It was a great weekend premiere for Sylvester Stallone sequel to 2010’s action heroes success. “The Expendables 2” leads the weekend box office, with $28.8 million.
“The Expendables” sequel had an impressive cast, with all the action heroes you’d see on TV like ten years ago. For the genre fans and those melancholic viewers, “The Expendables” brought together all the muscle, gun fire and bad boys Hollywood was showing off in the early and late 90’s.
Although “The Expendables 2” topped the weekend box office, it was clear that the novelty wore off and the new additions to the cast didn’t make the sequel as successful as the original. In fact, Sylvester Stallone’s action heroes “retirees” brought to the weekend premiere a lot less people than the 2010 movie.
Before “The Expendables 2” hit the U.S. theatres, box office experts were estimating it will top the weekend box office with $40 million revenue. Obviously, that’s far from the $28.8 million it made this past weekend. And it fell a lot shorter than the 2010 Expendables that brought at debut $34.8 million.
However, despite the slow debut, “The Expendables 2” was leader in the weekend box office, muscling out former frontrunner “The Bourne Legacy” to the second place. “ParaNorman”, “Sparkle” and “The Odd Life of Timothy Green” didn’t stand a chance against Sylvester Stallone’s latest action movie.
“The Expendables 2” slow debut can’t really be blamed on the competition with other viewer-appealing movies. “Sparkle” could have been the only actual contender to the weekend box office leader title, but somehow crowds were not drawn to the theaters.
Whitney Houston’s first movie appearance since 1996’s “The Preacher’s Wife” failed to get the same buzz as other movies featuring dead stars. Heath Ledger’s death made “The Dark Knight” all the more appealing and so did Michael Jackson’s passing away for the “Michael Jackson: This Is It” music documentary. “Sparkle” got a modest $12 million over the weekend, debuting fifth in the box office board.
It might not be that much of a financial success, but at least “The Expendables 2” topped the weekend box office. That might be a good news for Sylvester Stallone, who has been putting a lot of time and effort in the movie since his son’s death last month.
