Weekend box office: The Expendables 3 struggles
Brad Sturdivant
August 17th, 2014
Traditionally, sequels tend to open higher with each passing sequel, otherwise, they stop getting sequels. But THE EXPENDABLES has bucked that trend and with each passing film, they perform worse and worse at the weekend box office. The first film opened with $34.8 million, the second with $28.6 million and the third couldn’t even crack $20 million. The films have their audience, but the novelty of having all of your favorite action stars from 20 years ago seems to have worn off. Does that mean there won’t be a fourth film? No. Mainly because the films do pretty well overseas, where our fading action stars still hold a lot of draw. But there were a couple of other new films this weekend, including the comedy LET’S BE COPS, which not only beat THE EXPENDABLES 3, but has actually done pretty well considering it doesn’t have a big name star. I think audiences were starved for a comedy since that was the only one in the top ten this week. However, THE GIVER didn’t fare so well, proving that not all YA adaptations can be box office successes.
Next week sees the release of SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR. It will be interesting to see how well the sequel performs at the weekend box office. The first one opened with $29 million, but I don’t see the sequel doing that well. Maybe it’s just that I’m not that excited about, but I don’t feel like the sequel has been generating much buzz. My guess is that TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES repeats or GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY reclaim the top spot. Note: the numbers below will be updated as they become final.
1. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles $27m
2. Guardians of the Galaxy $23.7m
3. Let’s Be Cops $17.2m
4. The Expendables 3 $16.1m
5. The Giver $13m
6. The Hundred-Foot Journey $7m
7. Into the Storm $7m
8. Lucy $5.2m
9. Step Up: All In $2.2m
10. Boyhood $2m
(Deadline)
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