Thus, I'm in.

Two Things to consider...

First: Attendance

I'm pretty sure this will break the attendance record if it opens above $180 million

BOM's adjusted figure for TDK's opening weekend factors in the 3D prices to get their 2011 average ticket price. The average 2D ticket price is around $7.60. Assuming a 3% rise by next year would put this at $7.83. Now, for IMAX. I'm going to just throw out an estimate here and assume that by the time TDKR releases, the average IMAX ticket price will be $16.50, and assume that in 2008, it was $15.00.

Next, BOM estimates that TDK sold 22,062,900 tickets on its opening weekend. TDK made $6.2 million from 94 IMAX screens in 2008. Given the above estimates, that is roughly 413,000 tickets sold in IMAX. DH2 was somewhere just under 1 million tickets sold, so I'm going to guess that at the least TDKR sells about 1 million IMAX tickets. Good for $16.5 million. This leaves 21,062,900 tickets leftover, at 2D prices, this would equate to $164,922,507.

Put the two together, and TDKR should match TDK's attendance record at $181.4 million. Anything above that and we have a new record.

*Source for Ticket Prices: http://consumerist.com/2011/05/analyst- ... rices.html

Second: Precedence

Let's a quick look at the biggest Summer Opening Weekends of each year since Spider Man broke $100M in 2002

2002: SM1 - $114.8 M
2004: SM2 - $124.6 M*
2005: ROS - $121.0 M**
2006: DMC - $135.6 M
2007: SM3 - $151.1 M
2008: TDK - $158.4 M
2009: TF2 - $164.0 M*
2010: IM2 - $128.1 M
2011: DH2 - $169.2 M

Now I took each of these as a percentage of their overall respective Summer's:

SM1: 3.11%
SM2: 3.21%
ROS: 3.43%
DMC: 3.62%
SM3: 3.63%
TDK: 3.83%
TF2: 3.79%
IM2: 3.04%(Outlier, weakest Summer since 1997)
DH2: 3.85%


Now, first we need to predict how Summer 2012 might fair compared to Summer 2011. I'm going to go with a 5% bump from Summer 2011, which would put Summer 2012 at $4621M.

A $200M opening weekend, therefore, would represent 4.33% of that total. This is a jump of .48%. The largest we've seen in the last decade is .2%. That's more than twice the biggest jump, which IMO, is just unreasonable.

The largest increase we see from one top opener to the next is SM2 to ROTS, an increase of about .2%. Considering the massive hype around TDKR and factoring in the increasingly frontloaded nature of sequels and films in general, I think its safe to assume that TDKR sees a similar increase.

Applying an increase of .20% to DH2's high of 3.85%, we get 4.05%. Now, we've got to consider market conditions in 2012. Applying the 4.05% to this number gives an opening weekend of $187.1 million. This is where it should land IMO, give or take a few million.

*For Wednesday Openers, I used the average of the 3 Day and 5 Day as the equivalent of a 3 Day Opening Weekend.

**For ROTS, I used the average of the 2 Day and 4 Day (I'll admit, this was the hardest to estimate. By this method I get $121 M, but personally, I think it would've been closer to $132 M)

***Excluded Matrix Reloaded as it was <$100M

In in in!

LOL...no
There will be a decrease in attendance regardless of the frontloading nature of movies.

I should clarify that I was speaking strictly of the Opening Weekend attendance record

absolutely IN

no less than 175m, though

Im in easily

m051293, that was a highly informative post, but I think you're undervaluing just how massive summer 2012 will be. Looking at BOM's seasonal chart, the total gross has remained relatively stagnant for the past five years. Historically, such stagnation results in huge increases (such as in 2007, 2001, 1998, 1993 and even 1989) — and looking at how strong the schedule is for 2012 — I think we can see an increase upwards of 15%. Using your 4.05% for Rises OW, that gives it $201.4 million.

Obviously, this kind of analysis has a lot of "what ifs" and assumptions... but it wouldn't be much of a club without some faith on the part of the members.

Definitely. I am by no means ruling it out. It's definitely possible that we see a record breaking summer, and its actually what I'm hoping for. Beyond that, it's even possible that TDKR is a complete anomaly, and its opening ends up being something like 4.50%, in which case, even a summer identical to 2011 would give this a $200 million OW. On the other end, we could see a dropoff, though I think $200 million is more likely to happen than that.

As you said, this kind of analysis has a lot of assumptions and "what ifs" and I tried my best to stay somewhat conservative.

One thing I think is near certain however is the OW record. I think its a near lock to go down.

m051293's prediction expects a microscopic/pathetic increase of around 2% in overall tickets sold opening wknd.

I expect a small 15% to 20% increase, 200m+ yo

what are we talking in midnight sales for this? $30m, $40m, $50m?

Will be hard to determine as this will play all through the night. $40M seems reasonable without 3D.

Anybody here going to one of those 6 minute IMAX prologue screenings tomorrow at 10:00 ? I was thinking about going, but Regal is too far from my house.

Just curious, what are the daily breakdowns for everyone in this club?

Thought about it... But I'll just wait until Thursday night and see an actual movie while I'm at it.

100-60-40?

Maybe even... 100-60-45

It's funny, the midnights for major blockbuster openers now look like an additional day of business. Such a large percentage of the opening weekend is being made in just a single showtime (in most cases)

BJs Breakdown:

Opening Day: 89.75m (Midnights 27.80m)
Saturday: 58.90m -5% / -35%
Sunday: 53.00m -10%

Opening Wknd: 201.65m

I can legitimately see that happening. The midnight is going to be closer to 30 than 40 IMO, but the day business will be huge

Yep it's not like these movie's are HP or Twilight in which it will be really frontloaded since the fanbase is more widespread. I could easily see it doing $30M at midnight, but still have an $80M+ OD. Who knows though ? It feels like Batman is a red HOT character right now due to those Arkham games that are so damn popular. I wouldn't be suprised if we do see it get a big midnight push just becuase of those crazy game fanatics which TDK didn't have. That would also mean more frontloading of course.

OD: $97 million ($38 million midnights)
Sat: $56 million -42.3%
Sun: $51 million -8.9%
OW: $204 million

Given the recent trends with midnight numbers plus IMAX and inflation, a 100% increase from Dark Knight's midnight numbers seems fairly reasonable to me.

LOL...what? I can't agree on that $38m midnights and that absurd $97m OD, should be somewhere close to $70m (might go very close to $67m of TDK in the end). I don't agree on the Sat decrease as well cause I think that will be lower and come close to $49-$51m. It will see 3 days above $40m but not above $50m

This is how I see it ATM:

$28M midnights
$57M Friday

$85M Friday
$52M Saturday (-38.8%/-10.3%)
$46M Sunday (-11.5%)

$184M Weekend