Despite heavy promotion and some favourable - if lukewarm - reviews, Solo: A Star Wars Story has had an underwhelming opening weekend at the box office.
Early estimates placed the second Star Wars spinoff at somewhere in the region of $114 million in the US, however Variety is now reporting that its take over the past three days is at $84 million with a four-day total expected at $101 million.
Internationally, it didn't fare much better with $65 million taken so far and puts it significantly less than Rogue One's opening weekend of $134 million. All told, Rogue One made $523 million in its overseas and Solo has a long way to catch up with it. The Last Jedi, meanwhile, had a take of $230 million on its opening weekend in the international box office. Figures have yet to be released for its Irish take, but it's likely that the figures are in line with the estimates so far.
If the tracking turns out to be accurate, Solo will wear the title of lowest opening for a Star Wars title to date and could very well jeopardise potential sequels for the movie. Given the huge cost of the film - the budget was rumoured to have doubled owing to expensive reshoots over nearly 70% of the film by Ron Howard - there's likely to be some questions asked at the House Of Mouse over its underperformance.
Analysts, however, are pointing to a general box office fatigue and the fact that Solo was wedged between Infinity War, Deadpool 2 and Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom in the coming weeks. Previous Star Wars entries opened in the winter months, meaning that there was less direct competition for blockbuster audiences and being easier to dominate cinema schedules. It may be that Star Wars returns to the winter months rather than trying to battle it out in the summer months as it has, but for now, this spinoff hasn't made (groan) the jump to hyperspace.
Did you go see Solo: A Star Wars Story this weekend? What did you make of it?
Via Variety
