The Tune Squad ruled over the court and box office charts this weekend. In an unexpected win, Space Jam: A New Legacy, which sees LeBron James team up with the animated Looney Tunes crew, debuted to $31.6 million in ticket sales.
The better-than-expected start for “Space Jam 2” pushed last weekend’s champion, Disney and Marvel’s “Black Widow,” to second place on box office charts. The superhero adventure, starring Scarlett Johansson, brought in $26.3 million in its second weekend, representing a huge 67% decline, reports Variety.
Space Jam: A New Legacy, which arrived 26 years after the original, landed the largest debut for a family film during Covid.
Sony’s Escape Room: Tournament of Champions opened in third place with $8.4 million from 2,815 locations.
At No. 4, Universal’s Fast and Furious sequel “F9” pulled in $7.6 million in its fourth weekend of release, bringing its overall domestic tally to $154 million. Another Universal title, The Boss Baby: Family Business, rounded out the top five, generating $4.7 million over the weekend. In total, the animated sequel to 2017’s Boss Baby has made $44 million in theatres while playing simultaneously on the nascent streaming service Peacock.The original Space Jam was released in 1996 in the US. The first animated movie to be produced by Warner Bros. Feature Animation, Space Jam made $250 million worldwide, making it a slam dunk as the highest-grossing basketball film ever, as well as earning its place in the top 10 highest grossing films of that year. It starred Michael Jordan, NBA legend and global cultural icon of the 90s. Often called the greatest basketball player of all time, Jordan won six championships with the Chicago Bulls and his slam dunk ability earned him the nicknames ‘Air Jordan’ and ‘His Airness’.
