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Kim Hollis: GI Joe: Retaliation earned $40.5 million over the three-day portion of the weekend and $51 million since Thursday. It also added $81 million from overseas venues. What do you think of this result?

Bruce Hall: Well, don't think anyone's laughing about those reshoots anymore. I doubt adding more Channing Tatum improved the narrative much, and maybe someone can tell me whether or not the 3D conversion accomplished anything more than padding the gross. But hey, it worked out pretty well and instead of having to open in the summer amidst movies like The Dark Knight Rises and The Unnecessary but Generally Acceptable Spider-Man, they get to open against Tyler Perry's Same Old Story. As a result, Paramount was confident enough to officially announce the sequel before the weekend was over, and they get to do the victory lap of TV spots where the giant "#1" swoops through clips from the film. Whether or not this was all part of the plan, a dollar's a dollar. And for the sequel to such a widely disliked film to come so close to the original's opening, that's just a bonus.

Edwin Davies: I view this as a best case scenario result for the film considering that no one seemed to be asking for it and delaying it by almost a year, in a way which was pretty high-profile at that, should have screamed "BOMB!" to anyone paying attention. Having said that, it's only a best case scenario by comparison, it's not an objectively great result. The difference in gross between the two films is pretty small but inflation and 3D-gouging suggests that it probably sold significantly fewer tickets, which in turn suggests that demand was not all that great and probably isn't going to improve in the next few weeks. It's not a disaster by any stretch of the imagination, but it's going to shoot under Rise of Cobra's already mediocre final tally by at least $10 million, which makes this seem more like a successful attempt to salvage a complete wreck than a successful relaunch for the franchise. Now, of course, we get to speculate on which members of the cast will be retained for the sequel, and how many will join the cast of the first film in whatever magical, better land they were sent to. I'm guessing The Rock and maybe Bruce Willis if he doesn't become so disgusted with his career choices that he goes off to live in the wild for a few years.

Shalimar Sahota: Good. The first film was a passable family action flick, but with the majority of the cast not returning for a sequel (as well as a different director and writers), that kind of told me more than I needed to know. I stayed away and assumed others would too. Also, by going ahead with a sequel to a film that wasn't all well received in the first place, I guess Paramount weren't really expecting to top the opening of Rise of the Cobra. So, even if it is a little less than the original, a $40 million+ opening still comes across as a good result. Having the likes of Lee Byung-Hun (he's one cool dude) and Elodie Yung, as well as 3D, means that the film will likely earn more overseas than in the US.

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