'Ninja Turtles 2' Opens #1 With Soft $35M While 'Zootopia' Crosses $1 Billion Worldwide
The first weekend in June 2016 played out mostly as expected, with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows taking the #1 spot followed by last weekend's first place finisher, X-Men: Apocalypse. Warner's Me Before You, however, did manage to break out well above expectations while Universal's Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping may have received great reviews, but couldn't find much of an audience. Overall, the weekend was a wash compared to last year with estimates for the top twelve coming in just $56,118 higher than last year's actuals, but there are still some highlights to discuss despite something of a slow start to a sequel driven June.

Paramount's Ninja Turtles 2 brought in an estimated $35.25 million, which, as discussed in our weekend preview, puts the film pretty much right on the average for so many of today's sequels based on the original film's performance. In the case of Ninja Turtles, this is a 46% drop from the 2014 film's $65.5 million opening. Considering the $135 million budget for Turtles 2 is $10 million more than was spent on the original, that's not exactly what the studio was hoping for when they flipped the green light.

The sequel is now looking to bring in $90 million or so domestically, which is around $100 million less than the original. Of course, box office grosses are just half the story with a film like this as ancillary merchandise is a big revenue driver for a film of this sort. From a demographics perspective, the film did score an "A-" CinemaScore and audience members under the age of 18 made up 40% of the audience and scored the film with an "A". In all, 52% of the audience was under 25 and 54% male vs. 46% female.

In addition to its domestic total, Ninja Turtles 2 also opened in 40 international markets and earned an estimated $34 million. The UK delivered the highest returns with an estimated $5.3 million followed by Russia ($4.8m), Mexico ($4.5m), Indonesia ($2.3m) and Malaysia ($2.2m). The movie will continue to expand throughout the month and will release in China on July 2 where the first film brought in over $62 million.

X-Men: Apocalypse finished in second with an estimated $22.3 million, a 66% drop from its opening weekend, much steeper than expected and is now likely to find the film finishing somewhere in the range of $160-165 million domestically. For some perspective, that's just over where the first X-Men film finished back in 2000, is right around where X-Men: Days of Future Past was after just ten days in release, where Deadpool was at after just five days and less than Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice made in its opening weekend.

Internationally, however, X-Men: Apocalypse is delivering. The film brought in an estimated $84.4 million this weekend, which includes an estimated $59 million in China, the second largest Fox opening in China behind only the Titanic re-release and $20 million more than Days of Future Past opened with. The film's international total is now up to $286 million, bringing its global cume to just over $400 million, currently placing it within the top ten for 2016. Should this trend continue, Apocalypse would end somewhere around $650 million globally, which is about $100 million less than Days of Future Past.

Getting back to the domestic chart, Me Before You finished in third with an exceptional opening, bringing in an estimated $18.27 million domestically from 2,704 theaters plus another $7.7 million internationally from 16 overseas markets. An "A" CinemaScore is also going to work in the film's favor, pushing it toward what could be a $45-50 million domestic gross on a $20 million budget.

Finishing fourth was last weekend's other new "big" release, that being Disney's Alice Through the Looking Glass, which already suffered a disastrous opening weekend and didn't fair much better this weekend, dropping 60% for an estimated $10.69 million. The film did add an additional $42 million internationally this weekend, resulting in a global cume of just over $176 million. From a domestic perspective, it's beginning to look as if the sequel may have a hard time matching the $85 million 2010's Alice in Wonderland made in its first two days.

Outside the top five we find the weekend's third new wide release, Universal's Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping from The Lonely Island trio. The film made an impression on critics, scoring a 78% rating on RottenTomatoes, but it wasn't enough to get audiences out to see it. The film scored a meager $4.63 million this weekend from 2,311 theaters. It did manage to reach its core audience of young males, making up 60% of overall ticket sales, but that same audience had far too much to choose from this weekend and the R-rating almost certainly contributed to the lower box office in this case.

In other news, Disney's Zootopia has finally crossed the $1 billion mark worldwide, becoming only the fourth animated film to reach that milestone. It's also the second film of the year to hit that mark behind Disney's Captain America: Civil War and the 26th film to have ever done so. Looking into the near future, will Finding Dory become the fifth animated film to cross $1 billion and the third of the year for Disney?

Also, Deadpool opened in Japan this weekend and brought in an estimated $6.48 million, the largest opening for an X-Men movie in the market as the film's cume now stands at an estimated $409 million. If you're wondering, X-Men: Apocalypse doesn't open in Japan until August 11.

Next weekend the box office will be hoping for a bump from a pair of sequels in The Conjuring 2 and Now You See Me 2 along with Universal's Warcraft, which has now been in release for two weeks internationally and brought in $70 million so far from 28 territories. The big question is to wonder if all of these sequels and big budget features will simply cannibalize one another or if one of them will be able to break out of the pack.

Of the lot, The Conjuring 2 is looking like a strong contender for a big performance as we haven't had a horror film released in this many theaters, targeting this wide an audience, since The Boy back in late January and even it topped out at 2,671 theaters. The first Conjuring opened with rave reviews (the sequel is already following suit), an "A-" CinemaScore and $41.85 million. Bucking the recent trend, should expect the sequel, which is opening in 3,100+ theaters, to go even higher?

You can browse the weekend's three-day estimates right here and we'll update with weekend actuals on Monday afternoon.

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