The dinos will have no trouble winning the weekend, but the sequel’s opening won’t match the debut of the first ‘Jurassic World’ three years ago.
The dinos are back.
Universal and Amblin’s Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom stomped into North American theaters Thursday night, earning a promising $15.3 million in previews. As expected, that’s behind the $18.5 million earned in previews by Jurassic World (2015) but is still a good number on its own. Thursday night’s gross was on par with last summer’s Spider-Man: Homecoming ($15.4 million), and ahead of the more recent Solo: A Star Wars Story ($14.1 million).
Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom should easily fend off holdover Incredibles 2 and win the weekend race with a domestic opening in the $130 million-$140 million range. That compares to a then-record $208.8 million for Jurassic World, which, like Star Wars: The Force Awakens, benefited from pent-up demand for a franchise that had long been absent from the big screen. Jurassic World scored the biggest domestic opening of all time when it was released in June 2015, a record it held until Force Awakens debuted to $248 million six months later.
Jurassic World 2, costing roughly $170 million to produce before marketing, has already earned more than $435 million overseas, where it began rolling out two weeks ago.
This time out, directing duties belonged to Spanish filmmaker J.A. Bayona (The Impossible). Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard once again lead the cast, while Daniella Pineda, Rafe Spall, Isabella Sermon, James Cromwell and Geraldine Chaplin are among the actors joining the franchise for the first time.
The story follows Pratt and Howard’s characters as they rush to help rescue the dinosaurs on the abandoned island of Isla Nublar after a volcano erupts. They uncover a menacing conspiracy, however, when the evacuation leads to a secret dino-encampment on the mainland of America.
Frank Marshall and Pat Crowley produced Fallen Kingdom, with Steven Spielberg and Colin Trevorrow (who helmed Jurassic World) executive producing.
Incredibles 2 is poised to do formidable business in its sophomore outing with a projected $80 million to $90 million, one of the biggest second weekends of all time. On Thursday, the Disney and Pixar sequel stayed at No. 1 with an estimated $16 million for a North America total of nearly $170 million.
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