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Brett Beach: Even with the pedigree of an Oscar winner and a nominee headlining the film (and other nominees in smaller roles) and as grateful as I am that Emma Thompson can write herself parts and not wait for Hollywood to come calling, I feel like this is another Cats and Dogs scenario where the original was successful but not revered and enough time has passed that the family that might have seen an immediate followup is not the family who wound up attending this weekend. We are the last stop on the international rollout and as Josh and Matthew mentioned, Universal probably had the actuaries successfully crunch the numbers for this a while ago. Their feelings? Resignation tinged with melancholy, but a desire to work with Emma once again, nonetheless.

Reagen Sulewski: I'll admit I'm not a regular watcher of the channels this film would be most advertised on, but I saw significantly fewer ads for this versus the original film in the series. They made very little attempt at creating a cross-over market for the film (perhaps resigning themselves to the fate dictated by international grosses). While I'm a little surprised that it fell off this much, this is proving to follow the recent trend where sequels that wait too long to come out pay extreme prices.

Artificial fertilization is not in this year

Kim Hollis: The Switch was this weekend's bitch, earning a woeful $8.4 million. Why didn't audiences take to this romantic comedy?

Josh Spiegel: There are, I'm sure, a lot of elements at play here (Jennifer Aniston being the female George Clooney - very, very famous but not for being a box office hero; the movie being pushed back and back from its original release date; weak marketing), but I want to talk about the poster, which manages to be one of the most obnoxious things I've ever seen associated with a major movie. I love Arrested Development, and by its connection, the work Jason Bateman does. I want to see him get bigger. Frankly, the actual content in the trailer for The Switch doesn't sound that bad (though not enough to make me want to see it in theaters), but his face in the poster is one of the stupidest things that could show up on such a thing. "Oh, honey, should we see that Jennifer Aniston comedy?" "What, the one with the guy looking like he's about to puke? I don't think so." What were they thinking?

Bruce Hall: I’m not surprised. Call me cynical but in my opinion you have several things working against this film that killed it right out of the gate. I love Jennifer Aniston, but like most people who do, I really can’t tell you why. Although I have enjoyed her in the odd film here and there, my affection certainly isn’t thanks to her aggregate body of work, and I am probably the only person in America who didn’t like Friends. Maybe she’d be better off with an afternoon talk show because while people certainly seem to find her likable, lately they don’t appear willing to give up much to see her. I would give a pinky toe for Jason Bateman to be a bigger star than he is, but that’s probably because I reside firmly within the slim demographic that can truly appreciate his brilliant comic timing. For better or worse, he’s a niche actor and it’s hard to see him ever being a big draw as a lead. And am I the only one who saw the trailers for this movie and was instantly reminded of The Back-Up Plan, last April’s horrific rom-com featuring the other Jennifer nobody wants to see? To those of us who follow film, the difference in premise between the two films might be clear but to the average moviegoer it probably seems academic.

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