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Max Braden: On paper, that's a big number - it's just on the cusp of being in the top 20 biggest opening weekends of all time. But it still *feels* less than stellar. And looking again at the trailer, the movie just gives off that vibe. You've got a swashbuckler adventure without much swashbuckling. You've got a comedic franchise entry without much comedy. And you've got an essentially ensemble movie without the original ensemble. While Johnny Depp certainly sells the Pirates movies, in the way that The Rock help boost the opening of Fast Five to its franchise's biggest opening, the absence of Keira Knightley and Orlando Bloom siphoned off some of the opening for this fourth Pirates movie. You just get the feeling that this time they're really selling the brand and not the substance. And that's if people notice. I mentioned that I had seen On Stranger Tides to a (younger) friend and she responded, "There's a fourth Pirates of the Caribbean movie already?" Even more disappointing to me is that the fourth Indiana Jones movie - while bringing back both Ford and Allen - actually looked bad, but managed to earn over $150 million by the end of Memorial Day Monday when it opened three years ago, and passed $200 million in the middle of its second weekend. On Stranger Tides is going to have to conjure up some magic to pull anywhere near that in the coming weeks.

Shalimar Sahota: While this opening is by no means awful, it simply cannot help but be compared to the former sequels, which is where the figure starts to look a tad disappointing. I really thought this had a chance of opening over the $100 million mark. Looks like Dead Man's Chest and At World's End have clearly left their marks. The comparisons to the Shrek sequels are valid, but as Edwin has pointed out, the reviews for On Stranger Tides have not been kind, and from those that did like it they sounded like they were just one step away from the fence. I myself found the film to be merely okay. Nevertheless, Disney put together something resembling a story and still got people to go see it, scoring the highest opening weekend of the year so far. Any other studio would kill to have an opening like this. In the long run, it may finish shy of $300 million domestically, but it'll be a struggle getting there.

Reagen Sulewski: Usually, a sequel's box office is a referendum on the last film in the series. With At World's End turning a huge portion of consumers off, some slip back was inevitable. This opening shows strength in the franchise if they can rehab it.

Jason Lee: I think David was absolutely right in his Weekend Forecast to compare this film to Shrek Forever After. Whatever goodwill was generated by the franchise has been killed off by the last two films; all that Disney had to rely on was whatever goodwill could be generated by the character of Captain Jack Sparrow. Personally, I think most people were possessed by a "eh, why not?" mindset when buying tickets to On Stranger Tides. It wasn't going to be a "great movie" - heck, it likely wasn't even going to be a "good" movie. But it promised to be a "fun" movie. After all, Jack Sparrow, pirates, swordfights, treasure, ships, water, battles... eh, why not?

David Mumpower: I am the antithesis of Edwin in that I loved the second Pirates movie. I was with most consumers about the third entry in the series, which had some positives but also far too much Jack Sparrow. Literally. I am someone who should be fired up about a new Pirates title and the fact that I wasn’t made me fear for the worst here. While many analysts were talking about an opening weekend well in excess of $100 million, I wasn’t even certain that this would do $75 million.

The combination of the lackluster trailers Matthew mentioned, the artistic excesses from At World’s End and a general feeling that the franchise needed a break had me worried that we may see a Shrek Forever After type of decline. That franchise fell from $121.6 million with its third entry to $70.8 million for the most recent one, an in-series decline of 42% or $50.8 million in actual dollars. On Stranger Tides has fallen from the $114.8 million At World’s End grossed in its first three days to $90.2 million. That’s a drop of only 21%, half of what happened to Shrek, and an actual dollars decline of $24.6 million. As strange as this sounds, if I work at Disney, I am ecstatic right now.

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