Space Jam: A New Legacy went hard to the hoop for the weekend box office win, unseating last week’s champion, Marvel’s Black Widow.
The Warner Bros. sequel to the original Space Jam took in $31.65 million to Black Widow’s $26.25 million, quickly unseating the Marvel film (and much earlier than expected).
It appears that Labron James’ Space Jam: A New Legacy was not stymied by the availability of the toon/live action mash-up for free on HBO Max or terrible reviews. Space Jam: A New Legacy currently sits at a deflated 31% on Rotten Tomatoes, in contrast to the 81% Audience Score and an A- Cinemascore (the same grade that Black Widow received last week), proving once again that families don’t care about critic’s views of films directed at children.
Black Widow is quickly approaching F9 (which finished in fourth place with $7.6 million) and A Quiet Place Part II (which finished in seventh with $2.3 million), for the year-to-date box office title, with A Quiet Place Part II holding on for dear life at $155 million. It will certainly take longer than expected for Widow to get there however, having dropped -67% from last week.
This week’s other new release, Escape Room: Tournament of Champions, finished in third place with $8.8 million, as horror films try to establish a foothold at the box office once again. Look for Escape Room 2 to make a profit for Sony Pictures, albeit a much less robust one than the $57 million windfall that the original made.
Check back again next week to find out who the new champ will be, with most of the betting money predicting that G.I. Joe Origins: Snake Eyes will lead the way.