Posted in: Movies, Wonder Woman | Tagged: box office, dark universe, dc, dceu, gal gadot, marvel, mcu, patty jenkins, The Mummy, tom cruise, universal, wonder woman

Report: Wonder Woman Is Expected To Bury The Mummy At The Box Office This Weekend

Wonder Woman's massive success may be causing some trouble for the first film in Universal's beleaguered Dark Universe. The Mummy, directed by Alex Kurtzman and starring Tom Cruise, Sofia Boutella, Russell Crowe, Annabelle Wallis, Jake Johnson, and Courtney B. Vance, has seen its opening weekend projections downgraded from $40 million to $38 million to $35 million this week, according to a report from THR. The troubles come on the heels of a $100.5 million domestic opening weekend for Patty Jenkins' Wonder Woman, breaking the record for highest opening weekend by a female director by a huge margin and completely changing the narrative of the DC superhero movie universe, positioning the DCEU as a leader to Marvel's aging MCU, which has gone fifteen movies without a single film starring a woman in the lead role or directed by a woman, and plans to go another five before Captain Marvel hits theaters in 2019.

Wonder Woman is projected to make as much as $50 million dollars next weekend, which would make it the number one movie for the second weekend in a row and indicate strong staying power. Universal will have to hope The Mummy does well internationally to make up for the deficit, but it's worth noting that Wonder performed even better overseas, bringing in $122.5 million outside the United States.

Perhaps the fate of Universal's shared monsterverse is the result of a real life mummy's curse. The studio recently unveiled the Dark Universe name for their cinematic universe, and though they appear to have held the trademark for years, Dark Universe was most frequently known as the upcoming DC film also known as Justice League Dark, featuring DC's supernatural character. That movie was originally set to be directed by Guillermo Del Toro, but both he and his replacement, Doug Liman, later dropped off the project. Could Universal have taken on that negative energy, along with the stink of Man of Steel and Batman v. Superman, allowing Wonder Woman to usher in a figurative Rebirth for the DCEU while dooming Universal's franchise before it even started?

We'll find out when The Mummy hits theaters this weekend, and we all go see Wonder Woman a second time instead.

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