‘Halloween Ends’ Slides Beneath ‘Halloween Kills’ With $43 Million Box Office Opening

Universal/Blumhouse’s “Halloween Ends” is still going to turn a sizable profit with an estimated $43 million opening weekend, but its day-and-date release on Peacock and weak reviews from critics and audiences alike are already having an impact.

Prior to release, the final installment in David Gordon Green’s “Halloween” reboot trilogy was projected to open to $50 million, matching the $49.4 million opening of last year’s “Halloween Kills,” which was also a day-and-date release. With a reported budget in the $20 million range — a departure from the sub-$10 million budget philosophy Blumhouse usually adheres to — “Ends” is already set to make its money back.

But there is a strong likelihood that “Ends” will be the lowest grossing film in this trilogy, as both critics and “Halloween” devotees have savaged the film. The movie has a C+ rating on CinemaScore, lower than the B- received by “Kills” and Paramount’s recent horror release “Smile,” which is continuing to hold extremely well with an estimated $12 million third weekend.

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“Ends” has also had weak scores on Rotten Tomatoes of 39% critics and 57% audience, with a common criticism being a focus on a new character introduced to the series rather than Michael Myers or Laurie Strode, the latter of whom was at the core of the marketing campaign as Jamie Lee Curtis has announced that this will be her final performance in the role. With the DC film “Black Adam” coming out next weekend, a steep drop could be on its way for “Ends.”

With “Smile” in the No. 2 spot, Sony’s “Lyle Lyle Crocodile” is in third with an estimated $7.25 million total in its second weekend. That is a 35% drop from the film’s $11 million opening, a decent hold for this $50 million family film but still leaving it with a long way to profitability with an estimated $22.6 million 10-day total.

Sony’s other big film in theaters, “The Woman King,” is in fourth with $3.7 million in its fifth weekend and a $59.8 million domestic total, making back its $50 million co-financed production budget but likely still yet to recoup its marketing costs. 20th Century/New Regency’s bombing adult drama “Amsterdam” is in fifth with an estimated $2.8 million and an anemic 10-day total of just under $12 million against a New Regency-financed $80 million budget.