On the fourth weekend of their release, those a-holes known as the Guardians of the Galaxy jumped back to the top of the box office with $17.6 million, shoving aside a lot of newer competition to get there. Who saw this coming?
Marvel’s misfit intergalactic superheroes also crossed another landmark this weekend. ‘Guardians of the Galaxy‘ became the #1 movie of summer, earning a total of $251.8 million domestically. By next weekend, it will be the #1 movie of 2014, passing the $259.8 million earned by ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’.
For the second weekend in a row, three new wide releases were unable to defeat the Top 2: ‘Guardians’ and ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles‘. ‘Guardians’ was able to re-claim the top spot by slipping only 30% in attendance. ‘Ninja Turtles’ didn’t have quite the same success. It slid 41%, but still did well with $16.8 million. To date, the reboot has earned $145.6 million domestically.
The strongest of the three wide releases was Chloe Moretz’s teen melodrama ‘If I Stay‘. The sappy YA adaptation grossed $16.3 million. Teen girls fueled its decent earnings this weekend, but ‘Stay’ will likely go sooner rather than later. Movies like this have a limited, front-loaded appeal for a small demographic.
Fourth place went to ‘Let’s Be Cops‘, which dropped only 38% in attendance with another $11 million. Since its mid-week debut nearly two weeks ago, the $17 million R-rated comedy has earned a solid $45.2 million.
Rounding out the Top 5 was the barely advertised sports drama ‘When the Game Stands Tall‘. The based-on-a-true-story football tale scored $9 million, which is about par for the genre these days.
Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller bit the black & white bullet as ‘Sin City: A Dame to Kill For‘ tanked at the box office. The sequel’s $6.4 million debut landed in the #8 spot. In comparison, the original ‘Sin City‘ opened to $29.1 million in 2005 without the additional help of 3D ticket prices. It’s a tragedy to see the follow-up to an amazing movie perform so poorly, but taking too long to churn out the sequel and a half-assed final product are mostly likely to blame for the awful opening.
The opening weekend numbers for limited release ‘To Be Takei’ have yet to be announced.
Top 10:
1. ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ (Buena Vista) – $17,631,000
2. ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ (Paramount) – $16,800,000
3. ‘If I Stay’ (Warner Bros.) – $16,355,000
4. ‘Let’s Be Cops’ (Fox) – $11,000,000
5. ‘When the Game Stands Tall’ (TriStar) – $9,000,000
6. ‘The Giver’ (Weinstein) – $6,730,000
7. ‘The Expendables 3’ (Lionsgate) – $6,600,000
8. ‘Sin City: A Dame to Kill For’ (Weinstein) – $6,477,000
9. ‘The Hundred-Foot Journey’ (Buena Vista) – $5,562,000
10. ‘Into the Storm’ (Warner Bros.) – $3,800,000
Csm101
I can’t believe not a single movie has crossed the 300 million mark domestically this far into the the year. I’m wondering if it will even happen at all. Could Guardians do it? I feel like it could come close, but probably not. Talk about theater attendance being down!
Csm101
Well, I’m happy for my brother. They did a betting pool as to what the highest grossing summer movie would be and he picked Guardians so congrats to him. A big whopping 77 bucks.
Josh Zyber
I’m really surprised that Let’s Be Cops is doing as well as it is. Considering everything going on in Missouri right now, I wouldn’t think that this would be a good time for a comedy about police.
Julian
Does a 9-year gap immediately spell doom for a sequel? ‘Episode I’ did make some money after the 16-year ‘Return of the Jedi’ gap.
Csm101
Not for every sequel, but it did this one. Star Wars is MUCH bigger than Sin City.
Julian
Good point. What about ‘Tron’ versus ‘Tron Legacy’? ‘Tron’ isn’t/wasn’t a big franchise when ‘Legacy’ opened (which subsequently made $400 million worldwide).
William Henley
Yes, but didn’t the original movie bomb pretty hard too?
Wasn’t there like an 8 year span between Terminator and Terminator 2? Seven year for Alien and Aliens.
Mike
The nine year gap seems like a cheap studio excuse. I’d blame bad advertising.