Divergent reigned supreme at the box office this past weekend. The movie based on first time novelist Veronica Roth’s book of the same name, dominated the weekend by pulling in an estimated $56 million dollars. This is a good sign for the movie business, considering most think the real start of the “summer movie season” begins in April, with the much-anticipated release of Captain America: The Winter Solider. Coming in second and disappointing fans of puppetry all over, Muppets Most Wanted had an anemic $16.5 million dollar debut. It seems that family audiences must have been divided by Divergent and Mr. Peabody & Sherman, leaving a smaller group of viewers for Kermit and the gang’s latest adventure. It will be interesting to see how Disney will handle their branding and merchandising for The Muppets, since they don’t have the same cultural impact currently as their other properties, like Marvel and Star Wars. Regardless, Disney is set to have an extremely profitable summer with upcoming releases such as, the sequel to Captain America, Guardians of the Galaxy and Maleficient. 300: Rise of the Empire held onto fourth place while God’s Not Dead debuted in 5th place with over $8 million dollars in it’s first week of release. Here are the detailed box office numbers for the weekend of 3/21-3/23:
| This Week | Movie Title |
Weekend Gross | # of Theaters | Theater Average | Weeks Released | Total Gross |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Divergent | $56.00M | 3936 | $14,228 | 1 | $56.00M |
| 2 | Muppets Most Wanted | $16.51M | 3194 | $5,170 | 1 | $16.51M |
| 3 | Mr. Peabody & Sherman | $11.70M | 3607 | $3,244 | 3 | $81.00M |
| 4 | 300: Rise of an Empire | $8.67M | 3085 | $2,809 | 3 | $93.75M |
| 5 | God’s Not Dead | $8.56M | 780 | $10,979 | 1 | $8.56M |
| 6 | Need For Speed | $7.78M | 3115 | $2,498 | 2 | $30.40M |
| 7 | The Grand Budapest Hotel | $6.75M | 304 | $22,204 | 3 | $12.96M |
| 8 | Non-Stop | $6.35M | 2945 | $2,155 | 4 | $78.62M |
| 9 | The LEGO Movie | $4.12M | 2501 | $1,645 | 7 | $243.35M |
| 10 | The Single Moms Club | $3.10M | 1896 | $1,635 | 2 | $12.91M |
This coming weekend there will be a lot more adult-oriented fare including Noah, Sabatoge and The Raid 2. What are you most looking forward to?
Source: Fandango
-Braxter Timberlake-