By It was no surprise when Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 took top honors at the box office last weekend. The Super Mario Bros. Movie might be a financial juggernaut, but it had enjoyed an entire month as number one. What would really signify if Guardians was going to be successful is its second weekend. Thankfully, it seems Disney and Marvel have avoided comic book burnout for now.
In a solid second weekend, the swansong for Peter Quill’s rag-tag group of heroes drew in another $60.5 million domestically and only suffered from a 49% drop-off in ticket sales. While that number sounds bad, it’s actually pretty average as far as blockbusters go. In terms of other MCU films, the only other films to not suffer massive second-weekend dips were Thor and Black Panther, which dropped 47% and 45% respectively. For comparison, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, and Thor: Love and Thunder saw dips close to 70%.
As far as the rest of the box office goes, it should be obvious which film took second place. The brothers Mario just cannot be stopped, it seems. In third came Book Club: The Next Chapter, which opened to much less traction than expected with a $6.5 million debut. Its predecessor opened to more than double that in 2018 with $14 million, so something is up.
Here is how the top ten panned out this weekend:
- Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 – $60.5 million
- The Super Mario Bros. Movie – $13 million
- Book Club: The Next Chapter – $6.5 million
- Evil Dead Rise – $3.7 million
- Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret – $2.5 million
- Hypnotic – $2.3 million
- John Wick: Chapter 4 – $1.9 million
- Love Again – $1.5 million
- Air – $768,000
- Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves – $741,000
