Sony/Crunchyroll’s “Chainsaw Man: Reze Arc” won’t break the box office out of its October slowdown, but it will ease the slump slightly as it has earned a $17.2 million opening weekend from 3,003 locations.
The R-rated franchise anime film was never expected to reach the record $70 million start of “Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle” last year, nor is “Chainsaw Man” likely to make much beyond this weekend like nearly every other franchise anime film put in theaters.
But “Chainsaw Man” does rank among Crunchyroll’s top 5 highest openings ever, with high marks from the fan-heavy audience akin to a faith-based film with an A on CinemaScore, 5/5 on PostTrak, and a 99% Rotten Tomatoes audience score. And while not on the scale of “Demon Slayer,” “Chainsaw Man” is also performing well in overseas markets, particularly in the anime-loving Asia, grossing $108 million worldwide so far with $60 million coming from Sony-distributed markets
With anime fans showing increasing interest in showing up to theaters for films from their favorite series, Crunchyroll is becoming a key calendar gap filler for theaters on weekends where major tentpoles aren’t coming out. While the distributor’s 2026 slate hasn’t been filled out yet, it has acquired the theatrical rights to a film from the isekai series “That Time I Got Reincarnated As a Slime” to add to its coming attractions.
In a narrow race for second is Universal/Blumhouse’s “Black Phone 2” and Paramount/Constantin’s “Regretting You,” with “Black Phone 2” getting the edge with a $13 million second weekend.
Dropping 52% from its $27.3 million opening weekend, “Black Phone 2” is proving to be the successful sequel Blumhouse was looking for this year with a $49 million two-weekend domestic total. That’s slightly ahead of the $47.4 million total that the first “Black Phone” earned to this point in 2022.
“Regretting You,” a $30 million adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s novel of the same name produced by Constantin Films and acquired by Paramount, has earned a $12.8 million opening from 3,393 theaters with $22.8 million worldwide. It’s a decent start for a film that, like last year’s Hoover hit “It Ends With Us,” is heavily skewing female with an 80% audience share this weekend.
Critics weren’t impressed by “Regretting You” with a 30% Rotten Tomatoes score, but Hoover’s fans are largely pleased with a 4.5/5 PostTrak score, 90% audience RT score and a B on CinemaScore. Perhaps that will give the film better legs than Paramount’s last release “Roofman,” which is already out of the top 5 with a global box office total of just $21.1 million against a $19 million Miramax-financed budget.
The big disappointment of the weekend is Disney/20th Century’s “Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere,” which has earned a $9.1 million opening from 3,460 locations and $16.1 million worldwide. The rock biopic starring Jeremy Allen White was filmed in Bruce Springsteen’s home state of New Jersey and cost a reported $55 million.
It will take considerable legs from moviegoers over the age of 60 for “Deliver Me From Nowhere” to make even half of the $75 million domestic run of last winter’s Bob Dylan biopic “A Complete Unknown.” Reception for the film has leaned positive but hasn’t been as strong as that Searchlight release with a B+ on CinemaScore — “Complete Unknown” got an A — with Rotten Tomatoes scores of 61% critics and 85% audience.
Among holdovers, Disney’s struggling “Tron: Ares” completes the top 5 with $4.9 million in its third weekend, giving the tentpole flop a total of $63.4 million domestic and $123 million worldwide. Lionsgate’s “Good Fortune” earned $3.1 million in its second weekend for an $11.8 million domestic total.
In seventh is Neon’s “Shelby Oaks,” the debut horror film from YouTuber Chris Stuckmann which earned $2.35 million from 1,823 locations. The film has earned mixed reviews with a 59% RT score and a C+ on CinemaScore.
Finally, Focus Features released Yorgos Lanthimos’ biting satire “Bugonia” in limited release in 17 theaters, with eight of them presenting the film in 35mm. The film starring Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons grossed $690,000 for a solid per theater average of $40,588.
