Weekend thread August 16th-18th Alien Romulus $6.5m previews

[Ryan C]

3 minutes ago, filmlover said:

Furiosa flopped because it arrived way too late to take advantage of whatever lingering goodwill Fury Road had nearly a decade later and on top of that was a prequel with a whole new cast. The draw for the Alien franchise will always be...well, the aliens.

 

It also helps that Alien: Romulus (despite taking place between the events of Alien and Aliens) isn't really a prequel or a sequel. It's being sold as half another Alien movie (but actually good) and half another big-budget horror film set in space and filled with blood, gore, and practical effects. 

 

Those things and having both a new younger cast and a new director who isn't just Ridley Scott again is what is helping this movie open as strongly as it is right now. 

 

Also, it's arguably even more impressive with the fact that this movie was originally going to be sent straight to Hulu. 

[SnokesLegs]

18 minutes ago, Eric Ripley said:

 

Justin LaLiberty lies. He learned that Sigourney Weaver is better at basketball than 99% of the NBA.

[ringedmortality]

Just now, Ryan C said:

 

It also helps that Alien: Romulus (despite taking place between the events of Alien and Aliens) isn't really a prequel or a sequel. It's being sold as half another Alien movie (but actually good) and half another big-budget horror film set in space and filled with blood, gore, and practical effects. 

 

Those things and having both a new younger cast and a new director who isn't just Ridley Scott again is what is helping this movie open as strongly as it is right now. 

 

Also, it's arguably even more impressive with the fact that this movie was originally going to be sent straight to Hulu. 

 

Alien has also been a bigger franchise than the Mad Max one.

 

Kind of weird how Disney made two films to revive the Alien and Predator franchise and both were well received. It really is a shame Prey never got released in theaters. I think it could have matched The Predator's numbers at the very least, but that would have made it more of a success considering the lower budget.

[Gavin Feng]

China is doing good business with Alien. $18~20M opening weekend. Lifetime record ($43M) for the franchise is coming.

[ThomasNicole]

Not sure if Alien will be much more frontloaded than AQP … if WOM is truly good like it’s appearing to be, it can try 50M

 

But yeah likely 47M or so

 

Great result for 80M budget, should have good legs too

[CJohn]

41 minutes ago, Cmasterclay said:

I had this doing 25m OW the entire summer until the presale surge, so certainly above my expectations for what I thought was a Furiosa esque dead old white person franchise. Should probably get 100m with no real competition.

You forget Furiosa was a prequel with an entire new cast and with no actual Mad Max. The main star of Alien was right there in all of the marketing.

[Ryan C]

7 minutes ago, ringedmortality said:

 

Alien has also been a bigger franchise than the Mad Max one.

 

Kind of weird how Disney made two films to revive the Alien and Predator franchise and both were well received. It really is a shame Prey never got released in theaters. I think it could have matched The Predator's numbers at the very least, but that would have made it more of a success considering the lower budget.

 

I think Prey would've done well in theaters, but I also don't think it would've made as much money as Romulus is probably going to. 

 

Predator is even more niche of a franchise than Alien (it's just the first movie that is fondly remembered) and I don't think the bad taste from 2018's The Predator would've been completely gone. Though maybe a bit more appealing, Predator is definitely more akin to Mad Max as a franchise than Alien. 

Edited August 16 by Ryan C

[ringedmortality]

Just now, CJohn said:

You forget Furiosa was a prequel with an entire new cast and with no actual Mad Max. The main star of Alien was right there in all of the marketing.

 

I agree. Spaeny is so hot.

[ThomasNicole]

Insane for Coraline

 

it’s expanding for the weekend, and showtimes should be added due to sellouts 

 

I think it’s definitely doing +10M by SUN

[Eric the Marxist]

9 minutes ago, SnokesLegs said:

Justin LaLiberty lies. He learned that Sigourney Weaver is better at basketball than 99% of the NBA.

She actually didn't intend to make that final shot. She just got it in because she's that fucking awesome.

 

 

[ZattMurdock]

 

[Litio]

Does anyone know what time the Alien Romulus previews started yesterday?

[Ryan C]

4 minutes ago, Litio said:

Does anyone know what time the Alien Romulus previews started yesterday?

 

They started at 3:00PM.

[Eric the Marxist]

25 minutes ago, filmlover said:

Furiosa flopped because it arrived way too late to take advantage of whatever lingering goodwill Fury Road had nearly a decade later and on top of that was a prequel with a whole new cast. The draw for the Alien franchise will always be...well, the aliens.

 

8 minutes ago, CJohn said:

You forget Furiosa was a prequel with an entire new cast and with no actual Mad Max. The main star of Alien was right there in all of the marketing.

To be fair, the first four movies had Sigourney Weaver, who is just as, if not more synonymous with Alien than the xenomorphs. And even with Prometheus, Michael Fassbender was all over the advertising, and he was fresh off both Inglorious Basterds and X-Men at the time. I think it was fair to say a cast full of no-name actors for a franchise that always had at least one recurring and popular actor could have been trouble. Especially since said franchise hasn't had a big crowdpleaser success since the Reagan administration. But I guess Clay and I were wrong.

[titanic2187]

Alien franchise survive because it is also act like a monster flick to some. They are comparable to Jurassic franchise, monsterverse or Meg. That give some longevity to the franchise whereas dystopian action flick is harder to keep GA interested. 

[Blankments]

58 minutes ago, filmlover said:

Fantastic debuts for Alien and Coraline. The latter's going to post one of the bigger debuts for a re-release in a while, impressive considering it's a much newer movie than the majority of the other titles that have been reissued lately.

Nostalgia keeps getting newer and avatar 2 revitalized interest in good 3D which Coraline was always a poster child of and it’s like impossible to access the 3D at home too

 

cool for it tho don’t want to deride that

[Cmasterclay]

34 minutes ago, CJohn said:

You forget Furiosa was a prequel with an entire new cast and with no actual Mad Max. The main star of Alien was right there in all of the marketing.

Ehhh? Ripley/Signourey is kind of important to Alien lol. More importantly, I don't know too many hip, non-white people talking about fucking Alien nowadays, seems just as square as Mad Max, which is my general point. But I can't claim to have my fingers directly on the pulse or anything.

Edited August 16 by Cmasterclay

[Ryan C]

Just to point this out, another reason why the Alien franchise is way more appealing/popular than Mad Max is due to the amount of movies that were released. 

 

Mad Max only had three movies between 1979 and 1985. Then 30 years later comes Mad Max: Fury Road with another 9 year gap until Furiosa. 

 

Compare that to Alien which had a movie in 1979, 1986, 1992, and 1997. Then you had both Alien vs. Predator movies from 2004 and 2007, and then Prometheus in 2012 and Alien: Covenant in 2017. 

 

Regardless of the gaps between the movies or if they were successful or not, Alien has always been relavant throughout the decades in one way or another. The same just can't be said for Mad Max which isn't good for a franchise whose appeal is incredibly niche. 

[Ryan C]

Just now, Cmasterclay said:

Ehhh? Ripley/Signourey is kind of important to Alien lol. More importantly, I don't know too many hip, non-white people talking about Alien nowadays, seems just as square as Mad Max, which is my general point. But I can't claim to have my fingers directly on the pulse or anything.

 

Sigourney Weaver's Ripley will always be important to Alien, but it's honestly kind of nice to see a franchise that's been going on for this long not go in the traditional legacy sequel route of bringing her back to fight xenomorphs again. 

 

That would've happened by now (especially if either Fox or Disney wanted to turn this into the next Star Wars), but it's a genuinely good thing that this franchise can still get by without the need of Ripley or even Ridley Scott. 

[Litio]

23 minutes ago, Ryan C said:

 

They started at 3:00PM.

Thank you! Same as AQP:DO.
 

Thinking high 40s OW, but hoping for $50m. 

Based on the numbers that came out and the reception, $300m+ WW seems quite likely.

Edited August 16 by Litio