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Kim Hollis: Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 debuted with $34 million this weekend. What do you think of this result?

Jason Barney: While it did not open to the high end of tracking estimates, this is still a good, successful start for the sequel. $34 million is a very strong start for this kids flick, and it ensures positive outcomes on a number of fronts. The likelihood that Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 makes money is a virtual certainty now, based on this one being cheaper than the original. The opening is only slightly larger than the original, but that is fine, as it cost significantly less. This opening is also good for Hollywood, as I think the only other film to open north of $35 million since late July was Insidious 2. That is a pretty significant drought.

Brett Ballard-Beach: I was all set to write this opening off as more than a little disappointing, until I read about how significantly cheaper this was in relation to the first (at $78 million, about 25% less) and tempered my reaction by remembering that September is still one of the two slowest box office months - along with January - and that a $35 million start is nothing to achoo at. It has no competition for five more weeks and even then should be in play until Thanksgiving, but I am more than a little befuddled at this not being bigger. With the goodwill and long legs of the first one, and ad campaigns that seemed perfectly engineered for selling a sequel - more of what you liked from the first, but also lots of new stuff - and being the first animated film since Despicable Me 2 with the ability to get adults outside of those coming in with kids, the fact that this still wasn't all that close to Hotel Transylvania stymies me.

Felix Quinonez: I can't help but feel that this is a bit of a disappointment. With the general goodwill of the first film and the marketing done on this one I feel like it should have done at least a little better than this. Given what we know about how sequels perform, I think this one will end up lower domestically. I understand that the budget was lowered for this so it doesn't have to make as much as the first one but I really don't think any one makes movies to break even or make a little bit of money.

Bruce Hall: This is welcome news for Sony, after what I would charitably call a "quiet" summer. $35 million doesn't feel very earth shattering after a very active blockbuster season, but it puts the movie in the top five September openings of all time, and is actually just a tad more than the original movie earned in 2009. The last major animated title, Planes, is two months behind us, and Cloudy is going to have the family film space to itself until November. I doubt we'll talk about this movie again but if we do, it'll probably be to discuss the tidy little profit it made.

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