Weekend Box Office: ‘The Last Jedi’ Dominates With Second-Largest Opening Ever
In news that will surprise no one, The Force dominated the box office this weekend. Star Wars: The Last Jedi premiered with $220 million domestically, becoming not only the number one debut of the year, but the second-biggest opening in the U.S… of all time.
Here’s the full chart, and then some more analysis.
Film | Weekend | Per Screen | Total | |
1 | Star Wars: The Last Jedi | $220,047,000 | $51,996 | $220,047,000 |
2 | Ferdinand | $13,325,000 | $3,680 | $13,325,000 |
3 | Coco | $10,025,00 (-47%) | $3,177 | $150,810,896 |
4 | Wonder | $5,400,000 (-36%) | $1,772 | $109,256,738 |
5 | Justice League | $4,170,000 (-57%) | $1,543 | $219,456,347 |
6 | Daddy’s Home 2 | $3,800,000 (-36%) | $1,524 | $96,579,982 |
7 | Thor: Ragnarok | $2,981,000 (-53%) | $1,573 | $306,375,120 |
8 | The Disaster Artist | $2,636,908 (-59%) | $2,611 | $12,932,039 |
9 | Murder on the Orient Express | $2,470,000 (-52%) | $1,284 | $97,252,742 |
10 | Lady Bird | $2,108,117 (-39%) | $2,226 | $25,977,506 |
After Pixar’s Coco reigned supreme in the top spot for three consecutive weekends, Disney’s latest and most anticipated of the year unsurprisingly stole the number one spot. The Last Jedi‘s $220 million opening made it second only behind The Force Awakens‘ record opening weekend ($248 million). The Rian Johnson sequel also had the second-largest Thursday night and second-largest opening day, again coming in behind J.J. Abrams’ Episode VII. The film also raked in quite a hefty sum overseas, earning $230 million internationally over the weekend for a $450 million worldwide total. That means the porg-tastic sequel had the fifth-largest worldwide opening weekend of all time, sitting nicely behind The Fate of the Furious at $541 million, The Force Awakens at $529 million, and Jurassic World and the final Harry Potter film.
But Star Wars wasn’t the only wide release this weekend that posed competition to fall box office champ Coco. The Dia de los Muertos fable was knocked down by 20th Century Fox’s animated Ferdinand, filled with a cast of celeb voices from John Cena to Kate McKinnon and Peyton Manning. Ferdinand came in at number two, a spot held last weekend by Justice League. The DC superhero team up suffered a bit of a drop, falling just below Lionsgate’s Wonder, still performing strong in its fifth weekend. James Franco’s The Disaster Artist also struggled a bit in its third weekend, dropping from its spot at number four last weekend.
The other major changes from last weekend is that both The Star and Just Getting Started dropped out of the top 10, but most exciting of all is that Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird still remains. And while The Last Jedi of course had the highest per-screen average this weekend, some smaller releases favorites showed some exciting averages. In its second week in limited release Neon’s I, Tonya expanded to one theater for a total of five, and still managed to bring in a $35,238 per-theater average. Call Me By Your Name, The Shape of Water and Darkest Hour followed shortly behind, all with five-digit per-screen averages. From here on out we can expect The Last Jedi to continue reigning supreme with few major releases expected to oust it from the top slpt. That is, unless somehow The Greatest Showman knocks it out of the park circus ring.
Gallery - Amazing Star Wars Concept Art: