Seth Rogen’s ‘Sausage Party’ Knocks ‘Suicide Squad’ Out of Top Box Office Spot

Sausage Party, the new animated film from the mind of Seth Rogen, is set to rule the U.S. box office on its premiere weekend. It is expected to beat last week’s number one Suicide Squad, with an estimated $13.5 million take at theaters on Friday, this according to Variety.

The movie will edge out last week’s king, Suicide Squad, which will come in a close second with $13 million. And the two movies will easily clobber Disney’s latest children’s movie, a remake of Pete’s Dragon which stars Bryce Dallas Howard and Robert Redford, and which received warm reviews.

On August 12, food fights back. Watch the brand-new #SausagePartyMovie restricted trailer now! ?? https://t.co/grk0dyXEbR

— Sausage Party (@sausage_party) July 22, 2016

Sausage Party was released on 3,103 screens across North America, a record for an animated film released in August. And it still won out over Suicide Squad, which was available on 4,255 screens.

The movie co-stars some of Seth Rogen’s usual sidekicks, like Jonah Hill and James Franco. The cast also includes Kristen Wiig, Danny McBride, Bill Hader, Paul Rudd, Michael Cera, and Salma Hayek. This may have had something to do with the film’s popularity.

Apparently, theatergoers are more interested in beating the heat with a raunchy comedy than with a kids’ film. Disney’s Pete’s Dragon, which was expected to win the box office race this weekend, came up short with an estimated $7 million for Friday, leaving it in third place, far behind Seth Rogen’s new movie.

Sausage Party is predicted to bring in $24 million over its opening weekend. This will probably make it the last hurrah for the summer movie season. Summer time is Hollywood’s biggest and most profitable time of year, with most of the big blockbusters being released when the kids are out of school. The Thanksgiving to Christmas season comes in second in importance.

The top five movies were rounded out by Jason Bourne with Matt Damon, which took in $3.86 million in its third weekend bringing its estimated total box office up to more than $117 million. In fifth place was Bad Moms, the comedy with Mila Kunis, which took in $3.58 million on Friday, bringing it up to $63 million in three weeks of release.

Meanwhile Meryl Streep’s latest Oscar bid of a movie came in eighth, with only $6.1 million in receipts on 1,528 total movie screens.

Movie review site Rotten Tomatoes has given Sausage Party an aggregate score of 82 percent.

Seth Rogen has been having more success lately when he does not appear on camera. Sausage Party is a cartoon, so we only hear Rogen’s voice. And Seth has had some success now as a television producer with the AMC show Preacher, where he does not act himself.

His last live action comedy, Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising, which came out May 20, 2016, fell far short of its predecessor, bringing in just $55 million, according to Box Office Mojo. And 2015’s The Night Before only earned $44 million. So by Monday, Rogen’s new movie will have almost matched the income of his previous two attempts at performing in front of a camera.

This is probably largely due to luck of the draw. There is not much competition out there this time of year, as all of the big budget action movies, like Jason Bourne and Star Trek Beyond, released weeks ago.

And the movies released last week included Nine Lives, a real stinker where Kevin Spacey voices a cat. It, of course, bombed, taking in only $6.2 million in its first week.

Suicide Squad was also released last week, and stunned everyone by setting a record for an August release. It took in $133 million in its first week, in spite of getting awful reviews and being about characters that are unknown to most people in contrast to Superman and Batman. Its success has been credited to the popularity of the Suicide Squad comic books and the movie was not expected to continue to be competitive at the box office.

Seth Rogen’s latest movie is probably best described with the blurb offered on its own web site.

“Sausage Party, the first R-rated CG animated movie, is about one sausage leading a group of supermarket products on a quest to discover the truth about their existence and what really happens when they become chosen to leave the grocery store.”

So, it is basically an R-rated version of Toy Story, but with food.

The Inquisitr has provided a synopsis of the critics’ reaction to the movie.

So, will Sausage Party be the next Animal House? Superbad? Fast Times at Ridgemont High? Probably not, but it seems that that will at least be a mild hit.

[Photo by Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images]