Weekend Forecast for June 22-24, 2018
By Reagen Sulewski
June 22, 2018
BoxOfficeProphets.com

Hello. It's me.
Our proper summer movie lineup continues with a film that's a distillation of all that summer movies have come to be lately – big noisy action, a new wave of marquee names and a sequel that makes everyone think “OK, but do we really need that one?”

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom makes it five films in this series about cloned dinosaurs brought back from extinction that inevitably end up eating a whole bunch of people (guys, I'm starting to have some serious doubts about this project). Picking up where we left off from 2015's Jurassic World, the new and improved theme park has been abandoned to its fate after that whole “half the customers got eaten” business. Now, a previously dormant volcano has started erupting, threatening to drive the remaining dinosaurs to extinction. And that's the end of this idiotic sidetrip of scientific enquiry... wait, what? We're saving them? Cause huh?

*sigh* OK, I guess we're doin' this again and hey, go figure! The dinosaurs get away from us once again, escaping to the mainland, keeping the one good idea from The Lost World. Good job, Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard, you thought the dinosaurs were “cute” and “smart”! The arcane conspiracy from the last film that involved B.D. Wong comes back into play here as well, but really it's all about giant CGI dinosaurs (and OK, that mesosaur coming through the waves is a pretty cool shot) running amok.

Things have definitely changed in the blockbuster game, at least as far as the director's chair goes. Where once this was the territory of big name, established heroes of the cinematic world, now these projects go to guys you've never heard of, since they're cheap, controllable and still reasonably talented. Jurassic World went to Colin Trevorrow, who was mostly known for a Duplass-produced indie comedy and was supposed to direct Episode IX before he backed out. Jurassic 5 gives what's golden to Spanish director J.A. Bayona, who made A Monster Calls and The Impossible, the two of which together sort of make this movie.

Jurassic World shocked the world with a then-record $208 million opening weekend, blasting through what had been a fairly dry and disappointing summer to that date. No such luck here, and despite the joy of watching new dinosaur action, the movie felt kind of... generic and sterile. Is there really more to be achieved here in the venue of dinosaur chomping action? Is Universal greatly overestimating people's interest in the mythos of Jurassic Park (c.f. Whatever the hell the last Transformers movie was trying to do)? All signs point to yes, with no strong indications that it'll be able to hold that massive opening weekend through this movie. What was once the flag bearer for Hollywood cinematic spectacle has been cheapened and I can't believe Spielberg would let this happen why are you waving that copy of Jaws 4: The Revenge at me stop it that's annoying.

I don't think we're quite completely tired of this series yet (it's only just begun again) but I feel a strong amount of buyer's remorse off audiences, and this should open to a still-massive but possibly troubling $145 million.

The Incredibles 2 had a, well, you know, type of opening weekend with $183 million (maybe a little more considering the shenanigans Disney pulled stealing a bit of money for A Wrinkle in Time) and setting a bunch of records in the process. It's almost 50 percent past the previous record holder for animated opening weekends, and gives Disney 10 of the top 11 biggest single weekend results ever (Jurassic World being the sole outlier). While Pixar movies have often had solid legs, the story for their sequels has been larger drops – which makes sense. Is there anyone out there confused about what they'd get out of Toy Story 3 or Finding Dory? I'd look for this to come in with a strong $102 million second frame.

It's a pretty significant gap to get to our next returning films. Ocean's 8 had a sizable drop to about $19 million and is approaching the $100 million milestone. It probably won't get there this weekend, but perhaps midweek, and should get to about $130 million domestic, which would outpace all but the original film in the series. Give it $10 million here.

Tag started off with just under $15 million, which is solid if not amazing for an R-rated buddy comedy and downright blockbustery for a film with Jon Hamm in it (seriously, do people just not like looking at the dude, or...). I wouldn't expect huge legs for this as people rated it as basically... fine. It should grab about $8 million this weekend.

Solo should get one more significant weekend and cross $200 million, which is both an OK result – if it hadn't had such a huge budget – and hilarious that we're settling for “OK” on a Star Wars film. Disney's reportedly put the rest of their alternative Star Wars movies on hold for a bit while they figure things out, so that lets you know what they think of this one. Look for $5 million this weekend. Lastly, Deadpool 2 should grab about $5 million this weekend and cross $300 million, which is probably a best case scenario after that opening weekend. It's a strange world in which two movies collect $500 million between them and have question marks over their heads. Here we are, though.