Masters of the Universe has its first real box office figure. Deadline reports that the 170 million dollar Amazon MGM, Mattel and Escape Artists production took in around 4 million dollars from Thursday night previews, which started at 2PM the same day as the film’s wide release on June 5.
For context, Deadline places that preview haul just under the recent Ghostbusters revivals, Afterlife at 4.5 million (44 million dollar opening) and Frozen Empire at 4.7 million (45 million dollar opening), both PG-13 family pictures built on 1980s properties. In the same Thursday window, Paramount and Miramax’s Scary Movie reboot posted a much louder 7.5 million, a figure the trade compares to Scream 7 levels.
Deadline notes that the core audience for the Travis Knight film, which stars Nicholas Galitzine, Camila Mendes, Idris Elba, Jared Leto and Alison Brie, is expected to turn out on Saturday rather than Thursday night. Critic and audience scores have held up better than the pre-release narrative suggested, with the trade citing 71 percent certified fresh from critics and 89 percent from audiences.
The weekend picture stays crowded. Deadline flags A24’s Backrooms as a possible spoiler that could push past Masters of the Universe for second place with a 32 to 37 million dollar second frame, behind Scary Movie at the top.
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