The weekend estimates are in, and it looks as though Thor: Raganrok has delivered a thunderous sophomore session with approximately $56.6 million to add to a franchise best total of $211 million after just ten days of release. Having already passed the global total of 2011’s Thor, Taika Waititi’s well-received multi-coloured Marvel offering has now surpassed Thor: The Dark World’s $644.6 million, to stand at a whopping $650 million worldwide.
Second place was always going to be a straight fight between Kenneth Branagh’s star-studded Murder on the Orient Express (read our review here), and the critically mauled Daddy’s Home 2 (read our review here). The train based mystery pulled into its first stop with a solid $28.2 million for the weekend, which you might have thought would give it the edge over the Ferrell / Wahlberg / Lithgow / Gibson comedy based on the savage notices, but with a $30 million opening, just $8 million down on the first films debut, the sequel appears to be a huge win for Paramount.
STX’s A Bad Moms Christmas is performing in a similar small-and-steady fashion to the first film, grossing $11.5 million, and much like Daddy’s Home 2, will hope to gain momentum through Thanksgiving and beyond. Its domestic total now stands at $28 million.
Aside from the God of Thunder, the weekend once again belonged to the Goddess of independent cinema, as A24’s Lady Bird, written and directed by Greta Gerwig, leapt like Frances Ha down a monochrome sidewalk into the top ten, with a three day cume of £1.2 million from just 37 cinemas.
Equally successful in limited release were Fox Searchlight’s Academy Award hopeful, Martin McDonagh’s terrific Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, which pocketed $320k from four theatres, and Good Deed’s Loving Vincent, which earned $515k in 212 cinemas, and a running total of $4 million.
The rest of the chart was made up of holdovers such as Jigsaw ($3.4 million, $34 million total), Geostorm ($1.5 million, $31 million total), and Blade Runner 2049 ($1.4 million, $88 million total).
Next week will see Warner Bros. obliterate the competition with Justice League, although Lionsgate are braving the water with counter-programming feel-good dramedy, Wonder, starring Owen Wilson, Julia Roberts, and Jacob Tremblay.
