The Batman exceeded my opening weekend prediction of $125 million with a stellar launch of $134 million in its debut launch. Box office business on Sunday was stronger than anticipated and with the film facing zero competition this weekend and most of March, the predictions now turn to how The Batman will perform heading into his second weekend?
Weekend two really will be a test of The Batman’s word of mouth. What’s encouraging is that the film received an “A-‘ CinemaScore from opening day audiences and its audience score on Rotten Tomatoes stands at 89%. Also of note is the film’s current 8.5/10 on IMDB. All of these figures show that the reaction from the majority of the fans is not polarizing and they liked what they saw. Weekend two is now about convincing the uninitiated to see it and maybe getting your friends out again for a second or third viewing. There have been some qualms about the movie’s runtime being an issue for repeat viewings but a quick scan of social media shows that a lot of fans have already seen it more than once or they plan to. If the film is good enough, the runtime becomes less of an issue.
The Batman’s first Monday out of the weekend, per Deadline, was pretty strong considering this was a regular weekday that didn’t benefit from holiday traffic. The film grossed $11.1 million on Monday which ranks behind Spider-Man: No Way Homes’s first Monday of $37.1 million and the Laboy Day Monday of $19.2 million for Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. No Way Home’s Monday played during the December holiday season and that film is also in a league of its own while Shang-Chi benefitted from the Labor Day holiday. In many ways, The Batman’s $11.2 million feels more impressive since it was business as usual for moviegoers, and only the desire to see the film is driving that number. Through four days, as of this writing, The Batman has grossed $145.1 million at the domestic box office.
Despite all of the positives here, I still think that the film will see about a 50% drop and this isn’t because the film is lacking in any way. A bigger start sometimes results in a bigger weekend two drop before things level off a bit. Spider-Man: No Way Home stumbled 68% in its second weekend which seems like a hefty number until you look at other factors that came into play. No Way Home played mostly through the holiday season when most were out of work and school. The weekdays basically played like a weekend each day so grosses throughout the week were inflated. The Batman won’t see holiday inflation but its weekdays will be better than most due to the film being a tentpole release that is driving most of the box office traffic through March. Some won’t wait until the weekend to give the film a shot and will choose a more subdued weekday to take the movie in. A larger decline from weekend to weekend will be expected at that point. With that being said, I’m calling for a $67 million second weekend for The Batman and a repeat number one finish.
The rest of the top five is going to basically look identical to last weekend. Uncharted will take second place as it continues to play to families and young adults that may find The Batman too dark for their taste. I’m predicting a decline to about $6 million this weekend and there is a chance the hold is a little better depending on That Batman’s performance this weekend. To date, Uncharted has grossed $100.3 million at the domestic box office and a robust $271.6 million globally.
Third place is going to be a toss-up and that all depends on the size of the declines for Dog and Spider-Man: No Way Home. Both films fared well against the arrival of The Batman last week, with Spider-Man: No Way Home dipping a mere 22.1% from the previous weekend while Dog dropped 39.%. If No Way Home can achieve another slime decline like this, it’s possible that Dog and Spidey will swap spots on the chart. It will be close but I think No Way Home comes out slightly ahead of Dog with a gross of $3.9 million and Dog wags its tail to $3.7 million. It’s going to be very close. To date, Spider-Man: No Way Home has grossed $786.6 million domestically and $1.866 billion worldwide while Dog has taken in $40 million at the domestic box office and $44 million globally.
Rounding out the top five should be Death on the Nile. If it continues to perform as expected, I’m predicting about $1.9 million for the weekend To date, Death on the Nile has grossed $37.1 million domestically and $115.4 million worldwide.
Top Five Predictions:
What are your predictions for this weekend’s box office results for The Batman?