It had to happen sometime. After ruling the box office for four weekends, Barbie fell to second place as DC’s superhero picture Blue Beetle took first place.
Blue Beetle opened for an estimated $25.4 in North America. It remains to be seen how much Tropical Storm Hilary dampens grosses in Los Angeles — the movie’s top market — and other parts of the Southwest, but Warner Bros. expects the impact to be significant.
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Overseas, the film raked in $18 million from 63 markets for a worldwide take-off of $43.4 million.
It’s understandable why the superhero photo feels a little blue. Not only did Blue Beetle fell short of expectations — heading into the weekend, tracking had suggested $28 million to $32 million — but it also posted one of the lowest openings of any title in the DC Extended Universe, unadjusted for inflation.
Director Angel Manuel Soto Blue Beetle is Hollywood’s first live-action superhero film built around a Latino protagonist and hopes to become a breakthrough for Latino audiences and for Latino representation in front of and behind the camera. Xolo Maridueña stars in the titular role opposite Adriana Barraza, DamÃan Alcázar, Raoul Max Trujillo, Susan Sarandon, George Lopez, Elpidia Carrillo, Bruna Marquezine, Belissa Escobedo, Harvey Guillén and Becky G.
According to exit polling service PostTrak, 39 percent of ticket buyers were Latino (usually it’s maybe 30 percent). The top 10 theaters were AMC Burbank in LA, AMC Empire in New York City, Harkins Estrella Falls in Phoenix, AMC Grove in Los Angeles, AMC Century City in Los Angeles, AMC Puente Hills in Los Angeles, Santikos Casa Blanca in San Antonio , Cinemark Tinseltown in El Paso, Texas, AMC Orange in Los Angeles and AMC Disney Springs in Orlando, Florida.
Blue BeetleSoto’s release was hampered by the SAG-AFTRA strike, meaning Soto’s cast was unable to participate in the publicity tour. In terms of audience response and demo dropout, it earned a B+ CinemaScore and played heavily male (66 percent).
Greta Gerwig’s runaway blockbuster Barbie took in $21.5 million for an astonishing domestic sum of $567.3 million. It earned another $26 million overseas for a $711.9 million foreign cume and $1.279 billion worldwide.
Christopher Nolans Oppenheimeralso in its fifth weekend, followed in third place with $10.6 million.
of universal, Oppenheimer reached another milestone this weekend as it crossed the $700 million mark worldwide to become Nolan’s fourth-biggest film ever. The film ended Sunday with a domestic total of $285.2 million and a massive $432.6 million overseas for a worldwide total of $717.8 million.
Universal’s raunchy dog ​​comedy Roams struggled to find its bark when it opened at an estimated $8.3 million domestically. That was only good enough for a fifth-place finish behind Paramount’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem for fourth place. The final order will be determined Monday morning.
Roams, which also earned a B+ CinemaScore, is the latest in a string of R-rated summer comedies to fall flat at the box office. The star-studded voice cast includes Will Ferrell, Jamie Foxx, Isla Fisher, Randall Park and Josh Gad. Equivalent to Blue Beetlethe photo failed to include the voice cast in publicity plans.
Mutant mayhemnow in its third weekend, earned an estimated $8.4 million for a domestic total of $88.1 million.
August 20, 7:30 am: Updated with revised estimates.
The original version of this story was published on August 19 at 8:03 am.
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