Box Office: Joker 2 Debuts Well Below Half The OG 2019 Movie"s Opening Despite Reported $190M Budget [Full Chart Update]

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UPDATE: 2024/10/06 08:28 EST BY BRENNAN KLEIN Joker 2 Crashes Below Original $42-47 Million Projections With a $40 Million Debut
This article was originally written Saturday AM and has been updated Sunday AM with altered box office projections (in bold), a full chart, and further analysis.
Joker: Folie à Deux is expected to debut with a total less than half of the original installment. The DC comic book movie, which re-teams director Todd Phillips and star Joaquin Phoenix, is a sequel to 2019"s Joker, which made over $1 billion at the worldwide box office against a roughly $70 million budget. The sequel, which features multiple musical numbers and co-stars Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn, has a price tag more than two-and-a-half times as large, as the reported Joker: Folie à Deux budget is $190 million.
Per Variety, as of Sunday morning, Joker: Folie à Deux is projected to take in a three-day opening weekend total of $40 million at the domestic box office. This is the total being reported by Warner Bros., though other estimates show it hitting $39 million. Either way, this falls far below the initial industry projections of about $70 million and even Saturday morning"s projected range of $42 to $47 million. This is significantly less than half of the $96.2 million the original 2019 movie earned in its domestic debut, making its budget back over the course of a single weekend.
While Joker 2 still took No. 1 on the domestic chart, the gap between its total and the three-day grosses of the movies below it on the chart is significantly smaller than expected. In fact, the No. 2 titles, the holdover DreamWorks animated title The Wild Robot, has earned just under half of the new DC comic book movie"s debut during its second weekend with a haul of $18.7 million, representing a fairly solid week-on-week drop of just 48%. See the full domestic Top 5 below:
#

Title

3-Day Total

Cumulative (Domestic)

1

Joker: Folie à Deux

$40 million

$40 million (weekend 1)

2

The Wild Robot

$18.7 million

$63.9 million (weekend 2)

3

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

$10.3 million

$265.5 million (weekend 5)

4

Transformers One

$5.3 million

$47.2 million (weekend 3)

5

Speak No Evil

$2.8 million

$32.6 million (weekend 4)

Other than Joker: Folie à Deux, every title on the domestic Top 5 was also on the chart the previous weekend. Making room for the comic book movie, the previous No. 4 title - the Indian hit Devara: Part 1 featuring RRR star N. T. Rama Rao Jr. - fell from the Top 10 completely. Outside the Top 10, Francis Ford Coppola"s sci-fi passion project is also falling fast. After the disappointing Megalopolis opening weekend saw it debut at No. 6, it has fallen to No. 10 with an estimated $1.05 million, representing a shattering 73% drop.
Two mid-level releases that opened opposite Joker are also populating the remainder of the domestic Top 10. One is the YouTuber-led feature Sam and Colby: The Legends of Paranormal at No. 6 with a $2 million haul from just 302 theaters. Meanwhile, the Wonder sequel White Bird has quietly fluttered to No. 9 with an estimated $1.4 to $1.7 million from 980 theaters. The movie has performed staggeringly well with audiences, earning an A+ CinemaScore and a 98% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, so it could potentially climb higher in the coming weeks if it becomes a word-of-mouth hit.
What This Opening Weekend Means For Joker: Folie à Deux The Movie Could Still Break Even Close This disappointing opening weekend total is likely the result of the overwhelmingly negative reaction to the movie. In addition to Joker: Folie à Deux reviews earning the movie a 32% score from critics on Rotten Tomatoes, it has a matching 32% audience score tabulated from more than 1,000 verified users. The movie has scored poorly across the board on popular review platforms, compounding its dismal D+ CinemaScore with a 4.1 out of 10 on Meteoritic, a 5.3 out of 10 on IMDb, and a 2.5 out of 5 on Letterboxd.
This might be just enough for the movie to break even....
However, this does not necessarily mean that the movie will be a failure. While it seems unlikely to build strong word-of-mouth viewership, if it continues to grow in proportion to the original, it could eventually climb to $448 million or higher worldwide. This might be just enough for the movie to break even if it doesn"t crater in its second weekend and is buoyed by the Joker: Folie à Deux cast earning Oscar nominations in early 2025. According to Variety"s box office report, sources say that the movie"s break-even point is likely somewhere around $450 million.
Our Take On The Weekend Box Office Joker 2's No. 1 Status Is Already Under Threat Close While the schedule for the second weekend of October is largely clear of blockbusters due to studios steering clear of Joker: Folie à Deux, it seems that the sequel"s position at No. 1 on the chart is shaky at best. While it could still claim the top slot during its second weekend in theaters, especially if the movies below it on the chart have similar week-on-week drops, it seems highly likely that it will be toppled from its perch in two weeks by the upcoming Smile 2, a sequel to a hit which became the highest-grossing horror movie of 2022.
Source: Variety

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