'Glass' Fills Up with $40.58M Debut While 'Dragon Ball' Delivers Top Five Opening
Universal's Glass, from Blinding Edge Pictures and Blumhouse Productions, was unable to quite reach the lofty heights some had expected heading into the weekend, but the film still managed a solid #1 start, playing very similarly to its predecessor based on current estimates. Glass, however, might not be the biggest news of the weekend when you consider the monster debut of FUNimation's Dragon Ball Super: Broly, which is looking at a possible third place finish based on early estimates, but it's important to note current results are not from the film's domestic distributor, FUNimation. Elsewhere, STX's The Upside delivered on Mojo's pre-weekend expectations with a strong second weekend while WB's Aquaman topped $300 million domestically.

With an estimated $40.58 million over the three-day weekend, Universal anticipates M. Night Shyamalan's Glass will reach $47 million for the four-day holiday weekend. The performance is a bit shy of the studio's $50 million expectations, but the three-day already more than doubles the film's reported $20 million budget. In terms of some of the records it was eying this weekend, the three-day performance makes it the fourth largest January opening of all-time while on track to deliver the third largest Martin Luther King weekend performance of all-time.

Looking ahead, the film's debut is just ahead of 2017's Split, which opened with $40 million over the same weekend in 2017 and went on to gross over $138 million at the domestic box office. Glass received a "B" CinemaScore from opening day audiences, which is actually a grade higher than the "C" Unbreakable earned back in 2000, though behind Split's "B+" which would also seem to reflect the critical response which saw Split receive a 76% RottenTomatoes rating compared to the 35% for Glass. Audiences were 54% male with 65% of the audience coming in aged 25 or older. The difference in gender demographic is an interesting one considering Split played more like a well-reviewed horror film over its run, playing to an audience that was 52% female, not to mention a much younger crowd with 48% of Split's opening audience aged 25 or older. That said, Glass could be looking at a domestic performance ending around $85-95 million.

Internationally, Glass is being distributed by Buena Vista International (excluding China) and grossed $48.5 million this weekend from 55 markets. Leading the way was Russia with an estimated $5.2 million followed by Mexico ($4.5m), UK ($4.3m), France ($3.4m), Korea ($2.8m), Germany ($2.8m), Australia ($2.4m), Italy ($2.1m), Spain ($2.0m), Brazil ($1.5m) and Indonesia ($1.5m). Based on current exchange rates in the same suite of markets, Glass is outpacing Split by approximately +13%.

Finishing in second, following a strong debut last weekend, is STXfilms and Lantern Entainment's The Upside, dipping just -23% in its sophomore frame for an estimated $15.67 million. The studio anticipates the film will top $19.5 million over the 4-day Martin Luther King holiday weekend for a domestic cume just shy of $48 million after 11 days in release. The Upside has also brought in $4.1 million internationally thus far.

Looking at a surprise third place position is FUNimation's Dragon Ball Super: Broly, though, as noted in our lede, the studio is not reporting domestic grosses this morning. That said, results from third party sources show the film neck-and-neck with WB's Aquaman for a domestic three-day topping $10 million and a five-day total following its Wednesday release topping $21 million. On the lower end of projections, one source puts the film's three-day at $9.3 million, which is still incredibly impressive and enough for a fourth place finish.

Internationally, Dragon Ball is entering its seventh week in release and does so with an estimated $5.3 million from 18 markets for an international cume that now totals $65.8 million for a global tally just shy of $87 million. The film's top market is Japan with $33.3 million followed by Mexico where the film is in its second weekend and has brought in $9.5 million so far.

As for Aquaman, the film added an estimated $10.3 million to its domestic total this weekend, which now stands at $304.3 million. The film is still in fourth place among previous releases in the DC Extended Universe. The film also added $14.3 million from 79 overseas markets this weekend, bringing the international cume to $759.1 million for a global tally of $1.06 billion, just a little over $21 million shy of The Dark Knight Rises as it will soon become the highest grossing worldwide release among DC Comics adaptations.

Rounding out the top five is Sony's Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, which enjoyed the smallest drop in the top ten (-19.8%) with an estimated $7.25 million for the three-day. The film is expected to top $9 million over the four-day weekend, pushing the film's domestic cume over $160 million, which would put it ~$9 million shy of topping Hotel Transylvania 2 as Sony Animation's highest grossing domestic release of all-time. Internationally, the film added another $4.7 million this weekend, pushing its worldwide total over $322 million.

Elsewhere, on its 78th day of release, Fox's Bohemian Rhapsody topped $200 million domestically this weekend as the film continues to play almost neck-and-neck with WB's A Star is Born, which topped $200 million on its 80th day of release. After an additional $639k this weekend, A Star is Born has now grossed just shy of $205 million domestically. Worldwide, however, it's no competition with Bohemian Rhapsody adding another $11.3 million this weekend for an international cume that has now reached $596 million for a global tally $2 million shy of $800 million.

In limited release, Abramorama's Who Will Write Our History debuted with $12,719 in one theater; Distrib's The Heiresses opened in two locations with $11,288; and IFC's An Acceptable Loss opened in one theater with an estimated $5,103.

Next weekend sees the release of Fox's The Kid Who Would be King in ~3,400 locations along with Aviron's Serenity in ~2,500 theaters. It will also be interesting to see how well this year's crop of awards contenders perform following Tuesday's Oscar nominations announcement.

You can check out this weekend's three-day estimated results right here and we'll have four-day estimates tomorrow morning followed by full three and four-day weekend actuals on Tuesday afternoon.

Discuss this story with fellow Box Office Mojo fans on Facebook. On Twitter, follow us at @boxofficemojo.