‘Jurassic World’ Tops Box Office For Third Week In A Row, Finally Bests ‘Avengers’
Jurassic World, the fourth installment of the epic dinosaur film franchise, owned the box office again for the third consecutive weekend bringing in $54.2 million and earning the best third weekend box office take in history just beating out Marvel’s The Avengers, reports Scott Mendelson of Forbes.
Jurassic’s third week total brings its worldwide total haul to $1.24 billion in just 23 days of release, according to Box Office Mojo‘s Keith Simanton. The total already places Jurassic World eighth on the all time box office earnings list.
Jurassic World just fended off Pixar’s Inside Out for the top spot earning just over $2 million more than the animated feature. Seth McFarlane’s much anticipated Ted 2 debuted at No. 3 with a disappointing $32.9 million haul, according to Rachel Haas of IGN.
Jurassic World, which stars Guardians of the Galaxy and Parks and Recreation star Chris Pratt, narrowly missed catching The Avengers for the top domestic box office opening of all time, pulling in $204.6 million stateside and falling just $3 million shy of Avengers.
In the film, Pratt stars as a dinosaur trainer who works for the Jurassic World theme park who, along with the park’s manager, is thrust into action attempting to stop a genetically engineered dinosaur that gets loose in the park before it kills innocent park-goers. The film takes place 22 years after the events in the original Jurassic Park film.
Pratt, who has already signed on to at least two more Guardians sequels with Marvel with the expectation of some inclusion in the Avengers mythology, has already signed on for at least one Jurassic sequel, though with this level of box office success and in a day and age where studios are always eyeing the almighty trilogy, it is far more likely that unless Pratt’s meteoric rise to Hollywood’s A-List predicates a parallel rise in his asking price, that Pratt will shepherd this second Jurassic trilogy as much of World’s success is being directly attributed to Pratt’s likability and star power.
Jurassic World was directed by Colin Trevorrow. Jurassic Park‘s director, screen legend Steven Spielberg, acted as an Executive Producer for the film as he did on the franchise’s third installment, Jurassic Park III, via his production company Amblin Entertainment. Spielberg also directed the first sequel, The Lost World: Jurassic Park. Thus far, the Jurassic Park franchise has amassed over $2.4 billion at the box office alone, making it one of the most successful movie franchises in history.
[Image via ShutterStock]
