He once said, “King Kong ain’t got sh*t on me!” The legendary Denzel Washington closes out his Equalizer franchise with The Equalizer 3, and in a time when superheroes start to wane and Barbie has already dominated for an extended period, can a good ol’ fashioned action movie starring one of cinema’s best thespians stomp at the box office with the might of Kong? The summer has been unpredictable for a number of reasons, but analysts have tracked The Equalizer 3 a low end forecast of over $30 million in a four-day span.
Deadline reports that the threequel will have to overcome the competition in the form of DC’s Blue Beetle, which is slated to open this week, as well as the video game film adaptation that is based on a true story, Gran Turismo, which will be opening a week earlier.
When looking at the franchise’s history, it hardly broke the bank compared to something like Barbenheimer, but back in 2014, The Equalizer would open to $34.1 million in September and closed out with $101.5 million domestically. The Equalizer 2 became a summer movie and opened in July of 2018 with $36 million and finalized its U.S. and Canada run with $102 million. The Equalizer series is Washington’s only franchise in his entire career.
Washington would reflect on the series and how he finally leaves the character with some sort of conclusion, saying, “I don’t want to say he’s found happiness, and I don’t want to give it all away, but he meets someone lovely, he’s in a lovely town, and he seems to be at peace. That seems to be a good place to stop. I didn’t know that there were going to be three. Definitely didn’t know that when we did the first one. I didn’t know how it would end.”
The Equalizer 3 blasts into theaters on September 1.