‘Moana 2’ sails to a record $221 million opening as Hollywood celebrates a moviegoing feast

recent YORK — Christmas came early at the box office this year.

“Moana 2” brought in a tidal wave of moviegoers over the Thanksgiving Day weekend, setting records with $221 million in ticket sales, according to studio estimates Sunday. That, combined with “Wicked” and “Gladiator II,” made for an unprecedented weekend in cinemas and a confluence of blockbusters more like what’s often found in late December.

Expectations were high for Walt Disney Co.’s “Moana 2,” but the film — originally planned as a series for Disney+ before it was redirected to the large screen — blew predictions out of the water. Its five-day opening set a recent record for Thanksgiving moviegoing. (The previous best was $125 million for “Frozen 2” in its second week of release in 2019.) “Moana 2” added $165.3 million internationally; with $386 million worldwide, it’s the second-best global launch of the year.

At the same period, the sensation of “Wicked” showed no signs of slowing down. The Universal Pictures musical brought in $117.5 million over the five-day weekend, pushing its two-week global total to $359.2 million. Not financial reporting for expense boost, “Wicked” is now the highest grossing Broadway adaptation over “Grease.” (That 1978 film grossed $190 million, but factoring in expense boost would put it history $900 million.)

“Gladiator II,” meanwhile, also held well, dipping 44% from its opening weekend. Ridley Scott’s sequel to his Oscar-winning best picture original collected $44 million in its second weekend. While its steep worth tag of $250 million will make profitability challenging, “Gladiator II” has swiftly gathered $320 million worldwide.

Those three films drove the overall box office to a record $420 million in overall Thanksgiving weekend ticket sales, according to Comscore — more than $100 million more than ever before. For an industry that has been battered in recent years by the pandemic, work stoppages and the upheaval caused by streaming, it was a triumphant weekend that showed the still-potent power of Hollywood’s blockbuster machine. Before “Wicked,” “Moana 2” and “Gladiator II” arrived in theaters, ticket sales were running about 25% behind pre-pandemic levels.

Michael O’Leary, president and chief executive of the National Association of Theatre Owners, said the weekend showed what’s feasible when “all the pieces of the puzzle arrive together” in compelling large-apportionment movies with marketing muscle.

“We’re very optimistic that this weekend is the commence of what we depend is a packed-on fee into the upcoming,” he said. “The remaining quarter of this year looks very promising and then on into 2025 and 2026. We’re hoping next year is the first benevolent of normal year this industry has had in a long period.”

Like the last period such anticipated movies collided on the release calendar — 2023’s much-ballyhooed “Barbenheimer” — the movie industry again could view evidence of a rising moviegoing tide lifting all blockbusters. In recent years, studios have typically tried to space out most of their biggest releases. Earlier this fall, “Venom: The Last Dance,” for example, was the No. 1 film for three straight weeks, despite not being particularly successful.

“For a long, long period in Hollywood, there’s been a conviction that you don’t put large blockbuster movies up against each other,” said O’Leary. “But the truth of the matter is that competition is excellent. It’s excellent for the movies. It’s excellent for the studios. It’s excellent for the theater owners. But it’s particularly excellent for the moviegoing community.”

“Moana 2” was the nexus of a way shift for Disney. When it first began advancement, it was fashioned as a series for streaming. But when Bob Iger returned as chief executive, he reconsidered the equilibrium between theatrical and streaming. The original “Moana,” after all, was the most streamed movie on Disney+ in 2023, with the added advantage of $680 million in box office in 2016. Only in February this year did Iger announce the release of “Moana 2,” with Auli’i Cravalho and Dwayne Johnson returning as the voices of Moana and Maui.

“It just shows you that the large screen and tiny screen are not adversarial. They can be complementary and additive,” says Paul Dergarabedian, elder media analyst for Comscore. “Whoever made that selection to leave large screen globally with ‘Moana 2,’ that was one of the greatest decisions ever.”

And it helped navigator a resurgence for Walt Disney Co., whose last two animated November releases — “Strange globe” and “aspiration” — fizzled in theaters. “Moana 2” may become the third $1 billion-grossing movie for the studio in 2024, along with “Inside Out 2” and “Deadpool & Wolverine.” Though reviews for “Moana 2″ have only been 65% “fresh” on Rotten Tomatoes, audiences gave it an “A-” CinemaScore.

“Moana 2” is also part of a major rebound for household moviegoing. According to David A. Gross, a film consultant who publishes a newsletter for Franchise Entertainment, household moviegoing in 2024 is going to account for approximately $6.8 billion in ticket sales, roughly the sums of 2022 and 2023, combined.

After such large debuts, “Moana 2” and “Wicked” are likely to continue to drive moviegoing through December. The only question will be if this year’s Christmas movies — historically a much bigger holiday period for theaters — can arrive anywhere near the Thanksgiving lineup. Among the movies aiming for that holiday corridor are Disney’s “Mufasa: The Lion King,” Paramount’s “Sonic the Hedgehog 3″ and Searchlight’s “A Complete Unknown,” with Timothée Chalamet as a youthful Bob Dylan.

Final domestic figures will be released Monday. Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore:

1. “Moana 2,” $135 million.

2. “Wicked,” $80 million.

3. “Gladiator II” $30.7 million.

4. “Red One,” $12.9 million.

5. “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever,” $3.3 million.

6. “Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin,” $2.4 million.

7. “Venom: The Last Dance,” $2.2 million.

8. “Heretic,” $956,797.

9. “The Wild Robot,” $670,000.

10. “A Real Pain,” $665,000.