Movies

‘Avatar: The Way of Water’ Has 2nd Best Wednesday of 2022: Box Office – Deadline

December 22, 2022

Twentieth Century Studios/Disney Avatar: The Way of the Water made $14.3M yesterday in 4,202 theaters, ranking it as the second best Wednesday of 2022 after Top Gun: Maverickis $14.8 million on June 1. Avatar 2The first Wednesday of also preceded that of Minions: The Rise of Gru ($13.5M, July 6) and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever’s first and second wednesday ($8.1 million on November 16 and $10 million on November 23).

Imax led 14.6% of Avatar 2is Wednesday or 2.1 million.

What is interesting here is that from Sunday to the middle of the week, Avatar 2 play like Rogue One: A Star Wars Story; yesterday not so far off the $14.96 million prequel from Lucasfilm on Wednesday. That said, Avatar: The Way of the Water to $183 million over six days is 11% behind A thug in its national cumulative total. Avatar 2 hopes to earn between $90 million and $95 million in its second 4-day weekend, which drops Christmas on Sunday.

Universal also launched Dreamworks Animation following Puss in Boots: The Last Wish to $3.2M in 4,093 theaters in second place for the day. There were no previews on Tuesday, so consider this pre-Christmas run essentially previews. The film directed by Joel Crawford and co-directed by Januel Mercado received an A CinemaScore, a notch above the A- of the first film of 2011 which opened the last weekend of October. It’s usually a box office death zone, however, Puss in Boots opened to a solid $34 million. While Puss in Boots 2 is under the first opening of the Wednesday before Christmas of Sing 2 which grossed $8.1 million before $39.6 million over 5 days, realize we’re still in a hallway where the audience’s cinema is sidelined by holiday activities. This all changes on Christmas Sunday for the better. Universal is considering a long term here for Puss in Boots 2. The studio is out Sing 2 until the first weekend in April north of 2,000 theaters. During all weekends in March, Sing 2 was earning over $1 million every weekend by the end of its run. Impressive. The final domestic market was $162.8 million.

Yesterday, third place belonged to wakanda forever with $902,000 for a cumulative total of $421.7M to 3,200 in the middle of week 6.

Fourth was Universal violent night in 3,528 cinemas with an estimate $839,000 and a running total in the middle of week 3 of $37.6 million.

THE WHALE, Brendan Fraser, 2022. © A24 / Courtesy Everett Collection

The fifth saw the wide expansion of A24 The whale from 6 theaters to 603. The film, which rebounded the career of Brendan Fraser and The Mummy actor as a favorite for the Best Actor awards, did $682.5K for a cumulative total on day 13 of $1.28M.

Babylon begins previews today at 3 p.m. and will hopefully break double-digit millions over 3 days with 60% new Rotten Tomatoes reviews. There’s also the TriStar/Black Label biopic Whitney Houston, I want to dance with someone, which begins previews at 2 p.m. today with an eye on $12 million over four days. Critics gave the film a rotten 41%.