Nick Jonas, Jack Black, Karen Gillan, Dwayne Johnson Awkwafina and Kevin Hart star in Jumanji: The ... [+]
Jumanji: The Next Level opened with $60.1 million this weekend for a $213 million global cume, cementing the franchise as a rare example of a B-level property being revamped into an A-level blockbuster success.
Jumanji: The Next Level earned $60.1 million in its domestic opening weekend, which is both an insane 3.09x multiplier and or more than what Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle earned in its $52 million Wed-Sun debut in December of 2017. Now that film opened in the heart of the Christmas season, with a $7.2 million opening day on December 20 ($9.1 million including $1.9 million worth of sneak previews) and then went two weeks without a single day’s gross below $7.5 million. Heck, it was the biggest-grossing movie of January 2018, earning $171 million compared to the $94 million earned by The Last Jedi that month. It was the first or second-biggest grossing movie, save for January 29, 2018, for the first 51 days of its domestic release. And now I’d argue the threequel is a breakout sequel.
Even by December standards, Welcome to the Jungle was leggy as hell, pulling in a multiplier on par with Avatar from December of 2009. It did so concurrently with The Greatest Showman, which earned $184 million from a $13.5 million Wed-Sun frame to become the leggiest wide release since Titanic. The Dwayne Johnson/Kevin Hart/Karen Gillan/Jack Black action comedy remains Sony’s biggest (sans inflation) domestic grosser and their third-biggest (behind Spider-Man: Far from Home and Skyfall) global earner with $962 million on a $90 million budget. And now, without the presumption that The Next Level can do it all again, the threequel is off to a ridiculously good start. Directed by Jake Kasdan, penned by Kasdan, Scott Rosenberg and Jeff Pinker and produced by Kasdan, Johnson, Matt Tolmach, Dany Garcia and Hiram Garcia, Sony’s third Jumanji movie is a miracle.
As for “what went right,” Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle was a textbook case of a franchise relaunch done right. It was technically a sequel to the 1995 Robin Williams flick, but it offered a premise (four kids get sucked into a video game and have to win the game as exaggerated avatars) that was both clever on its own and an inversion of the original plot. It had a kid-friendly cast playing somewhat against type and used the video game tropes as fertile ground for gentle mockery amid a fantasy adventure that took itself just seriously enough to be dramatically compelling. It looked like a lot of fun, and was a lot of fun, for folks who had no interest in the Jumanji brand. Cue $962 million worldwide and a much-loved blockbuster that was primed for a breakout follow-up.
Also, unlike so many franchise relaunches (Independence Day: Resurgence, Pacific Rim: Uprising) or origin story reboots (Fantastic Four, King Arthur, Jem and the Holograms) that offered either a rehash of its predecessor or a generic origin story that took the entire movie to get its heroes to the desired status quo, Welcome to the Jungle skipped the rehash and went straight to the zany sequel pitch right away. It didn’t act as a remake of the first Jumanji and then say “Hey, next time we’re going into the game!” It just went ahead and did the cool new gimmick and benefited accordingly. And while The Next Level does play a very similar game, it offers plenty of twists and turns on the formula, including several clever surprises that were not in the marketing (and an intriguing sequel tease).
I cannot overemphasize the importance of the filmmakers notmaking that first sequel into a loose remake of the first one and ending on a “next time, we go into the game” cliffhanger. To the extent that The Next Level was similar to Welcome to the Jungle with a sequel tease for a “new” idea next time out, well, like Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (which did likewise), it worked on its own terms and teased a follow-up that was all-but-guaranteed. And yeah, with a $60 million domestic debut, I think we’re getting Jumanji 4. What’s stunning about this newly re-energized Jumanji series is that it’s essentially the first time that a B-level franchise has been rebooted into an unquestionable A-level success. Aside from maybe (in relation to horror), Blumhouse’s Halloween, I can’t think of another example of that happening.
The likes of Star Trek, The Force Awakens, Batman Begins, Spider-Man: Homecoming, Casino Royale and Jurassic World took formerly A-level franchises (the first two Star Trek movies both broke the opening weekend records in 1979 and 1982) and returned them, if only temporarily, to top-tier blockbuster status. Jumanji was a movie that earned $100 million domestic in 1995 mostly on the strength of Robin Williams and then-groundbreaking CGI effects that brought the book’s boardgame adventure to life. The closest thing that comes to mind is (by default) Universal’s Fast & Furious series, which began life as an overperforming B-movie franchise about street racing thieves and evolved into an A-level franchise that rivals the 007 series, the Mission: Impossible films and essentially anything else that isn’t the MCU, a Disney 90’s nostalgia play or a Star Wars movie.
Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle is still the biggest non-Disney/non-Universal/non-comic book grosser since Paramount’s Transformers: Age of Extinction back in 2014. Even if it’s not as leggy as the last movie, Jumanji: The Next Level has earned $60.1 million in its first three days. Even a multiplier like the Hobbit movies (or Rogue One) gets it to $216 million, while a run like Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows ($186 million from a $39 million launch), What Women Want ($181 million/$33 million) and Ocean’s 11 ($183 million/$38 million) gets it a domestic finish between $286 million and $330 million. It’s almost certain to be the year’s biggest “not a Disney flick or an MCU/DC Films movie” earner of the year in North America, with a solid shot of besting Hobbs & Shaw ($759 million) to be likewise worldwide.
I don’t have overseas updates yet (update: it has now earned $213 million worldwide), but we’re talking about a $120 million sequel to a $90 million predecessor that just pulled a 3.1x weekend multiplier (almost unthinkable for a live-action movie in this day-and-age) and a $60.1 million Fri-Sun gross. I’m not going to say that overseas is “gravy,” but it certainly won’t need a Chinese bailout for this one. And, yeah, in terms of taking once-was-popular franchises and successfully rebooting them into top-tier blockbusters, this level of success is unprecedented. It would be like if xXx: Return of Xander Cage went toe-to-toe with Spectre or Fate of the Furious. Sony now has an A-level franchise that A) doesn’t involve superheroes and B) doesn’t require them to play nice with King Mickey.
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2019-12-15 16:05:21Z
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