Sad to say, the 2018 Summer Movie Pool is now over. After Hollywood's major letdown in 2017 ($3.7B - the worst summer in 11 years), 2018 rebounded nicely with $4.4B - the fifth biggest summer box office ever. And to think that if Avengers: Infinity War had released in May as originally scheduled, the summer would have threatened the all-time record of $4.75B. Disney was again the big winner with $1.5B from their four movies. Our Top 10 spanned movies from all four months, with June as the big winner thanks to The Incredibles 2 ($598M) and Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom ($413M). May's highlight was Deadpool 2 ($318M), and the July winner was Ant-Man and the Wasp ($212M). This summer the mega-surprise was August's The Meg ($112M). Only 14 people trusted it, and two players specifically benefitted from its success. Even more surprising was that it was released in the SECOND weekend of August. Ballsy selections.
Let's start with the busts that ruined this summer for many. Of course random chances are made every summer, and not all of them end up being "bombs", but when 10+ people take a movie and it tanks, that's bust-worthy. We had five movies that failed us:
#13 Disney's Christopher Robin - $81M - 17 players - avg placement 7.9 #16 Skyscraper - $67M - 39 players - avg placement 8.5 #18 Life of the Party - $52M - 10 players - avg placement 8.3 #20 Sicario: Day of the Soldado - 12 players - $50M - avg placement 8.6 #22 Hereditary - $44M - 11 players - avg placement 8.9
As everyone here knows, the white whale of the Summer Movie Pool is the "Perfect 10". Of the 608 entries submitted over the prior 20 years we'd seen a total of just three Perfect 10s, two of which came in the same summer (sorry Kate). And of those three entries, their Deviation Scores were 14, 24, and 18. Even with 10 correct picks deviation can still come into play. With Year #21 wrapped up we've now had a total of 676 entries submitted, and amazingly we have another Perfect 10 tie. Whoa. So again we need to look at Deviation... but this isn't going to bode well for anyone not named Kelly Perone. In the most incredible performance we've ever seen in the SMP, Kelly had a PERFECT DEVIATION to go along with her Perfect 10. That's right, a Deviation Score of 0. ZERO. Incredible!! Back in 2011 Kelly became just our second member to win the SMP in their very first year, and now she sets the standard for perfection. The First Place prize is deservedly hers. Congrats!
With all this talk of perfection let's not forget that Jen Ballard also scored a Perfect 10 this summer, and the rest of us didn't. Jen also had a Deviation Score of 12, which in either other 10-for-10 summer would have won. Sadly just not this year. To be able to look at both Disney's Christopher Robin and Skyscraper and say, no I don't think so, and then look at both Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! and The Meg and say, yep they're definitely the ones... well major kudos to you as well for being smarter than us! Congrats on Second Place.
Third Place was a battle among those with 9 correct picks. 19 players to be exact. Thankfully we have a Scoreboard page that auto-calculates so we don't have to figure it all out ourselves. And lookie here... another tie. Dennis Berg's pursuit of his first SMP championship was well documented this summer, and it was his lack of faith in his very favorite actor in the world that did him in (the term "actor" used loosely). Kate Choomack, however, wouldn't let him have it all to himself, as her top selections were jaw-dropping. They get to split the Third Place prize. Focusing on just the top 4 on this list, the Deviation Score breakdown is as follows:
Dennis Berg - 9 (3,1,0,2,0,0,1,1,0,1) --- (4) perfect picks and (4) 1's. No busts. Steady picking this year, dad. Nice job! Sorry it didn't work out. Kate Choomack- 9 (0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1,0,8) --- Daaaaang. We spent so much time on Kelly's picks that we overlooked Kate's perfect top 7. (8) perfect picks total. But then there was Skyscraper. Curt Perone - 11 (1,1,1,1,0,0,0,0,1,6) --- (4) perfect picks and (4) 1's. And Skyscraper. Mike McPherson - 11 (1,1,1,3,0,1,1,0,0,3) --- (3) perfect picks and (5) 1's. Only letdown was Disney's Christopher Robin.
And then we have our Bonehead Award. It was a tight race this summer as both Ed Acayan and Ted Venable made highly questionable selections within the first two weeks of the pool. Not quite sure of their motivation, but unfortunately for Ted The Guardians (no, not THAT Guardians) continued to earn $$$ throughout the entire summer. A whole $174K to be specific. The big winner (loser) was Ed with his pick of Revenge that earned a whopping $102K. Enjoy your $10.00 prize.
To recap, this year's payouts are as follows:
1st Place - $500.00 - Kelly Perone 2nd Place - $100.00 - Jen Ballard 3rd Place - $15.00 each (tie) - Dennis Berg and Kate Choomack Bonehead Award - $10.00 - Ed Acayan
Some observations from this summer:
1) If it's not superheroes at the top, it's Pixar. And this year Incredibles 2 was the clear winner with nearly $600M, almost $200M more than the runner-up film. Last year's top animated film grossed just $255M.
2) Surprisingly #2 wasn't a superhero flick either. Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom eclipsed $400M, but that was just 2/3 the total of its predecessor. At least this one was the better film.
3) In fact, Incredibles 2 and JWFK both finished in the Top 25 all-time domestic list (#s 9 and 23, respectively).
4) The biggest box office disappointment of the summer had to be Solo: A Star Wars Story. An average placement of 2.4 shouldn't be grossing just $213M. And that was after a holiday weekend opening of $103M. What a shame. It was good.
5) After a 2017 of scathing film reviews we appear to have seen the softer side of critics in 2018. Of the 17 movies of note that are listed in the Weekly Comparisons, only five scored a Rotten Tomatoes rating below 52%. And two of those still made Top 10.
6) Three movies scored a RT grade higer than 90%: Incredibles 2 (93%), Mission: Impossible - Fallout (97%), and Crazy Rich Asians (92%).
7) Only one movie received the rare A+ CinemaScore: Incredibles 2.
8) The second weekend $$$ multiplers were really impressive this summer, as evidenced in the Weekly Comparisons. After the first three movies of note had multipliers below 1.75, the final 14 all eclipsed that mark, with only three of them being considered "average".
9) 62 movies grossed $1M+ this summer. 2017 had 60 movies earning that amount, and 2015 had 65.
10) 11 new entries to the Hall of Boneheads this year (after 9 in 2017).
Lastly, my favorite movies of Summer 2018, in terms of 'most enjoyable' experiences (not necessarily the 'best' films). Fun = enjoyable. That's what I want when I pay to go to the theater. I saw 6 movies this summer, with my favorites being:
1) Solo: A Star Wars Story - I still cannot understand all the negativity surrounding this flick. It's not like Alden Ehrenreich was gunning for an Oscar here. I found it pretty damn fun. 2) Mission: Impossible - Fallout - A super close second to Solo. These just keep getting better! 3) The Incredibles 2 - Not as good as the original, but that one set a pretty damn high standard. Still, this one had me hooked.
Everything else I wanted to see can wait to stream them.
Here's hoping everyone had a fun time playing in the SMP this year! Summer 2019 is looking pretty solid with Avengers 4 (for now), the live-action Aladdin, Godzilla: King of Monsters (yeahhhh!), The Secret Life of Pets 2, Men In Black 4, Toy Story 4, Spider-man: Far From Home (yeahhhhhhhhhhh!), the CGI/live-action The Lion King, and the next Tarantino flick Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. More sequels! lol
I'd also like to say thanks to Chapman for really helping out this year with the previews and updates. Glad you got to experience how much work actually goes into this pool ;) And you certainly had your moments with some sharp commentary. Thanks!
See you all next summer!!
9/01/18
The last day of the SMP is in the books, and now we will just have to wait for Friday actuals to see if Queen Kelly will pull off the flawless victory. Hopefully actuals will be posted early this afternoon, but we can assume that the estimates will stand. Lets hope Ant Man didn't pull in another 1.5 mi to pull it over Solo (it is tracking for 3ooK).
Box Office Friday Estimates:
1) Crazy Rich Kelly - 5.86M
2) The Meg - 2.28M
3) Searching - 1.9M
4) Operation Finale - 1.7M
5) Mission Impossibler - 1.5M
6) Christopher Robin - 1.2M
8/27/18
With the last weekend of the summer completed, we see the end in sight this Friday. We got to see the Meg swim past the Equalizer to capture the #10 spot, bringing Kelly to the top of the charts with an unprecidented 0 deviation score. At this point, the only thing that could stop Kelly "The Oracle" Perone from capturing the once in a lifetime "Score That Can Never Be Beaten, Only Matched", is if the Meg overperforms and tops Mama Mia by Friday, or if Crazy Rich Asians continues to continue its run, but that would be crazy...or would it?
Crazy Rich Asians posted one of the best second weekend holds in modern movie history falling only 6.4% week over week. When you take out December or films released right before holidays (Mothers Day on Mothers Day, Blind Side on Thanksgiving, etc), it ranks 3rd all-time in smallest second week declines. Again, it is a long shot, but a little drama in the last week makes for a more exciting finale to the pool.
The poorly reviewed top release of the weekend The Happytime Murders failed to capture any kind of audience with a 9.5M Box Office take. This is the worst of McCarthy's career, who seems to be having a bit of the same problem the Rock had earlier with Skyscraper - oversaturation in bland films. Happytime Murders managed a C- Cinemascore, so don't expect her to headline a top 10 hit next year...unless Dennis' former-favorite Jason Statham comes back for Spy 2.
Finally, looking at the scoreboard, women are currently dominating the winners circle with 3 out of 4 money-earning spots held by Kelly, Jen and Kate. Clearly they know something the guys don't - I mean, The Meg? Mamma Mia 2? I don't really want to do the math to confirm, but it looks like Kelly will get her second win in the movie pool becoming the second person to ever win the title twice, along with the Co-founder and Secretary of the Summer Movie Pool Steve Berg. But again, that score is ridiculous. Hope I didn't jinx the Immaculate Prediction.
Box Office Weekend Actuals:
1) Crazy Rich Kelly - 24.8M (76.6M)
2) The Meg - 12.8M (105M)
3) Happytime Murders - 9.5M (50M)
4) Mission Impossibler - 8M (193M)
5) Mile 22 - 6.3M (25.5M)
6) Christopher Robin - 6.2M (77.5M)
8/24/18
Last weekend preview before the finale! I updated the Box Office numbers, but the Meg is still a few million shy of taking the 10th spot, securing the flawless victory for Kelly. There isn't any titles that are going to stop the Meg from its path of destruction, with the new releases this weekend - the most likely weekend winner will be Crazy Rich Asians, with the new release of Happytime Murders failing to capture the top spot. The funniest part of this movie are the reviews - one called it the worst movie of the summer (screencrush), the next called it the worst movie of the year (Vanity Fair), but not to be topped, unknown blogger Solzy at the movies called it "The worst film ever" - I cant imagine it is worse than Evil Toons, Armegeddon, Loser or The Pallbearer, but there is always a chance.
Boxoffice.com Weekend Predictions: 1) Crazy Rich Asians - 17.5M (69M) 2) The Happytime Murders - 14M (14M) 3) The Meg - 12.7M (105.7M) 4) Mission: Impossible - Fallout - 7M (192M) 5) Disney's Christopher Robin - 6.7M (77.8M) 6) AXL - 1.7M (1.7M)
Rotten Tomatoes Freshness Ratings: The Happytime Murders = 21% (9% by the Top Critics) AXL = 25% (NA by the Top Critics) Searching = 92% (94% by the Top Critics)
Box Office Mojo Theater Counts: The Happytime Murders = 3,256 AXL = 1,710 Searching = 9
8/17/18
Down to just three weekends, and there's blood in the water. By Sunday The Equalizer should be around 95M, but The Meg will be circling at 85M. At its current pace Meg should catch Equalizer juuuuuuuust before the summer ends. That is, unless Dennis goes to the movies one million times all by himself to help pad the numbers. Sorry dad, I think you're screwed.
Two players selected this weekend's big hit, Crazy Rich Asians, which got a headstart 8.7M thanks to its Wednesday opening. While it has an impressive RT rating, it's going to need an opening of 50M+ to be a threat. Sorry, but I'm not a believer.
Rotten Tomatoes Freshness Ratings: Crazy Rich Asians = 92% (95% by the Top Critics) Mile 22 = 20% (26% by the Top Critics) Alpha = 84% (88% by the Top Critics)
(Background music - Duhh Dun) Thursdays estimates for Meg - 20-22M .
(Background music - Duhh Dun)
Friday's Estimates - 30M (Background music - Duhh De Duh Dun Dun De Duh Dun)
Saturdays Estimates 40M! (Background music - Cresendo) Final Box office haul for the opening weekend of the Meg 45.4M! We have ourselves a game, folks! Dennis is going to have a tough few weeks to see how this all pans out - with the Equalizer slowing down is it possible for the Meg to catch it? There really isn't any other films outside of Crazy Rich Asians that will pull in the crowds, so its possible that Jason Statham might pull out the perfect score out of his biggest fans hands with its B+ Cineamascore. As this is Statham's biggest hit (outside of the F&F franchise), Dennis may just give a nod to the brit action star and say, "you did good, mate. You did good."
In other box office news, MI6 continued to perform admirably adding another 20M to its haul. It is the third best reviewed film of the summer, and one of the few I am looking forward to see. Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman opened to 10M - his last summer hit (that I picked), Summer of Sam, fared about as well. Slenderman opened to 11.3M, but is the second worst reviewed film of the summer, second only to the thrown together Death of a Nation. It's D- Cinemascore should see a sizeable drop next weekend should make it a slender box office haul.
As mentioned, next week we see how Crazy Rich Asians will do and if we will have another suprise to take a "bite" out of Dennis' chance for a flawless victory. Also, his second cousin Peter Berg is releasing the film Mile 22, but I don't see that one making any significant waves in the pool.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Actuals:
1) The Meg - 45.4M (45.4M)
1) Mission: Impossible - Fallout - 19.3M (161M)
2) Christopher Robin - 12.9M (50M)
3) Slender Man - 11.3M (11.3M)
4) BlacKkKlansman - 10.8M (10.8M)
5) Spy Who Dumped Me - 6.4M (24.4M)
8/11/18
We have a player sitting at the top with a perfect 10-for-10, but that seat is heating up rapidly. The major relase this weekend is The Meg (selected by 14 players), and just a week ago projections were in the 18M-20M range. And then Thursday previews increased projections to 25M. Then on Friday night it was 35M. As of this morning it's now expected to do 40M. Uh ohhhhh. Maybe it will behave like most every other horror movie and die off quickly after a big opening weekend. Or maybe this one will have... fins. Rim shot! It's not very fresh according to RT, and only a B+ CinemaScore, so there may be hope yet for Dennis.
We also have Slender Man opening this weekend, which was picked by 1 player. Originally expected to release 8/24 (not sure why it was even selected knowing it was opening that late), it's going to make some extra cash thanks to its PG-13 rating, but not clearly enough to make a difference here.
Boxoffice.com Weekend Predictions:
1) Mission: Impossible - Fallout - 22.5M (165.6M)
2) The Meg - 22M (22M)
3) Disney's Christopher Robin - 14.3M (51.5M)
4) BlacKkKlansman - 12.2M (12.2M)
5) Slender Man - 10.8M (10.8M)
Rotten Tomatoes Freshness Ratings: The Meg = 50% (24% by the Top Critics) BlacKkKlansman = 97% (100% by the Top Critics) Slender Man = 15% (0% by the Top Critics) Dog Days = 60% (59% by the Top Critics)
Box Office Mojo Theater Counts: The Meg = 4,118 BlacKkKlansman = 1,512 Slender Man = 2,358 Dog Days = 2,442
CinemaScore Ratings: The Meg = B+ BlacKkKlansman = A- Slender Man = D- Dog Days = A-
- SB
8/6/18
Mamma Mia, it wasnt a great weekend for those who picked Christopher Robin. Nope, not at all. This epic fail by Disney brought in just under 25M, which is surprising given the epic star power of Ewan McGregor. Disney was hoping for Jungle Book or Beauty and the Beast and ended up somewhere between Country Bears and Pete's Dragon. A massive blow to those who were hoping to take out Dennis Berg's perfect ten score. We have seen it 3 times before in 20 years, so it is not impossible. To do it with Mamma Mia 2 and Equalizer 2 would be pretty impressive. It looks like it is in the hands of Jason Statham now to stop the Berg train. Can he do it? Can he take out his biggest fan and equalize too, by bumping out Equalizer 2? Will he be fast and furious or expendable? Tune in next weekend to the epic conlcusion of this post!
Box Office Mojo Weekend Actuals:
1) Mission: Impossible - Fallout - 35.3M (124M)
2) Christopher Robin - 24.5M
3) The Spy Who Dumped Me - 12.1M
4) Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! - 9M (91M)
5) Equalizer 2 - 8.7M (79M)
8/3/18
It's finally August, and we know that this final month of the SMP has historically been a dumping ground for studios. Expect to see lots of releases of these final 5 weekends. This weekend alone we have 5 Wide releases, with Disney's Christopher Robin being the highlight of the bunch. 17 players are hoping this one continues the trend of highly-successful live-action classic Disney flicks. The reviews, however, are pretty meh, as is the projected opening. Craaaaap. We also have 5 players who banked on the estrogen-fueled action comedy The Spy Who Dumped Me. Nope, it's not looking good for them. People can only take so much screaming in a trailer before saying, no thanks, I'll pass.
Boxoffice.com Weekend Predictions: 1) Disney's Christopher Robin - 31.5M (31.5M) 2) Mission: Impossible - Fallout - 31.5M (117.5M) 3) The Spy Who Dumped Me - 14.4M (14.4M) 4) The Darkest Minds - 8.4M (8.4M) 5) Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! - 7.9M (89M)
Rotten Tomatoes Freshness Ratings: Disney's Christopher Robin = 67% (69% by the Top Critics) The Spy Who Dumped Me = 37% (40% by the Top Critics) The Darkest Minds = 19% (16% by the Top Critics) Eighth Grade = 98% (98% by the Top Critics) Death of a Nation = 0% (0% by the Top Critics). ZERO!
Box Office Mojo Theater Counts: Disney's Christopher Robin = 3,602 The Spy Who Dumped Me = 3,111 The Darkest Minds = 3,127 Eighth Grade = 1,084 Death of a Nation = 1,005
CinemaScore Ratings: Disney's Christopher Robin = A The Spy Who Dumped Me = B The Darkest Minds = B Eighth Grade = n/a Death of a Nation = n/a
- SB
7/30/18
Hey movie fans! Theres a big shakeup in our top ten with Mamma Mia 2 jumping into the #8 spot in its second weekend! The Equalizer 2 barely missed the top 10 with the First Purge pulling in enough to make the top 10. Next week we should see Book Club finally drop off the top 10 (it was making me nervous, with the amount of underperforming films) and the First Purge as MI6 and EQ2 move up to the top 10.
This was the weekend for Tom Cruise's franchise Mission Impossible. It made a series opening high of 61.2M (lower than predicted, but a solid opening). Critics and audiences are loving this film, with an incredibly high 97% Rotten Tomatoes score and a cinema score of "A", the highest of the series. This is one I am actually looking forward to seeing in the theatres, and I have been pretty meh to seeing most of the tentpole films this summer.
The backend data pull from the website is currently broken, so right now I am having to manually add the box office numbers, so there may be some minor inconsistencies until we are able to adjsut the code. Why couldnt Box Office Mojo wait until AFTER the summer to change their reporting data?!?
Box Office Mojo Weekend Actuals:
1) Mission Impossibler - $61.2 M
2) Mama Mia 2 - $15.1 M
3) Equalizer 2 - 14 M
4) Hotel Transylvania 3 - $12.2 M
5) Teen Titans Go! - $10.4 M
6) Ant Man and the Wasp - $8.7 M
7) Incredibles 2 - 7.2 M
8) Jurassic World 2 - 6.7 M
9) Skyscraper - 5.3 M
7/27/18
Oh yeah. 66 players know what's up. Just check out that freshness rating for Mission: Impossible - Fallout... 100% from the Top Critics. Boom. $70M would be a very nice start. Best one of the franchise. Even Teen Titans GO! to the Movies got in on the action with a rating higher than 90%. Unfortunately for the 2 players who picked it it's on the wrong side of 20M. Don't say Hollywood can't put out good movies. This weekend says you're wrong.
Boxoffice.com Weekend Predictions: 1) Mission: Impossible - Fallout - 70M (70M) 2) Teen Titans GO! to the Movies - 17.5M (17.5M) 3) Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! - 16.5M (70.4M) 4) The Equalizer 2 - 15.7M (66.4M) 5) Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation - 12.8 (118.3M)
Rotten Tomatoes Freshness Ratings: Mission: Impossible - Fallout = 97% (100% by the Top Critics) Teen Titans GO! to the Movies = 91% (94% by the Top Critics)
Box Office Mojo Theater Counts: Mission: Impossible - Fallout = 4,386 Teen Titans GO! to the Movies = 3,188
CinemaScore Ratings: Mission: Impossible - Fallout = A Teen Titans GO! to the Movies = B+
- SB
7/23/18
Well, Poppa Berg is smiling in Jacksonville with the box office success of both the Equalizer 2 and Mamma Mia 2 - he dodged the Skyscraper bullet and would be sitting at a perfect score if they keep pace and don't have a considerable drop - that is if Mission Impossible 6 does well. Given the early reviews (it is sitting at 96% with over 70 reviews - the best score of the series) , it looks pretty definite. There are a few more films that could derail things, with Christopher Robbin and the Meg - the latter would be especially painful to Pappa Berg as he is the world's biggest Jason Statham fan.
Equalizer 2 overperformed to take the number 1 spot this week, with 36M. Any other year that would be a no go, but this year with so many underperformers, it could be enough to make it. We will see what kind of drop it has next weekend with MI6, which shares the same audience.
Mama Mia 2 did well enough, with 34.9M over the original which made 29M. The original had some legs to it, and I can't see this one being any different as it offers something different at the box office, and something geared towards the female moviegoers, which has been neglected since Oceans 8 and Book Club, both of which are still sitting on the top ten this year unless they get knocked out by a heavy hitter.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Actuals:
1) Equalizer 2 - $36 M
2) Mamma Mia 2 - $34.9 M
3) Hotel Transylvania 3 - 23.7 M
4) Ant Man and the Wasp - $16.5 M
5) Incredibles 2 - $11.8 M
6) Skyscraper - $11.3 M
7) Jurassic World 2 - 11.2 M
8) The First Purge - 5.1 M
8) Unfriended:Dark Web - 3.6 M
7/21/18
Tons of Comic-Con goodness!
- SB
7/20/18
It's the weekend of sequels, as all three new wide releases are v2's. 23 players selected Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again!. Shame on all of you! Ok, the goal is to win, and now that Skyscraper has tanked there's an opening for something else to take over. Its projected $38M opening would be a nice start, I guess. We also have The Equalizer 2, selected by 6 players, but the critics are not being kind to Denzel. Watch your back, critics. Denzel's gonna getcha.
Boxoffice.com Weekend Predictions: 1) Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! - 38M (38M) 2) The Equalizer 2 - 28.5M (28.5M) 3) Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation - 23.5M (90.6M) 4) Ant-Man and the Wasp - 15.3M (163.2M) 5) Skyscraper - 11.9M (47.4M) 6) Incredibles 2 - 10.9M (556.9M)
Rotten Tomatoes Freshness Ratings: Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! = 78% (68% by the Top Critics) The Equalizer 2 = 50% (42% by the Top Critics) Unfriended: Dark Web = 56% (62% by the Top Critics)
Box Office Mojo Theater Counts: Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! = 3,317 The Equalizer 2 = 3,388 Unfriended: Dark Web = 1,546
CinemaScore Ratings: Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! = A- The Equalizer 2 = A Unfriended: Dark Web = C
- SB
7/16/18
Well, Somebody has a case of the Mondays. The easy "lock" pick of Skyscraper underperformed even with rather conservative predictions. Did they tuck Effron in the movie somewhere to curse this flick? If book club is the number 10 film this year, I will throw my hands in the air and give up on predicitons. I can see why Hollywood is such a volatile industry when you can't even count on the Rock or Han Solo to generate decent revenue.
Transylvania 3 at least pulled in a respectable 44.1M in its opening weekend and managed to jump into the 13 spot in the pool. It should crack the top ten before the weekend - with only 19 films left this summer its going to be an interesting month!
Box Office Mojo Weekend Actuals:
1) Hotel Transylvania 3 - $44 M
2) Ant Man and the Wasp - $29 M
3) Skyscraper - 24.9 M
4) Incredibles 2 - $16.2 M
5) Jurassic World 2 - $16.1 M
6) The First Purge - $9.3 M
7) Sorry to Bother You - 4.2 M
8) Sicario 2 - 3.8 M
9) Uncle Drew - 3.1 M
7/14/18
Looks like Berg is back to the rescue. Berg does everything right. And let's get back to adding some color to this page.
Looking like a decent weekend for Hotel with a projected 45M, and the 49 who picked it should feel pretty confident knowing that multipliers for animated fims (even crappy ones) are always higher than the norm. For the 39 who took Skyscraper, however, it's not looking promising at all. Ugh, I can never pick The Rock movies correctly :( We also get the Wide release for Sorry To Bother You. The 2 players who took it can now breathe a sigh of relief. Just don't expect big bucks from fewer than 1,000 theaters.
Boxoffice.com Weekend Predictions: 1) Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation - 45M (45M) 2) Skyscraper - 33M (33M) 3) Ant-Man and the Wasp - 31M (136.5M) 4) Incredibles 2 - 15.4M (535.2M) 5) Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom - 13.9M (361.3M) 6) The First Purge - 8.2M (48.8M)
Rotten Tomatoes Freshness Ratings: Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation = 59% (65% by the Top Critics) Skyscraper = 51% (49% by the Top Critics) Sorry To Bother You = 95% (93% by the Top Critics)
Box Office Mojo Theater Counts: Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation = 4,267 Skyscraper = 3,782 Sorry To Bother You = 805
Another weekend in the books with the release of a few new movies - Ant Man was pretty havily frontloaded and took a big dive after a pretty impressive Thursday night preview of 11M - it just couldnt hold up all weekend and came in about 10M under predictions. It still did about 20M more than the original, and early predictions have it coming in at 180-200M by the end of its domestic run. Jurassic World 2 did just enough to hold off Incredibles 2 for the number two spot, but Incredibles is still looking to maintain its dominance by becoming the first animated film to top 500M and is poised to pass Beauty and the Beast for the 11th highest grossing domestic release of all time.
The other release this weekend the First Purge pulled in 17M, and as it opened on 4th of July, has a 5 day cume of 31 million. It has a suprising B- Cinemascore, which I find fascinating as 2-TIME WINNER Mad Mark fell asleep watching it, and the 3rd film was on my top ten worst movies of all time, sandwiched between Armegeddon and Rocky Horror Picture Show.
My beloved Sicario 2 had a pretty gut-punching dip, dropping 61.6% in its second week at the theatres. Lets rally people! Lets show them what SMP can do! I expect huge numbers next weekend as it takes teamwork to make the dream work. Also, Sorry to Bother You premiered and is said to be a "smashing success" on Box Office Mojo for taking in 727K in limited release. I guess thats successful as there were only 16 theatres it was released in. With wide release next week, we will see if it could be a dark horse.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Actuals:
1) Ant Man and the Wasp - $75 M
2) Jurassic World 2 - $28.6 M
3) Incredibles 2 - 28.4 M
4) The First Purge - $17.4 M
5) Sicario 2 - $7.6 M
6) Uncle Drew - $6.6 M
7) Oceans 8 - 5 M
8) Tag - 3 M
8) Won't You Be My Neighbor - 2.5 M
7/07/18
I hope everyone had a great mid-week 4th of July holiday. This week we have a few new releases that raise eyebrows, with Ant Man and the Wasp and the First Purge. As of Saturday AM, Ant Man and the Wasp (AM&W) is looking to have a 88M opening, but the predications have shifted over the week so it may hit 90M. The First Purge isn't fairing as well, with a predicted 36-40M opening - I say it isnt fairing well for the top 10 of the summer, but it is actually a very good opening for a horror film. Blumhouse has a history of making incredibly profitable horror films by keeping production costs low, and are taking advantage of the political/social state we are in to get an audience with the Purge series and the breakout hit Get Out. The First Purge is sitting at a rotten 52% on Rotten Tomatoes. Former 2-time champion Mad Mark saw it on opening day and fell asleep during the film, and he wasnt even tired. Not a good sign! The 3rd entry of the Purge series was probably the worst film I have seen in recent memory (I bailed with 40 minutes left), so it isnt really a surprise.
Ant Man and the Wasp is looking to add to Disney's record-breaking quarter with just under 90M. This summer is tracking 10% higher than last year in box office revenue, but it is only Disney and Sony that are actually up this year, the other five studios are down year over year. Imagine if Solo hadnt have been the bust that it was (currently it looks like solo wont make in its domestic run what The Force Awakens made in its opening weekend). Ant man has some favorable reviews (sitting at 86% on rotten tomatoes), but it also is looking at a A- cinemascore, which sounds great but apparently is low for a Marvel film. It will be interesting to see where it falls on the top ten by the end of the month when the lustre wears off a bit.
That about covers it for this we...waaiiitt - there is another film opening this weekend that a few SMP players picked - Sorry to Bother You openins this weekend as well, which as George mentioned, is opening in 16 theatres. At 94% positive ratings, it looks like it will contiue to expand to a wider release in the coming weeks to more than 20 theatres. Keep an eye on this one!
Box Office Mojo Weekend Predictions:
1) Ant Man and the Wasp - $88 M
2) Jurassic World 2 - $29 M
3) Incredibles 2 - 25.6 M
4) The First Purge - $22 M
5) Sicario 2 - $9.5 M
6) Uncle Drew - $7.5 M
7) Oceans 8 - 4.9 M
8) Tag - 2.9 M
8) Deadpool 2 - 2.1 M
7/02/18
Well, Sicario did better than projected, but only to the tune of 19M. That is going to be a rough road to the top ten, but it's doable! My Big Fat Greek Wedding's first weekend was 597K, and its highest weekend was 14.8M, and it came in with 222M! I am only asking for HALF of that!
In less depressing news, Jurassic World 2 and Incredibles 2 continued to dominate the top two spots, with Jurassic World dropping 59% for 60M - worldwide it sits just below a Billion at 932M. I guess there will be a trilogy? Incredibles 2 came in at 46.4M, making it the second highest grossing Pixar film already (3 weeks in) and the 3rd largest animated film ever.
The film industry posted its biggest quarter in history between April-June, hitting 3.3 Billion. It will be interesting to see how the summer plays out; Ant Man and the Wasp next week is estimating a 80M opening with positive reviews coming into a Holiday-ish weekend. Blockbusters seem to be the pull this summer, with midrange films suffering in their wake. There are still some suprises so far, with Solo underperforming and Deadpool 2 overperforming, so maybe there will be a suprise this summer that wasn't on anyone's radar. I sure hope it's Sicario 2.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Actuals:
1) Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom - $60.9 M
2) Incredibles 2 - $46.4 M
3) Sicario 2 - 19 M
4) Uncle Drew - $15.2 M
5) Oceans 8 - $8 M
6) Tag - $5.8 M
7) Deadpool 2 - 3.5 M
8) Sanju - 2.7 M
8) Solo - 2.6 M
6/30/18
Another meaty weekend with the release of Sicaro 2 and Uncle Drew. Hey, that rhymes! The pessimists over at Box office Mojo are predicting high teen box office numbers for both new releases, which of course doesn't fill me with hope. Comeon people! Use that Solo money you saved by not going and check out Sicario 2! It's got Thanos in it! Speaking of Josh Brolin, if Avengers is able to pull off some good numbers, there could be 3 Josh Brolin movies in the top ten this weekend. Cool? Not as cool as Sicario 2, that's for sure!Just ask the other 11 players that chose it this year!Current estimates have been adjusted to 19.4M as of Saturday Afternoon.
3 Players picked Uncle Drew this weekend, which looks to have a 16.7M opening. It won't beat the fantastic, must-watch Sicario 2, but it did recieve an A Cinemascore (VS Sicario 2's B Cinemascore). Not sure who thought that this would translate into a movie, but it looks like the audiences are responding positively towards it.
The two juggernauts of this years pool continue to duke it out for the top spot, Jurassic World 2 coming in at 59M and Incredibles 2 coming in at 44.8M. Worldwide, Incredibles 2 has already surpassed the first film in Box Office revenue, even when adjusted for inflation (as of Thursday). Worldwide, Jurassic Park 2 has crossed 800M and will hit a billion before you know it. Incredibles 2 has reached another milestone, becoming only the 5th movie to have 17 days of 10M + grosses. 3 of those were the new Star Wars films, and then Avatar. Nice work Incredibles 2!
In other news, Stevie Steve saw Jurassic World this weekend and gave it a decent review. He was happy there wasn't kids in this one, nad that it was a little more adult oriented than past films. He did say though, that you should all see Sicario 2 instead.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Predictions:
1) Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom - $59.2 M
2) Incredibles 2 - $46.1 M
3) Sicario 2 - Eleventy Billion
4) Uncle Drew - $16.7 M
5) Oceans 8 - $7 M
6) Tag - $4.4 M
7) Deadpool 2 - 3.4M
8) Solo - 2.7 M
8) Hereditary - 2.0 M
6/26/18
Jurassic World 2 expected expectations grossing 148M on it's opening weekend. I don't think it has enough legs to pass Incredibles for the #1 spot, but we will continue to track these two #1 contenders to see who reigns supreme. Incredibles 2 held pretty stong dropping 55.7% for another 80M, and both will have another week before similarly themed Ant-Man and the Wasp and Hotel Transylvania are released. The other 2 interesting films in the next few weeks Sicario 2 (my pick that I am starting to feel nervous about) and the Rock's version of Die Hard, Skyscraper. I watched Rampage about a week ago and it was less than amazing.
It is interesting to note that this is the largest June ever with the Box Office already totaling over 1 Billion.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Actuals:
1) Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom - $148 M
2) Incredibles 2 - $80.3 M
3) Oceans 8 - $11.5 M
4) Tag - $8.2 M
5) Deadpool 2 - $5.2 M
6) Solo - 4.5M
7) Hereditary - 3.6 M
8) Superfly - 3.4 M
6/23/18
Big weekend with the release of Jurassic World 2, which even having typed about 30 times this year, I continue having to go back and edit to correct. As of Saturday AM, it looks like it will have a 145M opening. It marks only the second time that there have been back-to-back openings over 100, and with Sicario 2 opening next weekend, the first time 3 films have had back-to-back-to-back openings (hey, a guy can dream)
It has gotten a A- Cinemascore so far, so it is hard to predict how well it will hold after the reviews have it sitting at 54%, and 51 at metacritic.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Predictions:
1) Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom - $145 M
2) Incredibles 2 - $91.3 M
2) Oceans 8 - $9.3 M
3) Tag - $7.5 M
5) Solo - $5.3 M
6) Deadpool 2 - 5.2M
7) Hereditary - 3.6 M
8) Superfly - 3.4 M
6/18/18
I hope everyone had a great Father's Day - it looks like everybody did and went to see Incredibles 2 with a record-breaking 182M opening weekend (8th in all-time opening weekends), shattering the record for animated film opening weekends that was previously held by Finding Dory (135M), which was also our number one film in the SMP the year it was released. Jurassic World 2 has a lot of work to do to hit this mark for the top spot of the summer, particularly since Incredibles 2 has an A+ Cinemascore and should give it some legs. Industry people have readjusted the multiplier to 3.3, which would put it at about 6oo million by the end of run.
Oceans 8 managed to hold decently in it's second weekend coming in second with 18.9M, a little lower than the 21M that was predicted at the beginning of the weekend. It "should" be good to finish in the top ten, we will just have to see in the next few weeks how much padding it can add to its good start.
Tag came in with a respectable 14.9 Million - obviously not enough to make it to top 10, but you roll the dice with R-rated comedies. Comparatively, similar R-rated comedy openings (Sex Tape and War Dogs) ended up with a take home of 38-43M.
In other news, I forgot to mention last week that Action Point was pulled from theatres after 2 weeks of miserable box office performances, so it looks like the 4.5M total is where the party ends, but it still more than the two SMP players battling it out for the Bonehead Award, with the Guardians still taking in money it will be a photo finish for last place, much like the dismal reviews of Gotti - although it still is taking in money, mainly because the ticket service MoviePass has bought 40% of the 1.6M opening ticket sales as they invested in the picture. Audiences are a little more forgiving, apparently, as it got a 79% audience score.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Predictions:
1) Incredibles 2 - $182.6 M
2) Oceans 8 - $18.9 M
3) Tag - $14.9 M
5) Solo - $10.0 M
6) Deadpool 2 - 8.6M
7) Superfly - 6.8 M
8) Hereditary - 6.8 M
9) Adrift - 2.2M
10) Book Club - 1.8M
6/15/18
Finally a weekend with a top 3 release - Incredibles 2 is already starting strong in theatres with 18.5M in Thursday previews - to put this into context, it doubles the previous record set by Finding Dory, which ended up as the number one film in the SMP a few years back. All those that picked Incredibles 2 at the number 1 spot are feeling pretty good about now, especially with the lukewarm reviews of Jurassic Park are coming out. There is one SMP player this year that wasn't feeling the Pixar love and left it off their list completely. Incredibles 2 is opening in 4,410 theatres and it is the first animated release since Sherlock Gnomes in March, so it should get a lot of kid love, and we will see if Father's Day weekend brings in the dad love... I love you, Dennis!
Seven bold SMP players chose the other major release this weekend, the R-rated comedy Tag - Box Office Mojo predicts it will make 15.3M in its opening, but I am not so sure it will break out; I saw this video earlier and it doesnt bode well when a passerby recognizes the youtube host, but none of the cast LINK HERE - doesn't look like Jeremy Renner wants to be there...
I did check out Hereditary earlier in the week. I really wanted to motivate myself to see Solo, but I just. Couldnt. Do. It. I give Hereditary high praise and if you want to check out a well done creepy film that won't make the top ten, I would recommend; just don't see it in a theatre that has groups of teenagers, because they just suck.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Predictions:
1) Incredibles 2 - $150.0 M
2) Oceans 8 - $21.2 M
3) Tag - $15.3 M
5) Solo - $9.3 M
6) Deadpool 2 - 8.3M
7) Hereditary - 7.6 M
8) Superfly - 5.5 M
9) Adrift - 2.5M
10) Book Club - 2.3M
Weekend Releases Rotten Tomatoes Scores
1. Incredibles 2 - 94% SUPERFRESH!
2. Tag - 57% ROTTEN!
3. Superfly - 54% ROTTEN!
4. Gotti - 0% A NEW LOW!
5. The Yellow Birds - 44% ROTTEN!
6/11/18
Another weekend in the books and we see a pretty healthy start for Oceans 8 after a few slow weekends at the box office. Oceans 8 opened to 41.6 million, giving it the best opening weekend of the "Oceans" franchise, with a solid B+ Cinemascore from audiences which skewed 69% female.
The second major release Hereditary exceeded expectations bringing in 13 million, higher than expectations by about 1 million. Unfortunatey, audiences weren't as enthusiastic about it, with the marketing calling it "the scariest movie since the Exorcist", you would expect better than the D+ Cinema score from a 58% male audience. The bright side is that A24s other Horror standout The Witch recieved a C- Cinemascore, and it was one of my favorite modern horror releases. Unfortunately, the score doesn't bode well for the movie having a long run due to word-of-mouth.
Poor Han Solo can't catch a break and pulled in 15.7 million to capture 2nd place this past weekend. Overseas it is already puttering out bringing in 11.3 million - I think we will see a bigger drop next weekend with the release of Incredibles 2. A nice postmortem video essay of the Disney era Star Wars films (and previous trilogies) is located HERE
We are going to have a few telling weekends with the releases of The Incredibles 2 and Jurassic World 2 - most players have put both of these films in the top 3, so we will see! Early reviews of the Incredibles have it sitting at 95% with 43 reviews (2 negative Nancies) and Jurassic World 2 less Incredible with 60% out of 94 reviews - it is already playing internationally and taking in a pretty solid box office.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Actuals:
1) Oceans 8 - $41.6 M
2) Solo: A Star Wars Story - $15.7 M
3) Deadpool 2 - $14.1 M
5) Hereditary - $13.5 M
6) Adrift - 5.2M
7) Book Club - 4.2 M
8) Hotel Artemis - 3.2 M
9) Upgrade - 2.3M
10) Life of the Party - 2.1M
6/08/18
With this new weekend we see the debut of a few counterprogramming films that could have an effect on the pool. First, we have Oceans 8, with an all-female cast from the Oceans 11 franchise. It is debuting in a substantial 4,145 theatres and looks to overtake the originals opening weekend haul of 38.1 million in 2001.
The second (and more compelling film, in my opinion) is Hereditary. It has had a strong buzz going into it with very favorable reviews comparing it to the classic Exorcist. That is a pretty bold assessment, but I hope that it does well (just not too well, as I didn't pick it). It has a much smaller theatre count (3,000) so I don't see it making it into the top 3 this weekend.
Solo continues to limp along with a predicted 47% drop to pull in an additional 14.5 million. I am still on the fence about seeing this one in the theatres, and I was the kid that had star wars jeans, shirt, hat and darth vader sneakers as a kid. Just. Not. Excited.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Predictions:
1) Oceans 8 - $45.0 M
2) Solo: A Star Wars Story - $14.5 M
3) Deadpool 2 - $13.0 M
5) Hereditary - $12.0 M
6) Adrift - 7.3M
7) Hotel Artemis - 5.0 M
8) Book Club - 4.6 M
9) Upgrade - 2.5M
10) Life of the Party - 1.9M
Weekend Releases Rotten Tomatoes Scores
1. Hereditary - 94% SUPERFRESH!
2. Oceans 8 - 69% FRESH!
3. Hotel Artemis - 59% ROTTEN!
4. Won't You Be My Neighbor? - 99% NEAR PERFECT!
5. Hearts Beat Loud - 92% Fa-Fa-FRESH!
6/04/18
Well, week two for Solo didn't quite pan out the way Disney would have hoped. Without any new competition, it hobbled its way to falling just shy of the 30M projection. Overseas, Deadpool 2 actually was the number one film. The speculation continues, with analysts says that the poor Box Office was due to poor marketing, not so much competition or fatigue. check out the article - personally, I dont agree with the assessment, but it definitely was a factor. I will leave to poll up for another week to see what the groupthink is.
As for the new releases for the weekend, no big suprises other than Action Point, picked by one player, performing worse than predicted and collecting 2.3 million (estimate was 5.5), and performing the worst of the new releases, and even worse than Breaking In, in its 4th week of release. It seems like it would be expected, but when you look at the Jackass films (and to a lesser degree, bad grandpa), they were hugely successful - the 4 Jackass films have brought Paramount in close to half a BILLION worldwide (WTF?) and Knoxvilles last flick Bad Grandpa pulling in 152 Million worldwide. This, however, is not those films. If you are interested in reading more about the troubles behind the film, check out the article.
Solo will most likely lose its top spot next weekend with the release of Oceans Eight, but I am more excited to see what the results of the horror film Hereditary will be, as it is currently sitting at 98% positive ratings on Rotten Tomatoes - the reviews all (save one) heap on the praise for this film, so it will be interesting to see if it lives up to the hype, or just be "OK" like the also highly praised Get Out. Horror is my wheelhouse so I will enjoy seeing an original horror film and hope it lives up to the hype, like The Witch or It Follows. We will see!
Box Office Mojo Weekend Actuals:
1) Solo: A Star Wars Story - $29.3 M
2) Deadpool 2 - $23.1 M
3) Adrift - $11.6 M
5) Book Club - $7.0 M
6) Upgrade - (1,457 theaters - 4.6M
7) Life of the Party - 3.5 M
8) Breaking In - 2.8 M
9) Action Point - 2.5M
10) Overboard - 1.9M
- Chapman
5/31/18
It is the last day of May and we are officially 25% through the pool!
We can pretty definitively state that the only two May films that will make the top ten at this point will be Deadpool 2 and Solo - and June looks to be a slow starter as well with 3 new releases coming out that are not predicted to make a significant dent in the box office, with the following week also being fairly tame, with Oceans 8 and the potential spoiler Hereditary, with some early reviews (33), it is sitting at 100% on the Tomato Meter...but let's focus on this weeks new films!
Only one new release, Action Park, was picked by one of our movie pool players. This stars 2 Jackass alumni in a film about an unsafe theme park based on a real-life park in New Jersey. Box Office Mojo has it predicted to make 5.5M this weekend, not even cracking the top 5. No reviews are out for it yet, so I don't hold a lot of faith that it will be breaking any records.
Box Office Mojo Weekend Estimates:
1) Solo: A Star Wars Story -(4,381 theaters) - $30.0 M
2) Deadpool 2 -(4,161 theaters) - $22.6 M
3) Adrift -(3,015 theaters) - $13.0 M
5) Book Club - (3,169 theaters) - $7.3 M
6) Action Point - (2,032 theaters) - 5.5M
7) Life of the Party - (2,511 theaters) - 2.8M
8) Breaking In - (1,682 theaters) - 2.6M
9) Upgrade - (1,457 theaters - 2.5M
10) Overboard - (1,228 theaters ) - 4.1M
Rotten Tomatoes freshness ratings: Upgrade = 84% (87% by the Top Critics) Adrift = 67% (71% by the Top Critics) Action Point = 21% (22% by the Top Critics)
- Chapman
5/29/18
Alrighty then! A not-so-spectacular holiday weekend for Solo - Even with reduced expectations it barely scraped by over the 100M mark. It will make the top ten list for the summer, but it will definitely cause some finger pointing at Disney. They are scrambling right now to determine what went wrong. Was it due to Star Wars fatigue? After all, Solo came out 5 months after the poorly recieved Last Jedi. Was it due to the negative buzz surrounding the film after dumping the original directors and bringing in Ron Howard? Was it backlash to the politically correct/SJW nature of the latest crop of SW films, or as Forbes postulates, is it because it has a white guy in the lead? I actually turned off my ad blocker to skim through the garbage article located here to give you some weekend insight.
Looking back historically, it was a terrible Memorial Day weekend; interestingly enough, Our buddy Harrison Ford (the one true Han Solo) is no stranger to Memorial Day weekend - All 3 Indiana Jones sequels and Return of the Jedi were are released on Memorial Day weekend. The terrible Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull is the only film out of those listed that beat Solo for a Memorial Day weekend opening. Solo fared better than films like Jurassic Park:Lost World and Return of the Jedi, more than tripling its opening weekend revenue, but its also 35 years later.
Vote in the new poll as to what you think the reason for Solo's lackluster opening is!
Box Office Mojo Holiday Weekend Results: 1) Solo: A Star Wars Story - 103M 2) Deadpool 2 - 53.8M 4) Book Club - 13M 5) Life of the Party - 6.8M 6) Breaking In - 5.5M 7) Show Dogs - 4.3M 8) Overboard - 4.1M
- Chapman
5/25/18
Big Memorial Day weekend with the release of Solo: A Star Wars story. I don't know if it is just the years of being burned, but I just am not all that interested in this film. It could be that I am expecting the worst as it has gone through filming twice with multiple directors, or it could be that they have had a lot of trouble behind the scenes - a good review of the events that happened during production is found here -
I guess the good news is that there are no other movies willing to compete with the release date with only a few indie films in a few theatres (that neither Ed or Ted picked). There is still some carryover from both Deadpool 2 and Avengers 3 which will limit the amount of revenue that Solo will bring in. It is still predicted to top the Memorial Day weekend release charts, overtaking Pirates of the Carribean: At Worlds End 11 years ago. It has the added benefit of being released on a record-setting 4,381 theatres and a BO prediction of 130-150 million, although some industry insiders have it pegged for a 105-115M opening. The reviews are looking OK, suprisingly, with most of the reviews saying it was entertaining, but without a lot of depth. That is the perfect formula for our good buddy Devo Borg! It will be interesting to see how this unfolds, but it will be a easy layup since everybody picked it (except Ted). It will only be the second film of the summer to cross 100 million so far! It should have a good few weeks as next weekend has some forgettable releases, with only one film (Action Point) being picked by one SMP player with dreams of a sleeper hit.
Box Office Mojo Holiday Weekend Predictions: 1) Solo: A Star Wars Story - 108M 2) Deadpool 2 - 53.5M 4) Book Club - 10M 5) Life of the Party - 4.2M 6) Breaking In - 3.2M 8) Overboard - 2.1M
Rotten Tomatoes freshness ratings: Solo: A Star Wars Story = 71% (60% by the Top Critics)
Theater count: Solo: A Star Wars Story = 4,381 Deadpool 2 = 4,349 Book Club = 2,810 Show Dogs = 3,212
CinemaScore ratings: Solo: A Star Wars Story = NA Deadpool 2 = A Book Club = A- Show Dogs = A-
- Chapman
5/21/18
Ok this is your last weekend update by Berg, as Chapman is back in town. Until next time..... deuces.
Current Top 10:
FINALLY we get some action this summer. The last time we had a SMP start this slowly it was kicked off by Kingdom of Heaven. Yeesh. Thank you Deadpool 2 for bringing the action, the laughs, and the big bucks. $125M later and it's the star of the Standings. That kind of opening should certainly put it in the Top 5, and its average placement of 3.4 is looking pretty good. Book Club ($13M) and Show Dogs ($6M), not so much.
Next weekend we get another elite release in Solo: A Star Wars Story. Will be interesting to see this and DP2 duke it out over the upcoming weeks.
- SB
5/18/18
Oops still no Chapman this weekend. Good thing Berg has it covered. Whew.
Boxoffice.com's predictions for this weekend: 1) Deadpool 2 - 133M (133M) 3) Book Club - 11.2M (11.2M) 4) Show Dogs - 8.2M (8.2M) 5) Life of the Party - 7.3M (30.3M) 6) Breaking In - 6.8M (29.5M) 7) Overboard - 5.7M (38M)
Rotten Tomatoes freshness ratings: Deadpool 2 = 84% (67% by the Top Critics) Book Club = 59% (59% by the Top Critics) Show Dogs = 26% (33% by the Top Critics)
Theater count: Deadpool 2 = 4,349 Book Club = 2,781 Show Dogs = 3,145
CinemaScore ratings: Deadpool 2 = A Book Club = A- Show Dogs = A-
- SB
5/14/18
Alright, your buddy Berg is back with some analysis of our 2018 Summer Movie Pool picks. Enjoy!
31 different movies were selected this summer, which is 7 more than 2017. The loss of Avengers: Infinity War may have had a little something to do with that, forcing people to go in other (some crazy) directions. Love it! Of the 31 selected, while the choices for Bonehead amazingly get uglier each year, this year we have 5 that are legit Bonehead-worthy, 2 of them being Limited-release. Here's a tip for all: Criteria #1 for making a selction should be "Is my movie going Wide release?" If not, cross it off. Just 2 minutes of research can save someone a summer of embarassment lol. While I stand by my annual advice of "nobody really knows anything", we do know that Limited-release movies will NEVER make Top 10. But hey, for those that choose to go their own way, we thank you for the laughs :D
Here are the numbers that we should keep an eye on for each 'major' movie this summer (Wide release + a minumum 10 selections):
Life of the Party - May 11 10 people / Avg placement = 8.3 / Highest placement = 5 With the move of Infinity War, 10 players hoped to capitalize on our first real option of the summer. It didn't work out.
Deadpool 2 - May 18 68 people / Avg placement = 3.4 / Highest placement = 1 A unanimous selection, wisely so. Early negative fanboy reviews be damned.
Solo: A Star Wars Story - May 25 67 people / Avg placement = 2.4 / Highest placement = 1 1 player doesn't like Star Wars. Interestinggggg. Production troubles be damned.
Hereditary - June 8 11 people / Avg placement = 8.9 / Highest placement = 6 We nearly always see a horror/thriller make the cut, and if it's going to happen in 2018 this could be the one. The buzz is big... but I didn't think either trailer showed the goods. Def a risky pick.
Ocean's 8 - June 8 57 people / Avg placement = 7.8 / Highest placement = 3 We have our big-name female-centric flick of the summer. And the tie-in to the original Ocean's trilogy helps keeps dudes interested. Smart.
The Incredibles 2 - June 15 67 people / Avg placement = 2.6 / Highest placement = 1 Apparently 1 person doesn't like Pixar. Big mistake. The original is my very favorite Pixar of all, and this is my personal #1 choice of 2018.
Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom - June 22 68 people / Avg placement = 2.3 / Highest placement = 1 Another unanimous decision. Looks better than the original JW, which startled up $652M in 2015. We'll take half that this year. Easy lock.
Sicario: Day of the Soldado - June 29 12 people / Avg placement = 8.6 / Highest placement = 7 LOVE the bold picks, but I just couldn't do it myself. The original made $46M in 2015, so the jump to $100M+ may be a stretch. But it is a weak list overall, so you never know.
Ant-Man and the Wasp - July 6 65 people / Avg placement = 5.0 / Highest placement = 2 It's Marvel. Enough said. The original made $180M in 2015. This could do even more now that we are past the skeptecism. And we need to see how this ties into Infinity War.
Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation - July 13 49 people / Avg placement = 7.4 / Highest placement = 4 The originals did $148M and then $169M in 2015 (so many 2015 references), so maybe the trend continues. Or just tanks. Does Adam Sandler even matter anymore? I'm thinking parents gotta take the little kids to see something.
Skyscraper - July 13 39 people / Avg placement = 8.5 / Highest placement = 6 After last year's "confident" Rock didn't make Top 10 (mostly due to douchey Zac Efron) we get "family man / reluctant hero" Rock. A swing movie, with just over half of us banking on this version to bring in the cash.
Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! - July 20 23 people / Avg placement = 8.5 / Highest placement = 6 No. Just no. I had it in my first list and couldn't live with the selection. The original made $144M way back in 2008, and I'm not sure if there was ever a demand for another one.
Mission: Impossible - Fallout - July 27 66 people / Avg placement = 6.3 / Highest placement = 4 The ultimate summer movie franchise. Always a blast. The last one (also in... wait for it... 2015) made $195M, so all but 2 players should be feeling good about the selection.
Disney's Christopher Robin - August 3 17 people / Avg placement = 7.9 / Highest placement = 5 A tough selection with only a teaser trailer to work with at cutoff time. Aside from the Alice sequel, Disney live action versions of their animated films have performed quite impressively.
The Meg - August 10 14 people / Avg placement = 9.2 / Highest placement = 4 I love this selection. Huge risk with only 3 full box office weekends, but could be pretty fun. And comes out right on the heels of Shark Week.
I may not have picked all of them, but these are the movies I really want to see the most in theaters: Deadpool 2, Solo: A Star Wars Story, The Incredibles 2, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdon, Under the Silver Lake, Sicario: Day of the Soldado, Ant-Man and the Wasp, and Mission: Impossible - Fallout. I have MoviePass, so as long as it's still operational I'll see them all.
I hope everyone enjoys this summer as much as I will. Too bad Sponge ONCE AGAIN has identical picks as me. Stop doing that!!!
- SB
5/13/18
Hey all! Your buddy Berg is back with some weekend analysis while Chapman is away on the other side of the Earth. Well, wherever he is it's not the US of A. I know you missed me, and a proper recap, so here we go!
Current Top 10:
Two weeks in and it's Overboard still sitting atop the list. Take a picture, TJV, as this is the last time you'll see it there. Looks like Melissa McCarthy wasn't any Life of the Party, as thanks to an opening of only $18M we've got our first bomb of the summer. 10+ people taking a movie is recognized as a "major" selection in SMP-land, and now 11 players are sad. Thanks, MM. Breaking In was even worse with $16M, and of the three who selected it, xwolf612 took BOTH new releases. That ties Tanner as the only players with two stinkers so far. Doh!
And our Bonehead race just heated up with the addition of ChargersEd's sleeper pick Revenge. Maybe it was a misclick when his entry was made? I really hope so, as $46K is no bueno.
- SB
5/10/18
Coming into the 2nd weekend of the 2018 Summer Movie Pool we have 3 new contenders, all 3 picked by SMP veterans, and marking the comeback of long-time vet Kurt Weierstall. Do they know something we don't? We will see at the close of the weekend but early estimates don't look promising.
Box Office Mojo's weekend predictions
1. Avengers: Infinity War (4,474 theaters) - $62.0 M
2. Life of the Party (3,656 theaters) - $21.0 M
3. Breaking In (2,537 theaters) - $18.0 M
4.Overboard (2,006 theaters) - $9.0 M
...and Revenge is opening in limited release so they don't have a predicition (hopefully higher than last weeks Guardians).
Weekend Releases Rotten Tomatoes Scores
1. Revenge 90% FRESH!
2. Life of the party 38% ROTTEN!
3. Breaking In 34% ROTTEN!
- MC
5/9/18
Happy Birthday to my second in command, Stevie Steve! I couldn't do it without you, buddy!
- MC
5/7/18
Weekend one is in the bag! Congrats to the 68 players making it the second highest attendance for the summer movie pool in 21 years. The prize money breaks down as follows:
1st Place = $500.00 2nd Place = $100.00 3rd Place = $30.00 Bonehead Award = $10.00
The remaining $40 will apply towards administration to the website(domain and hosted server maintenance). A nice haul for the champ. This year we are also raising the bounty with custom trophies for both the first-place winner and the bonehead - expect to see these trophies shortly - they arent quite ready for primetime just yet...
On to the weekly breakdown - No suprises as Avengers 3 once again dominated the box office with $112.5 million, pushing it over the billion dollar mark, making history with it becoming the fastest film to make it to a billion dollars. The second place film, new release Overboard, clocked in at a respectable 14.75 mil. Probably not enough to carry it to the top 15 this year, but much better than the $7,479 that Guardians pulled in (no zeroes are left off that number) - making it a strong contender for the Bonehead award, but maybe they will extend the theatre count beyond the single theatre it was released in. Now that everyones picks are out there for scorn and ridicule, we can take a look at where everybody sits, and start counting down until the end where players see themselves fall out of contention as their movie drops from 3rd place, to 4th place, to fifth. I've been there. It sucks.
If you didn't make the list above, congratulations! you get to sit back and relax if your pics do well as you will have nobody to compete with and not suffer like the souls above who didn't march to the beat of their own drummer, like you have. One of those souls gets the added bonus of coming out of the gate on fire, selecting two films in the first weekend of summer. If the prize money went to, "who is in first place after the first weekend", you would be the winner! Unfortunately, the only thing that your picks got you was two movie pool posters, which in some people's eyes, is worth more than the prize money! Congrats Ted, you earned it!
- MC
5/4/18
22 players with no selections were removed from this year's SMP. We have 68 completed entries. Awesome! Next up... identifying payments. If you still haven't paid your $10 entry be sure to hit us up at summermoviepool@gmail.com to be provided directions.
All non-selected Limited release movies were removed as well. All Wide releases remained so that they don't have to be re-added manually once they make $$$. The 2018 Original Picks can now be viewed in Excel format in the Weekly Spreadsheets page. Enjoy!
- SB
5/4/18
It's 2018 SMP time!!! Registration is now closed, and the Startup Links including the Make Picks page have been disabled and removed. There are 85 listings in the Scoreboard, but 17 of those are 2017 players who did not return. Those players will be removed. Limited release movies that were not selected will also be removed from the Standings to help tidy things up.
Best of luck to those who selected movies this weekend. They are not Avengers: Infinity War, so their box office will certainly be lacking.
- SB
5/3/18
Let's get this started!!! Ehhhh not a strong intro to the summer with the loss of Avengers: Infinity War. Yuck.
Boxoffice.com's predictions for this weekend:
2) Overboard - 14M (14M)
6) Tully - 3.9M (3.9M)
9) Bad Samitarian - 1.9M (1.9M)
Rotten Tomatoes freshness ratings: Overboard = 30% (36% by the Top Critics) Tully = 90% (90% by the Top Critics) Bad Samitarian = 55% (27% by the Top Critics)
Last chance to get your picks in before the site locks down and Registration is closed. ~24 hours remain.
- SB
5/1/18
30 payments are in already, and only 3 days left to get those picks in and payments made. We know the rest will come pouring in quickly. Last year was a record 70 participants, so let's see if we can shatter that record.
- SB
4/27/18
One week left!! The picks and payments are starting to roll in, so don't get left behind. You can enter your picks and then make edits at any time up until game-lock: 5/3/18 at 11:59pm PST.
So Marvel Studios pulled a fast one on us and recently moved our no-brainer #1 movie up and out of the summer window. That's a shame as Avengers: Infinity War is NOT a selectable film (April movies do not count in the SMP), yet is projected to do $235M. What resulted is the elimination of a movie that EVERYONE would have picked, thus creating a more challenging pool. I don't know about you but I'm really having a tough time deciding on my bottom-of-the-list movies.
- SB
4/3/18
Since the 2018 invite had gone out to all players we've had a couple inquiries regarding Avengers: Infinity War and Marvel's late decision to move the release date up from May 4 to April 27. We certainly appreciate the input you've provided, and we'd like to take this opportunity to identify our stance.
Avengers will not be part of the SMP this year, as it moved right out of our summer timeframe. There is precedent, as Fast Five did the same thing in 2011, having moved up from the original June 10 date to April 29. The decision was made then to not create an exception, and we all enjoyed a great summer. Avengers' departure isn't necessarily a bad thing, as it's a pretty safe bet that 100% of players would have picked it, most likely atop their list. Not much competitiveness there. A concern is if studios continue this trend, where do we stop? Two other F&F movies came out in early April, and the highest-grossing April movie ever (The Jungle Book) came out on April 15. If we allow late-April, soon it will be middle-April. And then it will become early-April. At some point we just have to stick to the summer schedule, and if the studios make changes, so be it. I'm personally looking forward to a pool that doesn't included a guaranteed Top Three film that most likely EVERYONE would pick.
- SB
4/2/18
Who's ready for Year XXI of the most awesome annual Summer Movie Pool everrrrrrrrrrr?!?! New banner... check (another great one from Chapman). Cleaned up site pages... check. New list of 2018 summer movies entered... check. Game on!!!
2017 RECAP
2016 saw a 3% increase from 2015 with a total $4.3B, but 2017 sure gave it all back with $3.7B - the worst summer in 11 years. While we had our monster hits in May (Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 - $389M), June (Wonder Woman - $407M), and July (Spider-Man: Homecoming - $320M), where was August?? Not a single marquee film in a month that was led by $81M for Annabelle: Creation. Yeahhhh that's no good.
WW came as a bit of a surprise finishing #1, as it's average placement was 4.6. GOTG2 only missed #1 by $20M, nearly matching it's own avg place rating of 1.1. And Spidey's #3 finish was spot on it's avg place rating of 3.6. Even Despicable Me 3 finishing #4 closely matched it's avg place rating of 3.3. Collectively we weren't too far off for each of the remaining Top 10 films... but where in the heck did Girls Trip come from? I looked back at my initial research and I had it at $44M. NO ONE saw this coming. To think that just $110M would have made Top 10 for any other film this summer. I'm looking at you, The Mummy :( 19 movies so far this year have earned at least $110M, but only 9 during the summer.
Geez, are we looking at only 8 in 2018? This summer we had 12 sequels/reboots with only 3 exceeding their previous installment. 2016 had 14 and 4. You'd think at some point Hollywood would wake up.
For the SMP, once again 8 was the magic number, and we had 15 players hit that mark. Big tiebreaker! And for the EIGHTH straight year we've had someone new win the top prize. Congrats to xfactor (Mike McPherson) for becoming our 15th different person to win in our 20 total years. Things got a little hairy there at the end with the final shuffling, but Mike was able to keep the second-placers at arm's length to win in just his 3rd year of playing. Nice work!
Mike wins the 1st Place prize of $500 - our biggest payout yet!. Brandon and Kevin tied for 2nd Place, so they split the 2nd + 3rd prize money for $80 each. Great work in your very first SMPs! Just emember, EVERYONE has a shot at winning this thing.
And we can't forget our beloved Bonehead Award. Amityville: The Awakening did not make any $$$, so it did not qualify for the Bonehead. That leaves us with The Wall ($1.8M) which happened to be selected by not one or two, but THREE players. Ok we've never had a three-way tie for the Bonehead. This just keeps getting better! Our "winners" Ted Venable, Justin Kane, and Lindsay Pate all get to share the $10 prize. Congrats! lol
Here are our previous winners:
2017 - Mike McPherson
2016 - Curt Perone
2015 - Mario Nelson
2014 - Mark Adolphus
2013 - Ally Mauro
2012 - Sponge
2011 - Kelly Peterson
2010 - Kurt Weierstall
2009 - Steve Berg
2008 - Justin Klein
2007 - Tim Driscoll
2006 - Steve Berg
2005 - Larry Pennington
2004 - Chic Meyers
2003 - Todd Fiore / Dave Logan / Jaime McGauley (tie)
2002 - Steve Berg
2001 - Steve Berg
2000 - Mike Chapman
1999 - Steve Berg
1998 - Steve Berg
RULES
The rules of the game are simple. Select a Top Ten list of summer movies, and then rank them in the order that you believe they will finish. The pool runs from May 1 to Aug 31, so the only eligible movies are those that release within that date range. Your picks AND entry fee must be submitted before the site locks for the summer.
The process for RETURNING MEMBERS couldn't be easier:
1) Log in
2) Make Picks
Those who played in 2017 are already registered on the site. Your User Name should be your first initial + last name (example: TStark). The Scoreboard page has been left open to help identify. If you've forgotten your password just send an email to summermoviepool@gmail.com to have your profile deleted. You can then re-create a new one.
The process for NEW MEMBERS and those who skipped 2017 is almost as easy:
1) Register (follow the criteria listed on the page)
2) Log in
3) Make Picks
The cutoff for entries is the first Friday of May, so the time to confirm entries and track payments will be limited. As such, the deadline for submitting your picks will be the first Thursday of May at 11:59pm PST. At that point the site will lock and no further entries will be accepted. The entire month of April is more than enough time to assemble your picks and submit them.
On May 4 all picks will be revealed on the Current Standings page. Enjoy... and good luck!!
- SB
3/21/18
We are working on a new ShoutBox for the site. Looks like the old one died.
- SB
3/20/18
We're close to the start of the 2018 Summer Movie Pool, and the website is currently being updated for the upcoming season. Now is the perfect time to research this summer's movies and start building your lists. The email invite to 2017's participants will go out soon.
For now, feel free to check out the Previous Years, Official Posters, Photo Gallery, and Hall of Boneheads links to reminisce. Stay tuned!
