Weekend predictions: Bad Boys riding towards respectable $40-million-plus opening

This is looking like a glass-half-full kind of weekend at the box office. Bad Boys: Ride or Die doesn’t look it will match Bad Boys for Life at the box office, but it does look as though it will have the best opening weekend since Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes with something around $45 million. Meanwhile, The Watchers looks as though it will have a respectable debut.

Here’s what our model thought of Bad Boys’ prospects going into the weekend:

Given the current strength of the market, $45 million is a par score for Ride or Die compared to the previous installment in the franchise, which came out just before the pandemic hit in 2020 (and incidentally up as the top-grossing film of the year). Our audience tracking predicted something a little higher, and several surveys have suggested an opening over $50 million.

Thursday’s preview numbers don’t rule that out:

Generally, films like this have been a little more front-loaded on opening weekend compared to prior to the pandemic, and our model thinks a weekend of $44 million is what we should expect at this stage. If its multiplier is as high as Bad Boys for Life’s, it’ll come in with around $57.75 million. That, I think, is a high-end possibility, but $50 million isn’t out of the question. It would be only the fifth film to earn that much on its first weekend in 2024 if it could manage that. Fingers crossed, it will at least come close.

The Watchers had more modest ambitions:

There’s a consensus that the studios have released too many horror movies recently, but this one is holding up well compared to recent openings:

The goal for The Watchers at this point is really $10 million.

Here’s what the model thinks that top 10 will look like.

With really very little competition, Ride or Die will stand head and shoulders above any other film playing in theaters this weekend. The Watchers has a decent chance of finishing second, which is more an indictment of it competition than anything else.

For the weekend as a whole, a total market size above $100 million looks on the cards. That shouldn’t even be a question at this time of year, but it’s not a done deal yet, and we’ve only one such weekend since March.

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Bruce Nash, bruce.nash@the-numbers.com