Garfield Is No. 1, Summer Movie Season Limps Along

Summer movie season is usually the time of year replete with blockbusters and massive box office returns. However, 2024’s version of the good ole cinematic summertime suffered a major setback over the weekend. And, without a high-profile, new release opening on Friday, May 31, The Garfield Movie clawed its way to the No. 1 spot. Unfortunately, for Warner Bros. Pictures, at least, last week’s top dog, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga slipped all the way to No. 3, and John Krasinski’s IF squeaked by George Miller’s latest adventure in The Wasteland to claim the silver medal.

Chris Pratt’s lasagna-loving Garfield can sit back and actually enjoy Monday this week, because his animated film made an estimated $14 million over the weekend, which was good enough for the top spot at the domestic box office. Anya Taylor-Joy’s Furiosa, on the other hand, lost what should have been an easy race for the No. 2 slot, because Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga dropped 59% between its first and second weekends en route to only $10.75 million — and IF took advantage.

The Garfield Movie

3/5

Based on Jim Davis’s comic series, Garfield is a new imagining of the lasagna-loving cat and his friends, opting for a fully computer-animated approach. Chris Pratt voices the titular cat, with the film aiming to explore his early days and new misadventures for him, his friends, and his family.

Release Date: May 24, 2024
Studio: Alcon Entertainment, Columbia Pictures, Paws
Tagline: He gets bigger.

If the estimates hold, Furiosa will have to settle for third place, because Krasinski’s animated IF’s $10.8 million currently ranks the family-friendly adventure at No. 2, but barely. However, as alluded to earlier, this weekend was a major setback for all movie titles overall. In their totality, the box office numbers this weekend came to only $62.5 million (per The Numbers). By comparison, Memorial Day weekend generated over $101.6 million. But, believe it or not, though, that’s not the worst news — especially when stacked up against May 2023’s numbers.

The 2024 Summer Movie Season Blues

2024 is turning out to be a real disappointment for the movie industry, and there’s simply not any way to sugarcoat the numbers. Consider this weekend’s overall box office total of $62.5 million. Yes, it’s horrible that business dropped off over $39 million from Memorial Day weekend’s total. But what’s even worse is that March releases Dune: Part Two ($82.5 million) and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire ($80 million) made more money over their respective opening weekends — by themselves — than every title this weekend could muster together!

If that’s not alarming enough, May 2024 only resulted in one weekend (Memorial Day) that managed to surpass a total of $100 million. This time last year, every weekend in May of 2023 eclipsed the $100-million mark — every single one! So, does it simply boil down to the lack of star-powered titles this year compared to last?

May 2023 was loaded with moneymakers like The Super Mario Bros. Movie (opened in April), Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, Fast X and The Little Mermaid. Meanwhile, by comparison, 2024’s May roster consisted of films like The Fall Guy, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, IF, The Garfield Movie and former No. 1 Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. Check out the disparity between May 2024 and May 2023’s box office numbers below.

Will Smith Martin Lawrence Bad Boys Ride or Die

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May 2023

May 2024

Whatever the reason, 2024’s summer movie season is off to a rough start. While next Friday’s Bad Boys: Ride or Die and the upcoming Inside Out 2 could both help generate some much-needed revenue for theaters, it might not be until the release of Deadpool & Wolverine in late July that things really have a chance to turn around. Deadpool ($783 million) and Deadpool 2 ($786 million) both performed well at the box office. So, it’s certainly plausible that the Merc with a Mouth’s first entry in the MCU could make $1 billion, especially with all the hype around Hugh Jackman’s return as Logan and all the variants who could show up in the film.

Back to this weekend, though, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes claims the No. 4 spot with $8.8 million, while the record-breaking Fall Guy rounds out the Top 5 with $4.2 million. A total of six newcomers (Haikyū!! The Movie: Decisive Battle at the Garbage Dump, Ezra, In a Violent Nature, Robot Dreams, Flipside, Handling the Undead) dropped over the weekend, but none of them made enough money to even crack the Top 5. However, NEON’s Robot Dreams did boast the best per-theater average this weekend with $16,268 per cinema in limited release (2 venues).