Following the biggest Black Friday ever at the North American box office with an estimated $108 million ($54.5 million was contributed by Disney Animation's Moana 2), business looks incredibly strong over the Thanksgiving weekend.
Five-day estimates for the Moana sequel have raised to $215 million - $220 million; its three-day haul is expected to be around $140 million, the second-best debut of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's career after Fast & Furious 7's $147.1 million opening.
Moana 2 has also set a new five-day Thanksgiving record, beating The Super Mario Bros. Movie's $204.6 million.
The other two big movies contributing to this record-breaking haul are Wicked and Gladiator II. The former is eyeing $118 million over five days, ensuring it's broken a few records of its own.
After the movie's success, the expectation is that we'll see a greater number of musicals brought to the big screen...and that studios might finally start marketing them as such (Joker: Folie à Deux likely hasn't helped with the latter possibility, of course).
As for the Gladiator sequel, that's set to make $45 million over five days and is now closing in on $278 million worldwide to become the highest-grossing movie of Denzel Washington's career; however, that's a record we'd expect to be broken by Black Panther 3.
Overall, theaters are looking at a $422 million gross over Thanksgiving, a much-needed boost after what's proven to be a relatively quiet year thanks to last year's Hollywood strikes. Something we can now confidently say is that Disney CEO Bob Iger was right when he decided to shift Moana 2 from being a Disney+ TV series to a theatrical release.
Here's a new critics TV spots for Thanksgiving weekend's biggest winner:
Walt Disney Animation Studios' epic animated musical Moana 2 reunites Moana (voice of Auli'i Cravalho) and Maui (voice of Dwayne Johnson) three years later for an expansive new voyage alongside a crew of unlikely seafarers. After receiving an unexpected call from her wayfinding ancestors, Moana must journey to the far seas of Oceania and into dangerous, long-lost waters for an adventure unlike anything she’s ever faced.
The voice cast also includes Rachel House, Temuera Morrison, Nicole Scherzinger, Hualālai Chung, David Fane, Rose Matafeo, Awhimai Fraser, Gerald Ramsey, and Khaleesi Lambert-Tsuda, who lends her voice to Moana's adoring and adorable little sister, Simea.
Directed by David Derrick Jr., Jason Hand and Dana Ledoux Miller, and produced by Christina Chen and Yvett Merino, Moana 2 features music by Grammy winners Abigail Barlow and Emily Bear, Grammy nominee Opetaia Foa‘i, and three-time Grammy winner Mark Mancina. Jared Bush and Miller are writing the film, which is executive produced by Jennifer Lee, Bush and Johnson.
Moana 2 is now playing in theaters.