Battle at the Box Office 4/18/22
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore managed to take the top spot at the box office this past weekend but Warner Bros probably isn’t seeing it as much of a win, as it’s the lowest opening ever for the Harry Potter/Wizarding World franchise.
Secrets of Dumbledore took in $43 million for the weekend, which continues the downward trend of the Fantastic Beasts prequel series. Unlike the mainline Harry Potter series, which grew until the massive $169 million+ opening for The Deathly Hallows Part II in 2011, Fantastic Beasts started at just over $74 million with the first movie and has only gone down. There have been tons of issues in front of and behind the camera, including the problematic stances of JK Rowling, issues with actors like Ezra Miller and Johnny Depp, and more and the movies have also just been all over the place as far as tone and what they are trying to add to the overall mythology. For director David Yates, his take on Tarzan, 2016’s The Legend of Tarzan, is still his lowest opening, although Secrets of Dumbledore just barely topped it.
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 dropped to second place with $30 million, down about 58% from last weekend’s opening. The movie has $119 million domestic and over $189 million worldwide, making it the 7th biggest movie worldwide for the year so far. A sequel and Knuckles spin-off series are already confirmed and on the way to continue the Sonic cinematic universe.
The Lost City held onto third place with another $6.5 million, bringing it to $78.5 million domestic.
Everything Everywhere All at Once, probably due to its rapturous critical reception, jumped up the charts from 6th place to 4th with another $6.1 million, bringing it to $17.6 million domestic.
Father Stu opened in fifth place with $5.4 million and $7.7 million in total as it opened on Wednesday last week. There is normally some sort of faith-based movie trying to capitalize on the Easter holiday but Father Stu wasn’t a typical faith-based movie and maybe didn’t draw in the crowds who would go and see a Courageous or God’s Not Dead. Compared to typical faith-based dramas, Father Stu sits between Unplanned and Paul, Apostle of Christ. It’s definitely down in the lower end of Mark Wahlberg’s openings around Renaissance Man and The Truth About Charlie.
Further down the list, Michael Bay’s Ambulance fell out of the top 5 in its second weekend, dropping to 7th place with another $4 million. It didn’t have a massively steep drop from last weekend but the issue is that last weekend’s opening wasn’t large to begin with. Indian blockbuster K.G.F. Chapter 2 debuted in 9th place with $2.8 million in 570 theaters.
Secrets of Dumbledore took the Per Theater average for the weekend with $10,219 in each of the 4,208 theaters it played in.