Rogue One Tops Christmas Box Office For Another First Place Weekend

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story stayed in first place in domestic box office with a dominant victory over every other film in theaters Christmas weekend. Despite Assassin’s Creed, Passengers, and Sing all debuting, and La La Land expanding into most markets, Rogue One did not stutter at all, using the Force (that’s not how the Force works, we know) to overcome.

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The first standalone Star Wars movie did $96.1 million in US receipts this weekend, moving its domestic total to $286.4 million. That means it held to 62% of its opening box office in weekend #2, as well, an incredible hold from week 1 to week 2. In fact, dropping only 38% means Rogue One finally defeated The Force Awakens in a category in the box office, as last year’s juggernaut dropped 39.5% from its first to second weekend. The number is expected to have a significant boost on Monday, as most businesses outside of retail (and press) are closed for official holiday.

The animated Sing took second place with a solid $56.1 million, and its domestic haul over $76.7 million so far has already eclipsed its production budget. Passengers finished the weekend at $23.1 million, still within projections but about 7 million under what Sony was hoping for in its opening weekend. The raunchy comedy Why Him? came in fourth place at $16.7 million, and Assassin’s Creed finished at fifth with $16.7 million. It appears AC won’t be the first video game movie to break the streak of poorly reviewed and/or poorly performing.

Rogue One‘s legs should continue to run nicely for Disney/Lucasfilm over the next several weeks. January is full of lower-budget action fare like another Underworld, another Resident Evil, and another xXx, the last of which may challenge Rogue One slightly thanks to Donnie Yen and Vin Diesel’s presence. Still, Rogue One should plow through most of January with aplomb, giving it an easy second place finish overall in the Star Wars franchise and a grand future for the “Star Wars Story” model.

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Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is in theaters now. Directed by Gareth Edwards, it’s the first of the new standalone features from Lucasfilm and Disney, which take place outside the core “Skywalker Saga” of films noted by an Episode number. Rogue One tells the story of the small band of rebels that were tasked with stealing the plans to the first Death Star. The story spins directly off the opening crawl from the original Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope. In that crawl, it read: “Rebel spaceships, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire. During the battle, Rebel spies managed to steal secret plans to the Empire’s ultimate weapon, the DEATH STAR, an armored space station with enough power to destroy an entire planet.”