Our Fall Fantasy Movie League run is now eleven weeks in, leaving only two more to go.
The week eleven box office was clearly going to go to Thor: Ragnarok again, and the goat-driving god of Asgard was priced appropriately for that. The week’s picks were.
Thor: Ragnarok $659 Murder on the Orient Express $284 Daddy's Home 2 $266 Bad Moms Christmas $105 Jigsaw $34 Boo! 2 $25 Geostorm $19 Thank You for Your Service $18 Happy Death Day $16 Blade Runner 2049 $14 Only the Brave $13 Victoria & Abdul $10 The Foreigner $9 It $6 Subrubicon $6
Competing with Thor for anchor position in people’s lineups were two new entries, Murder on the Orient Express and Daddy’s Home 2.
Estimates on both of the new films were somewhat soft, with those willing to commit to a number sticking below $25 million on each while those giving a range allowed that either might go past that and close to $30 million. But nobody strayed much beyond that.
Meanwhile Thor was a pretty solid bet for $55-65 million. Having wrested the lead of the TAGN league from SynCaine last week, I felt that the conservative track might be best. So I anchored on Thor, put on a pair of Bad Moms Christmas, and then filled in with Geostorm.
My Fall Week Eleven Picks
Going with Geostorm was mostly based on it exceeding estimates every week despite being critically panned as a disaster of a disaster movie.
Thor came in a little low, but still in the range I expected. But Daddy’s Home 2 seemed to be doing better than expected and was pulling up close to $30 million in the Saturday estimates. That was giving SynCaine, who went in with three screens of Daddy’s Home 2 a lead for the week. The only redeeming factor was that Bad Moms was the best price/performer and the $4 million extra that was giving me helped mitigate the strong Daddy’s Home 2 showing.
But I always call those first estimates “the Saturday of False Hopes” because the usually change by Monday. Sure enough, on Sunday the roles had flipped, Dads passing Moms, putting Daddy’s Home 2 as the best price/performer, sinking my own picks to the bottom of the list.
Corr, who pays closer attention to these things, and who was in for six screens of Bad Moms so was keenly interested in the outcome, said early Monday that the margin between the two was thin enough that it could go either way with even a small shift in the final numbers.
However, it was not to be. When the numbers were finalized, Daddy’s Home 2 was the best price/performer and the anchor for the perfect pick.
Fall Week Eleven Perfect Pick
123 people got the perfect pick for week eleven. Fortunately, SynCaine was not one of them. However, his anchoring on three screens of Daddy’s Home the only person in our overall group to do so, gave him his fifth win in the TAGN league and a win in the overall Meta League, with the numbers shaking out as:
- SynCaine’s Dark Room of Delights (T) – $115,590,767
- Kraut Screens (T) – $104,712,521
- Corr’s Carefully Curated Cineplex (M) – $100,919,575
- The Filthy Fleapit (T) – $96,030,514
- Darren’s Unwatched Cineplex (T) – $95,384,287
- I HAS MOVIES (T) – $94,984,586
- Elly’s Elemental E-Plex (M) – $94,252,816
- Ben’s X-Wing Express (M) – $91,751,712
- Dan’s Decadent Decaplex (M) – $90,021,774
- Logan’s Luxurious Thaumatrope (M) – $89,618,203
- Paks’ Pancakes & Pics (T) – $89,093,184
- Aure’s Astonishingly Amateur Amphitheatre (M) – $88,224,634
- Wilhelm’s Films from New Eden – $88,224,634
- TAGN Movie Obsession – players from it marked with a (T)
- MCats Multiplex – players from it marked with an (M)
I was feeling pretty good when I saw that Aure and I had the same picks for week eleven, she having done much better than I overall. Pity we were of like minds on the week when she chose poorly.
That left the overall Meta League looking like this:
- Corr’s Carefully Curated Cineplex (M) – $910,230,456
- Aure’s Astonishingly Amateur Amphitheatre (M) – $889,775,200
- Elly’s Elemental E-Plex (M) – $858,929,007
- SynCaine’s Dark Room of Delights (T) – $857,063,666
- Ben’s X-Wing Express (M) – $854,027,980
- Wilhelm’s Films from New Eden – $834,616,933
- Dan’s Decadent Decaplex (M) – $819,444,618
- Paks’ Pancakes & Pics (T) – $805,922,146
- Logan’s Luxurious Thaumatrope (M) – $794,791,471
- Kraut Screens (T) – $728,356,671
- The Filthy Fleapit (T) – $701,979,852
- I HAS MOVIES (T) – $698,096,697
- Darren’s Unwatched Cineplex (T) – $555,611,337
Corr’s third place finish this week put him solidly out in front of Aure again. Aure, likewise, has a pretty solid hold on second place. The close fight is for third place where this week’s results put Elly and SynCaine past Ben, who went all-in with eight screens of Bad Moms this week.
Then I sit down in sixth place, not completely out of the running, but I need a big week or one of those three to stumble in order to move up a notch or two.
Which leads us to the options for week twelve, the penultimate week of the Fall season.
Justice League - FRI $636 Justice League - SAT $434 Justice League - SUN $334 Thor: Ragnarok $269 Daddy's Home 2 $175 Murder on the Orient Express $152 Wonder $140 The Star $120 Bad Moms Christmas $77 Lady Bird $30 Jigsaw $16 Boo! 2 $9 Geostorm $8 Blade Runner 2049 $8 Three Billboards $8
We have another big super hero movie opening for week twelve. Justice League, like Thor two weeks back, is supposed to open so big relative to the rest of the pack that it has been divided into Friday, Saturday, and Sunday screenings.
The Justice League three-way, along with new films Wonder, The Star, Lady Bird, and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri managed to push Thank You for Your Service, Happy Death Day, Only the Brave, Victoria & Abdul, The Foreigner, It, and Subrubicon off the list this week.
So Justice League seems to be the safe bet, being predicted to open even bigger than Thor did. Putting Batman and Wonder Woman on the same screen will do that I guess.
On the other hand, Justice League is pretty pricey. There is no “three Sundays” option as with Thor. Friday seems like a sucker bet again, with maybe a Saturday and Sunday plus some very cheap filler being my main guess. That might be my last chance to put Blade Runner 2049 in my lineup.
But without Justice League, where do you go? With Thor good for $25 million or so, what do you team him up with? There is The Star, a rework of the Christmas nativity billed as a “computer animated Christian comedy film” starring animals. I guess in a world with Veggie Tales that is possible. And then there is Wonder, where photogenic parents struggle with the problems of a child with facial deformities. Or there are last week’s properties, Daddy’s Home 2 and Murder on the Orient Express.
There are a lot of ways to jump this week.
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