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Gladiator II doesn't do enough to set itself apart from the original. It justifies its existence but could have been better.
Posted in: Box Office, Movies | Tagged: demon slayer, godzilla vs. kong, mortal kombat, nobody, raya and the last dragon, Weekend Box Office
Weekend Box Office: Mortal Kombat Defeats Demon Slayer In Close Race
Mortal Kombat and Demon Slayer brought quite a bit of life to the box office over the weekend as more and more theaters reopened around the country. In the end, the video game adaptation defeated the popular anime, grossing $22.5 million and scoring a first-place finish. One wonders now if the HBO Max numbers were enormous and if that kept some Mortal Kombat fans at home and away from theaters. In any case, it opened number one, and that is a huge win for Warner Bros. Reviews have been fairly mixed, so who knows if the box office staying power is there, but with this hybrid release, that won't be the true story.
Mortal Kombat Wasn't The Story, However
Yet again, an anime came to the big screen and flourished. Demon Slayer- Kimetsu no Yaiba- The Movie: Mugen Train grossed $19.5 million, helping the total weekend box office to score its biggest weekend since last March. While most of these anime special events are front-loaded to Fridays, Demon Slayer held up pretty well through Saturday, and fans were buzzing about it big time. In the comic shop I run, there were multiple people dressing as characters and going to screenings in town, and it was the film being talked about all week. Cool to see that.
The rest of the top five included kaiju smackdown Godzilla Vs. Kong at $4.2 million, John Wick clone Nobody at $1.86 million, and rounding out the top five Disney film Raya and the Last Dragon, still holding on at $1.68 million. Below is the top five at the weekend box office for April 23rd:
- Mortal Kombat: $22.5 million
- Demon Slayer- Kimetsu no Yaiba- The Movie: Mugen Train: $19.5 million
- Godzilla Vs. Kong- $4.2 million
- Nobody: $1.86 million
- Raya and the Last Dragon: $1.68 million
Next week is all about streaming as The Mitchells Vs. the Machines debuts on Netflix, and Michael B. Jordan's new action film Without Remorse hits Amazon Prime Video.
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