As with many horrors before it, bad reviews didn't scare off moviegoers from buying tickets for The Nun II. The sequel to the 2018 hit, released in 3,728 theaters by Warner Bros., topped the box office in its first weekend in North American theaters, earning an estimated $32.6 million, the studio said Sunday. AP's Mark Kennedy wrote in his one-star review that it's "a movie that seems destined to pound a nail into this franchise's undead coffin," and audiences gave it a C+ CinemaScore. But it hardly matters: Horror is perhaps the most reliably critic-proof genre, at least when it comes to opening weekend, the AP reports.
The Michael Graves-directed sequel starring Taissa Farmiga and Storm Reid fell far short of the debut for the first film ($53.8 million), but it's still a solid launch. The Nun movies are part of the so-called Conjuring universe, which now has nine films and $2.1 billion in box office to its name. The sequel also played well internationally, picking up $52.7 million from 69 markets (Mexico being the strongest with $8.9 million) and boosting its global debut to $85.3 million. And there are many more scary movies on the calendar through the fall including A Death in Venice, which opens next week, Saw X on Sept. 29, and The Exorcist: Believer on Oct. 6.
Below are estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at US and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore, as reported by the AP and Deadline. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.
- The Nun II, $32.6 million.
- The Equalizer 3, $12.1 million.
- My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3, $10 million.
- Jawan, $6.2 million.
- Barbie, $5.9 million.
- Blue Beetle, $3.8 million.
- Gran Turismo: Based on a True Story, $3.4 million.
- Oppenheimer, $3 million.
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, $2.6 million.
- Bottoms, $2.05 million.
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