Box Office: 'X-Men: Apocalypse' Scores Troubling $26.4M Friday

FROM FORBES:

There was a time when the X-Men franchise was one of the biggest around. The originalX-Men opened with the fifth-biggest opening weekend of all time back in 2000 ($54 million) and the biggest non-sequel debut ever back in the day. When X2: X-Men Unitedopened with $85m back in May of 2003, it was the fourth-biggest opening weekend of all time. When X-Men: The Last Stand debuted on this weekend back in 2006, it snagged the second-biggest single day of all time with a $45m Friday and ended up with just the fifth $100m debut ever and the fourth-top Fri-Sun opening weekend of all time.

So if I seem overly harsh on what could be a $75-$85 million Fri-Mon debut, it’s because the franchise was once a god among insects. X-Men: Apocalypse had the fourth-lowest opening day out of nine X-Men films. Opening on the same weekend as two of the biggest entries, the ninth X-Men movie (and the sixth team-up X-Men movie) earned $26.4 million on Friday, including $8.2m in Thursday previews.

That means it did 31% of its Friday business on Thursday night, compared to Days of Future Past ($8.1 million Thursday/$35.5m Friday) which made 22% of its opening day business in previews.

Even with inflation and a 3D bump factored in, it had a smaller Friday than X2 ($31m),X-Men: The Last Stand ($45m), X-Men Origins: Wolverine ($34m), X-Men: Days of Future Past ($35m), and Deadpool ($47m). When you factor in the 3D bump, it arguably didn’t sell that many more tickets than X-Men: First Class ($21m back in 2011 in 2D).

We should acknowledge that Fox and Walt Disney chose to inexplicably go head-to-head this weekend, with Alice Through the Looking Glass opening yesterday as well. But X-Men: Days of Future Past had to contend with the second $38 million Fri-Mon weekend of Godzilla, which arguably played to the same demos, back in 2014. So that’s not in itself an excuse.

I thought this film was great and for me it was better than DOFP(which I think gets wanked), but it seems like unfortunately this movie is going to fall short money wise. We'll see soon on Tuesday the total for the long 5 day stretch(Thurs-Monday) how much it can make this Memorial Day weekend. But, next week it's probably gonna have a major drop due to TMNT 2 coming out. Then in week 3 of it's domestic run, Warcraft comes out. Then week 4 it's all over cause Finding Dory comes out. Then week 5 seals the deal with Independence Day which is going to push a lot of movies out of the theater. X-Men has a very limited time to make it's money so it better hurry.

(Update)I'm not trying to be super negative about this film. In fact I thought it was great and for me deserves to make a lot more money. But, Deadline just posted this article:

‘Apocalypse’ & ‘Alice’ Take A Dive On Saturday As Memorial Day B.O. Bloodbath Continues – Late Night Update

The new titles — 20th Century Fox’s X-Men: Apocalypse and Disney’s Alice Through the Looking Glass—were both down today from their Friday returns, respectively -23% and -11%, which is putting a damper on some weekend projections. Meanwhile, most of the holdovers in the top 10 posted increases.

Fox is confident it will hit its $80M four-day projection for the fourth Bryan Singer X-Men movie after $20.3M on Saturday, and a $65M FSS. Despite being blasted by critics, the studio has the upper hand here on Apocalypse with enthusiastic exit polls (A- CinemaScore, an 81% PostTrak positive score and a 63% definite recommend. The Pico Blvd. studio finds itself in a similar scenario with Apocalypse as they did with X-Men: The Last Stand, where critics loathe it, but audiences are applauding after they see it. A Batman v. Superman situation apparently this is not.

Batman v Superman had a mediocre Cinemascore of B(same score as Catwoman & Green Lantern), and has only a 66% Audience Approval on RT. On the other hand X-Men Apocalypse has a great cinemascore and a 74% Audience Approval on RT. It's strange that X-Men is struggling to make money and could even possibly be a mini flop. IMO it seems like the bad reviews scared a lot of people away from this film. Because the people that saw it, gave it a high approval.

Ooooh, considering Warcraft is predicted as making $25 million within its opening weekend in the US (when its budget was $160 million, maybe more), that must be a bitter pill for Fox to swallow. I imagine the comments will bring up either BvS' shortcomings in the box office or the superhero fatigue of this year as probable causes.

@lukehero: I saw this article.

I think I disagree with their analysis. In fact, I think the critics missed the point with this movie. The lack of "novelty" as they say should be a strength.

Once you have established a universal with its rules and it's internal logic, it's easier to have a cinematic genre that will stay for a while.

The MCU has it, but you have to be a comic fan to perceive it.

The Foxverse is easier to follow (how the world would change confronted to the emergence of homo superior) and there is no need to be "innovative " to manage to go to the next step and produce real good films. Not just CBM.

We are not there yet, but we might.

I can see a "masterpiece" coming out of this universe.

I see only entertainment movies in the future of the MCU.

...

I don't know if I'm clear, but bottom line, there is maybe a risk of having a super hero fatigue in the future.

But there is no risk of people being less afraid of being replaced by a better species or of people being tired of watching a minority fighting against its persecution.

These are two fundamentals themes. They are enough to produce plenty of movies without the need of being "original and novel".

Yes, the MCU needs that's.

Not really the X-Men movies.

...

Anyway that's my personal analysis.

@lvenger: I think the Warcraft movie was a bad idea to make it now. If they had of made it when the game(s) were in their prime people would have been much more interested in seeing it.

Is it bad that I havent watched it yet?

@chichen_nuggeg: No it's great, go see it. But, it's just struggling money wise.

I can understand it. The movie was just ok, had mixed reviews, the entire plot spoiled wirh Fox's marketing campaign, and a real lack of novelty. This one doesnt really have much to sell it on whereas DoFP had the novelty of combining the two casts and was critically acclaimed. At this rate Apocalypse will probably only make a little more than First Class as all the X-Men films have huge dropoffs.

@lukehero: Perhaps but the digital technology and CGI capabilities wouldn't have been good back then as they are now.

It got mediocre to poor reviews, and this after two other recent superhero releases. Hell, Civil War is still showing so there is some oversaturation right now. It could be worse, however, Disney is looking at their first big flop for the year with the tepid turnout for the critically panned Alice Through the Looking Glass.

When did these games come out in the 90's? So no the CGI wasn't there, but they could have made a film by the early 2000's. It seems like in the early 2000's these games were still a big deal. This movie is what based on Orcs & Humans which was a 90's game? Maybe they should have made a game based on a more recent game? A newer game was released in what 2004? And Spiderman came out in 2002? So there was the tech to use to make a good game film. Resident Evil came out in 2002 as well(the movie). Say what you will about the storyline, but the films make money and the CGI is very good IMO.

Superhero fatigue? Not quite, I hope believe this means 80's nostalgia is dead.

Looking forward to the 90's movie though. ^_^

@black_wreath: 80s nostalgia has dropped off since 2011-2012. It's all about the 90s now.

I though X-Men was great.

Not really poking my interest tbh, will probally wait for it to be on TV

i thought it was great !

@lukehero: They were trying to make it for years but it kept getting hit with obstacles which pushed it back. I don't think that will really hurt it either though. I think people are either into the genre or not and it will need a lot more than just the people who play the game to be successful anyhow.

game movies in their prime? lmao they never have been in their prime lmaooooo ,

@birdman400: When Warcraft was in it's prime?? That's what my statement was about.

@spambot: Certain proprieties have cultural capital for a limited window though, they should have struck when the iron was hot. I remember a time when WOW was a culturally iconic; tv shows, internet in jokes, & movies would reference WOW. Sure it gets referenced now every once and while, but it's no longer a big thing.

oh yea for sure but was CGI technology even that advanced at the time , unless Michael Bay was in charge of it , more than likely , it would of been very poor

@birdman400: Well I remember WOW still being quite popular in the early 2000's, they released a game in 2004...Spiderman had come out at 2002. So the tech was there IMO. On top of that Phantom Menace had come out in 1999, and Resident Evil came out in 2002. Say what you will about the movie's story lines, but RE looked good IMO. I think the Leroy Jenkins Meme was around 2005? So IMO if we can use that as a cultural bench mark they should have made this film around 2004-2006 and they should have had the special effect tools to do so(even with no Micheal Bay).

The last two X-Men movies besides Deadpool(DoFP and The Wolverine) both performed poorly in the states. X-Men makes most of its money over seas.

though I agree with your point , I took years for people to figure out how to do a CGI world movie , now you gotta augment the humans and other people , that type of technology wasn't great in 2005-2006

@birdman400: It just depends I think this particular film is based on Orcs & Humans. So because of the Orcs there has to be tons of complex CGI. But, if they made the film with mostly human characters, then they wouldn't need to be so CGI heavy.

Won't matter, Fox will keep making Xmen movies.

Hopefully this lets Fox & Singer know they screwed up and should do better in the future.

But, they didn't screw up. Audiences enjoy the film and exit polls prove it.

Meh. Could be worse....

They didn't..

Agreed. I enjoyed the hell outta this movie.

i this X-men apocalpyse was awesome !

No X-Men movie has made that much money. DoFP is the highest in the franchise and I think it made less than 800M. It's fine.

I'm not really surprised. Apoc has a few factors working against it right now which has already been mentioned enough on this site. I expected it to break $700m and not much more and once it started getting luke warm reviews it kind of sealed the deal on it falling short of dofp numbers. $600-650m is prob where it ends up.