The box office has slowly but surely gotten back to normal after almost going extinct in the wake of the pandemic in 2020. April has been a particularly strong month thanks to The Super Mario Bros. Movie quickly approaching the $1 billion mark and Evil Dead Rise giving horror fans another killer release. Both films had extremely strong showings this past weekend, but now it's being reported that Super Mario and Evil Dead Rise did even better at the box office than previously expected.
Hail to the Box Office Kings, Baby!
Up from its previous estimated $58.2 million, Super Mario Bros. actually made $59.9 million in its third weekend of release. This is still the third highest grossing weekend for an animated film in history and also takes the crown of Universal’s best third weekend in its history. The previous record holder was Jurassic World in 2015 with $54.4 million. That film went on to make well over $1 billion at the worldwide box office. If that wasn’t enough, Mario also became the best third weekend in Illumination’s history, a record that was previously held by The Grinch at $30.3 million. Super Mario Bros. has now made over $870 million at the worldwide box office. It’s on pace to cross the $1 billion mark by the end of next weekend.
Then, in its opening weekend, Evil Dead Rise came in second place with another major win for the horror genre. The fifth entry in the Evil Dead franchise made $24.5 million which is more than both the $20 million early weekend estimate and Sunday's $23.5 million updated number. This puts Rise ahead of opening weekends for other recent horror hits, including Smile, Cocaine Bear, and The Black Phone. It was also impressive since this was the first film in the franchise since 2013 and was only made with a modest budget of $17 million. Rise has already doubled that at the worldwide box office grossing over $40.3 million.
Why Does Super Mario and Evil Dead Rise’s Success Matter?
Super Mario Bros. and Evil Dead Rise may be completely different films, but they tell the same story. No matter if you're dying for a fun family adventure or are a horror fan looking to get their guts gleefully shredded, moviegoers want to see their films on the big screen. They don’t want to watch these larger-than-life films on a Smart TV that crashes every five minutes and has terrible audio quality. This is nothing new for the horror genre, which has seen hit after hit with Smile, The Black Phone, Terrifier 2, M3GAN, and Scream VI paving the way for the Deadites' successful take over.
However, the animation genre has had the toughest time readjusting back to theatrical dominance. For every Minions there were five lukewarm box office releases like Lightyear, Strange World, and Super-Pets. It didn’t help that companies like Disney were putting most of their films on streaming. Super Mario has reminded audiences how magical animated films can be on the big screen which is only going to help other films like Spider-Man: Across the Spider-verse, Elemental, and Wish at the box office. It also just helps that both Super Mario and Evil Dead Rise are good movies. They’ve been thriving thanks to great word of mouth which is only going to help them in the weeks to come. We’re sure to see even more horror and animated projects in theaters thanks to these two films. With CinemaCon this week, that’s the best news theater owners can get.
While we anxiously wait to see when Super Mario Bros. will hit the $1 billion mark and how far the Evil Dead will rise at the box office, you can see both films in theaters now. Evil Dead Rise’s trailer can be seen down below.