NCsoft

That's good, have to say though in my mind before the opening weekend I had it surpassing TGM worldwide by the time new year comes.

Imagine how crazy that dom\os ratio be if it doesn't have a depressed China market, and with a normal exchange rate...

Canada and US has at least 500 IMAX screens, there's also a large number of other branded PLF screens that are not IMAX.

Total presale on Taopiaopiao is like ¥3841 or ~$550(dollars). Want to see is a truly hilarious 5746 on Taopiaopiao and 8964 on Maoyan. Safe to say no one wants to see it, but hey, might be well received and surprise us.

Really happy to hear that you enjoyed it even more the second time, I'm planning to go for my second viewing in the next few days but not sure when yet. I'm invested in the 2.5B number because I participated in this avatar bet over at resetera which has the threshold of $2.5B, which to be honest, a week ago I thought it would have no problem reaching at all! Right now, I'm feeling slightly more optimistic about $2B than yesterday, we'll see how it legs out. I might be dreaming bigger when evidence of good legs start to show. Oops, I completely forgot this is the review thread I thought it's the Avatar thread Anyway just adding in my score then: It is a 8.5/10 (A-) for me. Visually stunning, part of it felt like an out of body experience, the under water scenery was so beautiful that even as I realized that it was a little indulgent, I was still perfectly fine with it dragging on. But narratively it is messier than I imagined and I wished it was just a bit more neatly executed; I wasn't the biggest fan of a certain character but I loved all of the Sully kids and I thought they were all distinct and memorable. I loved the last hour of non-stop action, thought the final scene with the ship could have been shorter. The ending scene brought me to tears and it was very emotionally effective. I'm invested in the sequels and immediately want to do a second viewing, might like it even better the second time.

Sci-fi imo.

Historic post pandemic moment.

Maybe so for most, but one of my biggest theatrical regret was never seeing Gravity in theatres. It still became one of my favourite of all time.

I still hold out hope for this to happen, and I think it still can! The worldwide threshold to make this happen: $2.068B

Yeah, one can certainly argue that even if Covid didn't exist, China could still underperformed those lofty expectations thrown around. But the current trajectory is insane that just can't be explained by "underperformance". It's the covid situation.

If we count Gravity as a blockbuster (definitely should) It's the closest to BP win for a blockbuster since ROTK, it has the PGA+DGA combo with a locked director win and a sweep of the tech categories.

I kind of want to see a Top Gun BP, Cameron BD (since Kosinski is certainly not winning BD) scenario, making this academy awards one of the most populist in decades.

I'm not talking about the films lacking passion, I am saying the award circle, the critics, the film twitter circle and eventually the industry are collectively showing a lack of enthusiasm toward this movie, to an extent that surprised me. I have not actually seen the film yet, but these type of movies never become the ultimate winner.

The Fabelmans seems to have even less passion toward it than Belfast and I didn't think that was possible. Despite the strong narrative, I'm not sure about Spielberg in director either; I have the Daniels winning, and Cameron might have a shot as well (but could also be snubbed Villenueve style). BP is most definitely between EEAAO and Banshees

I agree, but difference is Dune was a surprising snub that most were predicting a directing nomination while Kosinski is most definitely not getting nominated, he's not nominated even in precursors that nominates like 10 directors..

In the case that WE2 does not move, do you think it is possible that Avatar 2 gets extension and get some screens throughout Chinese NY period anyway?

Seems better than yesterday

Thank you for this post. Speaking for myself only, while over the years I've placed a lot of interest in A2's box office performance, and there's reason for me to feel a little down this weekend. Ultimately, what I want the most is to see Cameron's vision realized and see all five films get made with no compromises; even if their box office performance isn't as lofty as the goal we set all those years ago. Getting such a unique stand alone Pentalogy of films made with such passion and all have something to say is rewarding enough. And perhaps, with exchange rate improving a bit, strong WOM and China market becoming normal again, there could be reason to hope for an outstanding box office performance from A3. Also A2's box office story has only just started anyway.

Well, as an Avatar stan I am of course a little disappointed in the number but clearly our tracking team nails it again!

Although it's like almost 2023, their current mentality toward Covid is about at the stage of summer 2020 in North America I'd say, probably worse even. With time, the mental adjustment toward "coexisting with Covid" will happen, but unclear if that comes fast enough that A2 would reap any benefit.

Yeah, $360M at this point would be a really good number. I think we might observe some really peculiar legs/behavior during its China run, the potential upside I think can still be pretty big.

I'd argue the China range is still pretty wide at $250M - $500M, just because while there's definitely a more pessimistic outlook, but there is also a (albeit optimistic) scenario where as people get more used to Covid, and the fear subsides, as we go into Christmas, New Year, and then maybe get an extension to get at least some showings during CNY (due to light slate this year), suddenly we're looking at a very persistent stream of box office coming in for a long time, with large amount of showing and limited competition ( at least for the first 4-5 weeks or so). This current time is such a peculiar situation it's hard to make conclusions.

Yes, a weekend thread years in the making!

OK after reading all the available information, will have to drop my prediction by quite a bit Now : $165.55M (still on the optimistic side probably, but think I'll stick with this).

Yeah, I haven't tracked enough presales trajectory for CBO but I get the sense that the slow down in China doesn't seem like a normal-ish slow down, it feels like a shocking "coming to a halt" type of slow down.