Weekend Wrap-Up: Thor Hammers Competition with $122.74 million

November 7, 2017

Thor: Ragnarok

Thor: Ragnarok beat predictions by a substantial margin earning the fourth biggest opening weekend of the year. Its opening weekend haul of $122.74 million helped this weekend rise 135% compared to last weekend hitting $179 million. Unfortunately, while Thor: Ragnarok was a monster hit, the rest of the box office wasn’t able to make much of an impact, leaving the overall box office down 6.6% from this weekend last year. Year-to-date, 2017 has pulled in $8.77 billion, putting it behind 2016's pace at 4.9% or $450 million.

Thor: Ragnarok earned a shocking $122.74 million during its opening weekend, which is nearly $20 million more than our prediction. Additionally, the film’s box office potential grew over the weekend. The previews were better than predictions would suggest. Friday’s numbers were higher than previews would suggest. Etc. This is a strong indicator that the film’s word-of-mouth is going to really help its legs. Additionally, the film earned 93% positive reviews and an A from CinemaScore, both of which will also help its legs. On the down side, Justice League opens next Friday, which will hurt Thor: Ragnarok at the box office. That said, it would take awfully bad legs to not reach $300 million domestically after a start like this.

A Bad Moms Christmas started off slower than expected, but in the end topped predictions with $16.76 million over the weekend for a total opening of $21.29 million. This is actually a good sign, as it suggests stronger legs. On the other hand, its reviews and its B from CinemaScore are reasons to be less optimistic. That said, it only needs about $30 million during the rest of its domestic run in order to pay for its $28 million production budget. I think it can get there.

Jigsaw came within a rounding error of matching expectations with $6.56 million over the weekend for a total of $28.69 million after two weeks of release. It has already surpassed Saw VI in the franchise chart, while it looks like it is going to have better than average legs for the franchise. However, one has to assume the studio was expecting more.

Tyler Perry’s Boo 2: A Madea Halloween added another $4.54 million to its running tally, which now sits at $42.84 million. Now that Halloween is over, it will quickly fall, but $50 million domestically is still its goal and that’s good enough to break even sooner rather than later.

Geostorm rounded out the top five with $3.19 million over the weekend for a three-week total of $28.93 million. This is a disaster for a film that cost $100 million to make.

Thank You for Your Service was the best of the sophomore class. It fell just 42% to $2.21 million over the weekend for a total of $7.30 million after two. On the one hand, this is a lot better than most films manage. On the other hand, the film’s theater average is just $1,060, so it will likely lose a number of theaters this Friday. Suburbicon did much worse with just $1.19 million over the weekend for a total of $5.08 million after just ten days of releases. Its average is just $579, so it could lose over 1,000 theaters on Friday.

- Weekend Box Office Chart

- Thor: Ragnarok Comparisons
- A Bad Moms Christmas Comparisons

Filed under: Weekend Wrap-up, Suburbicon, Geostorm, Thor: Ragnarok, Jigsaw, A Bad Moms Christmas, Thank You for Your Service, Tyler Perry’s Boo 2! A Madea Halloween, Saw