. At least for now.
Our number one movie, to the surprise of absolutely no one, is Captain America: Brave New World with $88 million for the three-day weekend. Disney, rather bullishly, has already declared it a $100 million champ for the four-day weekend, but let’s be real, this opened on Thursday with showtimes every half hour starting at 2:00 PM. So really we are talking about five days, not four. But I digress.
Regardless, this is nothing to sneeze at it. Brave New World scored the fourth best President’s Day weekend ever, behind three other Marvel titles which include Ant-Man 3, Deadpool, and Black Panther. That said, is anyone popping out champaign, or are they just breathing a sigh of relief? That remains to be seen. You see, Brave New World has the worst CinemaScore for the MCU ever with a “B-” rating. And as far as reviews go, it’s one of the worst scored titles (and keep in mind, critics are very generous with Marvel Studios; they even gave Thor: Love and Thunder a pass).
I’m hearing everyone compare this one to 2014’s The Winter Solider, but that was a universally acclaimed thrill ride at a time when the MCU could do no wrong. Also, I dare you to watch the trailers for The Winter Solider and Brave New World side-by-side and tell me which looks like the better movie.
The worst case scenario for Brave New World is that it’s another Ant-Man 3, which as previously mentioned opened very well, but then plunged the following week. In that case, though, the trailer just straight-up lied about the plot (Scott never makes a deal with Kang to go back in time to relive lost years with his daughter) and desperately tried to sell it as the next Endgame when it was actually a goofy and wacky adventure. And I strongly suspect the backlash to that wouldn’t have been so bad if Disney had been upfront about that. With Brave New World, it’s the opposite problem; instead of promising a false plot, the trailers are said to be giving way too much away.
Still, this opening does prove that audiences are willing to go to a Captain America outing without Chris Evans at the center. Let’s just hope that the quality of the film itself doesn’t ensure it’s the last time that happens. Am I being a wet blanket? I feel like I’m being a wet blanket. Fingers crossed my concerns are proven wrong next week.
Elsewhere, we have Paddington in Peru. This movie has already cleaned house overseas, so I’m not sure how concerned it is about American box office dollars, but in any case, everyone’s favorite overly polite bear raked in $13 million for the weekend. Believe it or not, this is the third distributor Paddington has gone through in the US, with the first film coming from, er, The Weinstein Company and Paddington 2 being taken over by Warner Bros. Sony is handling Peru, and hopefully it will be able to draw in families until Snow White takes over that market next month.
Lastly, there’s the animated fantasy action epic Ne Zha 2, which you may not have heard about, but is absolutely exploding in China, earning $1 billion in its native country alone (yes, really). I can’t really tell you what it’s about, since I’m a stupid American, and the plot of this involves…resurrected warriors fighting dragons and gods, I think? Also, it has a lot of fart jokes. And it’s two and a half hours long. And is Ne Zha a play on words for “ninja”? Anyway, curious Yanks actually showed up in droves for this. It made it into the top five despite only playing on roughly 600 screens! Wow.
Anyway, the top ten, via Deadline
Captain America: Brave New World (Dis) 4,105 theaters, Fri $40M, Sat $27.5M Sun $21M Mon $11.5M 3-day $88.5M, 4-day $100M/Wk 1
2.) Paddington in Peru (Sony) 3,890 theaters, Fri $5.1M Sat $4.2M Sun $3.6M Mon $3M 3-day $13M, 4-day $16M/Wk 1
3.) Dog Man (Dis) 3,334 (-553) theaters, Fri $2.77M (-15%) Sat $3.75M Sun $3.1M Mon $2.7M 3-day $9.7M (-30%), 4-day $12.5M, Total $69.5M/Wk 3
4.) Heart Eyes (Sony) 3,102 theaters, Fri $4.9M (+33%) Sat $3M Sun $2.1M Mon $1.1M 3-day $10M (+20%) 4-day $11.1M, Total $22.6M/Wk 2
5.) Ne Zha 2 (CMC) 660 theaters, Fri $3.1M Sat $2.3M Sun $1.8M Mon $1M 3-day $7.3M 4-day $8.3M, Wk 1
6.) Mufasa (Dis) 2,240 (-705) theaters, Fri $1.5M (+46%) Sat $1.5M Sun $1.1M Mon $1.1M 3-day $4.1M (+3%) 4-day $5.26M, Total $241.8M /Wk 9
7.) Love Hurts (Uni) 3,055 theaters Fri $1.97M (-25%) Sat $1.3M Sun $1M Mon $630K 3-day $4.37M (-25%) 4-day $5M, Total $12.9M/Wk 2
8.) One of Them Days (Tri-Star/Sony) 1,357 (-694) locations, Fri 1.2M (+26%) Sat $1M Sun $685K Mon $340K 3-day $2.97M (+4%) 4-day $3.3M, Total $43.8M/Wk 5.
9.) Companion (NL/WB) 1,062 (-2,223) theaters, Fri $770K (-27%) Sat $610K Sun $490K Mon $320K 3-day $1.87M (-38%), 4-day $2.19M, Total $19.08M/Wk
10.) Chhhaava (Yash) 497 theaters, Fri $500K Sat $700K Sun $590K Mon $330K 3-day $1.8M, 4-day $2.1M/Wk 1