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

[kayumanggi]

25 minutes ago, Mojoguy said:

Xenos on Earth. That was suppose to be the plot of Alien 3 until they chickened out.

 

This is the route they should go if a sequel gets greenlit.

[wattage]

4 minutes ago, Mulder said:

The latest budget for Romulus is 80 million so even if it's 'just' 40, that's half its budget right there with a (Going by this thread) unexpectedly good debut in China. I think it'll be fine.

Yeah not many are talking about it but the debut is looking like it's gonna be strong, it had a good first day and what I've seen of the user scores is pretty good. The advantage that Aliens has is that horror isn't really a genre that is created a lot in their domestic market, so it'll get a lot more interest and potential longevity. A lot of other movies are competing with local movies in the same genres.  It has that edge over most other Hollywood product in China in this more lukewarm marketplace. 

[Ryan C]

3 minutes ago, Eric Ripley said:

Will say that I was always skeptical over the 50M/60M projections people were making for Romulus. Alien has always been a niche, fan-driven property, and there was little I saw in the marketing that helped make it crossover to non-fans. But I mean, 40M+ is still a great result for a franchise that just hit its lowest financial point a few years ago and peaked back in the 80s. Plus the soft reboot and clean slate approach will probably help a potential sequel and the franchise in general going forward. I don't think Disney needs to fret here.

 

A few weeks ago, I was really thinking Romulus could hit those $50M-$60M projections, but once you brought up that comparison to Furiosa in the pre-sale thread, I started lowering my expectations for it. I didn't want to start thinking that this could hit numbers that seemed pretty unrealistic in the grand scheme of things. Then I expected it to at least hit $50M and now it looks like it'll end up just over $40M.

 

In relation to its $80M budget, a $40M+ opening is still good, but I guess it's just disappointing in the sense that we've had so many walk-up heavy movies this summer that I guess people just automatically expected this one to have that same kind of business. Though really looking at it, I guess Alien is just one of those franchise that has a big fanbase, but unfortunately can't seem to punch beyond it's own weight. 

 

Personally, if I were Disney or 20th Century, I'd go into a direction that involves having horror-centic filmmakers directing their own Alien movie and letting them have most if not all of the creative freedom they want. Learn from Fox's mistakes when they handled the Alien franchise and just let the directors do what they can with the xenomorphs and the Alien universe. Keep the budgets relatively in check and I think Disney can have a reliable horror franchise through the 20th Century brand. 

[Cooper Legion]

20 minutes ago, Ryan C said:

 

Yeah, Alien: Covenant fell 70% weekend two and having to lose all its PLF screens to Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales certainly didn't help it hold better. 

 

For me, I'm just hoping that $100M domestically is still attainable even if it comes below $45M this weekend. I say it still is, but it can't drop 70% next weekend. 

42

13

18 // 73 with 31 wk, ezpz  

 

More pessimistic:

40

12

16 // 68 with 28 wk, should still hit 100 with Labor Day    
 

Maybe like 110-125ish?

[AMC Theaters Enjoyer]

Damn, guess my club is dead.

[Ryan C]

1 minute ago, AMC Theaters Enjoyer said:

Damn, guess my club is dead.

 

Yeah, but your club was still a lot more realistic than some of the other ones I've seen on here. Don't feel too bad about it. 

[Cooper Legion]

Tbf clubs are not exactly supposed to be realistic

[Cmasterclay]

[Unfitclock]

Damn I was expecting it to be frontloaded but I at the very least expected it to do 2x previews for true Friday even scream 6 and insidious 5 and nope did that but this is like marvel movie level frontloaded

[charlie Jatinder]

Wait how is $40M disappointing? It was tracking in the 30s. This is overperforming.

Also OS looks good. Will be $100M+ WW weekend.

[Kon]

43 minutes ago, Yollten said:

Ouch, that's some pretty nasty frontloading.

 

Still if you offered me a $40m OW a month ago I would've been pretty impressed. Add that this is the first Alien movie that seems to be widely liked since....Aliens? and it might leg out.

Even if the reception is good, I really doubt Alien Romulus will have really good legs. It seems the kind of movie who only incite interest to their fanbase.

 

It will need new audience to have good legs.

[Kon]

2 minutes ago, charlie Jatinder said:

Wait how is $40M disappointing? It was tracking in the 30s. This is overperforming.

Also OS looks good. Will be $100M+ WW weekend.

People expectations were too big after they see the previews.

 

The walkups seem to be a bit dissapointed for this movie.

Edited August 17 by Kon

[ZattMurdock]

2 minutes ago, charlie Jatinder said:

Wait how is $40M disappointing? It was tracking in the 30s. This is overperforming.

Also OS looks good. Will be $100M+ WW weekend.

I mean other than me saying that I saw this potentially blowing up on walk ups, I haven’t seen many people expecting much higher than $50m. I think Charlie has a point here.

[Cooper Legion]

40m instead of 50 is same % as 160 instead of 200. It’s not a disaster or anything but there was plenty of reasonable info to base somewhat higher hopes on

[ThomasNicole]

Just got out of remastered Coraline, the screenings are sold out for the whole weekend.

 

Truly a modern classic, still have the same magic that it had when i was a kid.
 

Insane how the animation didn’t aged a bit. The remaster are absolutely gorgeous and the 3D is fabulous (a rare accomplishment).

I’m very happy to see actual effort in keeping the movie alive without having to do sequels or live action remakes, which is why i’m so happy with the success.

 

FRI seems stronger than what i was expecting, maybe it can try 11M for the weekend. Hoping they’ll release worldwide stats on SUN.

 

 

[ThomasNicole]

I was hoping for more for Romulus, still 41-42M is more than good enough for a franchise that is obviously niche. 
 

Since they learned to be responsible with their budgets, the franchise will be fine. 
 

Movies that skew older usually have good legs when well received, which seems to be the case here. 
 

Still expecting 110-120M DOM / 300M WW

[charlie Jatinder]

It's funny. I asked someone before the weekend that Alien gonna have $6.5M previews, what will be their weekend expectations? I was hoping to surprise them  but they gave out $35-40M. 

 

So I don't think its even unexpected. 

Before Thursday, I was starting to think of possibility just below $40M but it managed to escape that.

Edited August 17 by charlie Jatinder

[JohnnyGossamer]

32 minutes ago, charlie Jatinder said:

Wait how is $40M disappointing? It was tracking in the 30s. This is overperforming.

Also OS looks good. Will be $100M+ WW weekend.

Yeah. This. Budget was only 80M too. This will definitely turn a profit from theatrical release. Expectations got out of hand.

[BadOlCatSylvester]

Romulus is doing as well as it could've under the stench of Sir Ridley's highly controversial prequels. It would be opening a lot higher had those not been made, but it should still make a profit without much issue. Hopefully future movies end up doing better now that audience confidence in the Alien brand is seemingly being restored.

[THUNDER BIRD]

4 hours ago, TMP said:

I get that this forum is largely a place to discuss the financial metrics of a movie’s performance, but i have no idea why you’d want Furiosa to be a worse movie just so it’d be more commercially viable. Like surely we should be happy a movie as bold and artistically rich as that even exists at all, especially in a summer movie season as dry as this one was. Just feels weird to have so much cynicism over something that’s so clearly an artistic passion project which paid off (quality wise at least) just because audiences didn’t turn up

Because quality is subjective, box office is only place you can judge how a movie did with audience. 

 

So you can discuss what could've made it more enticing to audience. 

 

And it's not about quality, but that if audience didn't turn up then they didn't think it was worth their time & money.