Box Office Weekend – ‘Glass’ Reflects a Good Hold on a Quiet Frame
This weekend at the box office was predictably quiet due to the Super Bowl, but it ended up being the worst Super Bowl weekend box office performance in the past 20 years. Universal’s Unbreakable trilogy-capper Glass still topped the charts, while Sony’s Miss Bala disappointed.
Miss Bala, the sole new release of the weekend (aside from an encore performance of They Shall Not Grow Old after it played in January), made just under $7M for the three-day weekend. Even against a slim $15M production budget, that’s… Not great, to say the least. Some are predicting that the movie will end its run at $15M domestically, which would mean that after accounting for the cut that theaters get per ticket and the advertising costs, Sony will be taking a bath with their English-language remake of the acclaimed 2011 foreign film. Meanwhile, Glass is holding well in spite of the flak it has received, and though it’s trailing Split domestically, the film is outperforming its predecessor overseas.
Since there’s not a lot else to say about the holdovers (aside from noting that award favorites Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and Green Book are clearly benefiting from the buzz that they’re getting), we should instead take a look at the box office numbers on the Super Bowl weekend. That period usually sees a slump on Sunday due to most eyes being directed toward the big game instead of elsewhere, but even then, the weekend was pretty terrible for theaters. This is one of the few weekends in modern box office history that no movie topped $10M over a three-day period, and the last time the weekend’s numbers were this low was back in 2000. This weekend is also firmly in the Top 20 worst weekends at the box office since 1997. Ouch.
Thankfully, The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part is hitting next weekend, and it should bring this year’s slow box office a well-needed shot in the arm. Soon to follow are Happy Death Day 2U, How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World, A Madea Family Funeral, and Captain Marvel over subsequent weekends, which should get what ought to put a likely-record-breaking year into high gear in spite of having such a sleepy start.
The Top Twelve box office performances for the three-day weekend can be summarized as follows (bolded titles are new releases):
- Glass (Universal Pictures/Blumhouse Productions) – $9.535M Weekend/$88.655M Total; 49.5% Drop.
- The Upside (STX Films) – $8.85M Weekend/$75.59M Total; 25.9% Drop.
- Miss Bala (Sony Pictures) – $6.7M Total.
- Aquaman (Warner Bros./DC Films) – $4.785M Weekend/$323.572M Total; 34.1% Drop.
- Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (Sony Pictures/Sony Pictures Animation) – $4.41M Weekend/$175.286M Total; 27.8% Drop.
- Green Book (Universal Pictures) – $4.317M Weekend/$55.821M Total; 21.3% Drop.
- The Kid Who Would Be King (20th Century Fox) – $4.2M Weekend/$13.173M Total; 41.5% Drop.
- A Dog’s Way Home (Sony Pictures) – $3.51M Weekend/$35.902M Total; 31.2% Drop.
- Escape Room (Sony Pictures) – $2.9M Weekend/$52.089M Total; 29.7% Drop.
- They Shall Not Grow Old (Warner Bros.) – $2.405M Weekend/$10.745M Total.
- Mary Poppins Returns (Disney) – $1.924M Weekend/$168.205M Total; 41.9% Drop.
- Bumblebee (Paramount Pictures) – $1.9M Weekend/$124.253M Total; 36.4% Drop.
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, Mary Poppins Returns, Bumblebee, Aquaman, and Glass are now playing in theaters.
Grant Davis is a freelance writer who has covered entertainment news for more than seven years. His articles have frequently appeared in Star Wars News Net as well as as other entertainment-related websites. As someone who grew up on Star Wars and comic book movies, he’s completely thrilled with the current era of genre entertainment.
