The Boxoffice Podium
Forecasting the Top 3 Movies at the Domestic Box Office | December 4 – 6, 2024
Week 49 | December 4 – 6, 2024
Top 10 3-Day Range | Weekend 49, 2024: $135M — $185M
1. Moana 2
Walt Disney Pictures | Week 2
Weekend Range: $65M – $85M
Showtime Market Share: 29%
Pros
After a multi-record-breaking Thanksgiving weekend, Disney’s Moana 2 continues to make waves, with a large amount of walk-up/same-day ticket purchases by families. With $239.2M at the domestic box office, it is already the #8 highest grosser of the year behind Twisters ($267.7). This kind of momentum means it will be nipping at the heels of the #3 movie of the year, Despicable Me 4 ($361M), by next week. It also entered the global Top 10 of Hollywood movies with a $423.4M cume, below Beetlejuice Beetlejuice‘s $451.1M on its way to toppling #6 Kung Fu Panda 4 ($547.6M) by the end of its second frame.
Cons
We’re looking at a 40-50% drop from Moana 2‘s domestic debut of $139.7M. It is in striking distance of toppling the original’s $248.7M total cume, although the 2016 Moana nearly doubled its business overseas at $437.3M international. The top overseas territory for the first film was Japan ($45.9M), where the second movie will open on December 6, but the third biggest was China ($32.7M). The middle kingdom only turned out to the tune of $7.6M for Moana 2. The best comp for domestic performance is probably Frozen II, which at this point in its run had only made $202.8M, although look for softer numbers for the final worldwide tally.
2. Wicked
Universal Pictures | Week 3
Weekend Range: $40M – $55M
Showtime Market Share: 18%
Pros
Universal’s Broadway adaptation of the Oz-set prequel had a great second-weekend hold of $81.1M (-28% drop) and is still ahead of Moana 2 at $268.8M. It will be interesting to see if the musical can sustain beyond the holiday theater traffic, as our forecast panel projects another drop under -50%. Another beneficiary of the movie’s success was Broadway, which—like the movies—had a record Thanksgiving haul ($46M), with the long-running Wicked show shooting to #1 in NYC at nearly $3M in ticket sales.
Cons
Wicked has only brought in $97.1M from foreign markets, with over a third of that coming from the United Kingdom ($35.9M). This weekend it will finally launch in the robust French market (where Moana and Gladiator are soaring) as well as China and a few Eastern European locations. If there is no explosion in overseas numbers from those territories it could mean a long flying broom ride for Wicked to get much farther than the half-billion mark globally.
3. Gladiator II
Paramount Pictures | Week 3
Weekend Range: $15M – $20M
Showtime Market Share: 10%
Pros
Ridley Scott’s long-gestating sword and sandal sequel Gladiator II has posted a solid run so far for Paramount as well as star Denzel Washington, for whom this is now his biggest global grosser. An additional $15M-$20M generated this coming weekend should unseat Scott’s American Gangster as Washington’s best domestic grosser as well. There’s no incoming competition beyond art house fare like Y2K and Nightbitch, which won’t hold a candle to Romans being impaled by rhinos.
Cons
This might be Gladiator II‘s final frame to shine as Sony’s R-rated Kraven the Hunter will satiate those looking for blood and muscles on December 13. The animated The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim could also siphon those looking for old-world thrills. At $322.3M WW, Gladiator II is still shy of the original 2000 movie’s $451.6M (not adjusted for inflation) and will rely heavily on foreign grosses to get there. For Scott, this has passed Prometheus ($402.4M) worldwide but won’t touch The Martian‘s $653.6M global haul. Still, it is one of the director’s most financially successful efforts, signaling that the 87-year-old has still got it.
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