Based on Friday’s grosses, weekend #31 of 2014 looks like $173 million for the top 12 films Friday-Sunday, well above our forecast ($150 million) and 34% above the norm for this weekend ($129 million). Opening at 4,080 theaters, Guardians of the Galaxy from Disney and Marvel grossed $37.7 million through Friday and is on track for a […]

  BAD JUDGE:  Thursdays 9PM on NBC starting October 2 – Change the Channel PLAYERS:  Non-Writing Executive Producers Will Ferrell and Adam McKay (and Anne Heche).  Star Kate Walsh.  Series creator Chad Kultgen (mostly a novelist–Jason Reitman’s new dramedy movie Men, Women & Children is based on his book–although he was also a writer on, […]

  It’s not as though expectations for GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY (Marvel/Disney) were low–at the projected $70-75M level, it would have outgrossed the opening weekends of the original Captain America, Thor and Amazing Spider-Man.  But the movie blasted past those predictions with the force of an Infinity Stone, boasting a Friday reported at Deadline and […]

  NETWORK UPDATE:  ROOKIE BLUE and NY MED were up 0.1 in final numbers–but not THE QUEST.  BIG BROTHER also gained 0.1.  THURSDAY CABLE:  The new series on USA and FX continued to flounder.  On USA, RUSH fell 15% to 0.41, while SATISFACTION was at least stable at 0.44.  Things were even worse at FX, where MARRIED dropped by […]

  GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY (Marvel/Disney) had a sensational $11.2M start in Thursday night shows starting at 7PM.  That’s the biggest Thursday night result of the year, edging out Captain America: The Winter Soldier‘s $10.2M (although that had a slight handicap with its 8PM start time) and beating all of the summer’s other blockbusters.  It’s […]

WORLDWIDE STUDIO SCORECARD. Scroll down for domestic and overseas grosses for each film individually so far in 2014. YEAR TO DATE BOX OFFICE. Looking at North American box office, 2014 is still running -8% behind last year and now -6% below the average for this point the past four years ($5.904 billion).  Over the same […]

  NETWORK UPDATE:  TAXI BROOKLYN dropped 0.1 in adjusted numbers (as usual), allowing EXTANT to claim victory in its new 10PM slot.  In addition, BIG BROTHER gained 0.1, as did several of the ABC reruns, including MODERN FAMILY, which climbed to 1.1. WEDNESDAY CABLE:  As we ponder the increasing excellence of cable drama, let’s take […]

Weekend #31 of 2014 is looking like $150 million for the top 12 films this weekend, up 16%from the norm for this weekend and the first up weekend since June 13-15.   Opening at around 3,800 theaters Friday (above the 2,886 average theater count for opening weekends the last two years), Guardians of the Galaxy from Disney and […]