Box Office: ‘The Dog Stars’ Bombs With $8 Million; ‘Spider-Man’ Continues Reign in Fifth Weekend
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Ridley Scott's post-apocalyptic thriller "The Dog Stars" flopped at the North American box office, opening in fifth place with just $8 million despite a production budget of more than $80 million. The film, starring Jacob Elordi alongside Margaret Qualley, Josh Brolin, Guy Pearce, Allison Janney and Benedict Wong, was poorly received by critics and audiences alike, scoring 40% on Rotten Tomatoes and a "C+" CinemaScore, and is expected to lose tens of millions during its theatrical run in one of Scott's biggest box office misfires.
Meanwhile, Sony and Marvel's "Spider-Man: Brand New Day" retained the top spot for a fifth straight weekend, earning $22.2 million and pushing its domestic total to $891 million as it closes in on "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" record and a potential $1 billion domestic haul. Universal's "The Odyssey" held second place with $14.6 million in its seventh weekend ($564 million total), while "Coyote vs. Acme" — the animation-live-action hybrid once dropped by Warner Bros. and later rescued by Ketchup Entertainment — opened third with $13.5 million. Sony's "Insidious: Out of the Further" rounded out the top five, falling 60% to $10.1 million in its second weekend for a $43 million total against an $18 million budget.
- "The Dog Stars" flopped, earning only $8 million on an $80 million-plus budget
- "Spider-Man: Brand New Day" stayed at No. 1, nearing $1 billion domestically
- "Coyote vs. Acme" and "The Odyssey" also featured strongly in the top five
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The North American box office is tracked weekly, with ticket sales from Friday to Sunday used to rank films and gauge how well they are performing against their production budgets. A wide gap between a film's cost and its opening earnings, as with a big-budget release struggling on debut, is generally read as a poor sign for its prospects, while a long-running hit maintaining strong weekly earnings suggests sustained audience demand.
Ridley Scott is a veteran director known for films such as Alien, Blade Runner and Gladiator, and Jacob Elordi is an actor who has gained wider recognition through television and film roles in recent years. The Spider-Man franchise, based on the Marvel comic book character, has for decades been one of the most reliable draws at cinemas, with recent instalments produced through a partnership between Sony and Marvel Studios.
Box office performance matters beyond individual films because it shapes decisions by studios about future budgets, sequels and release schedules, and because a small number of very successful films, such as long-running blockbusters, can significantly affect overall industry figures for the year. Comparisons to historic records, such as past top-grossing films, are often used as a benchmark for how significant a film's commercial success is.
Full account
Ridley Scott's post-apocalyptic thriller "The Dog Stars" landed with a thud on its opening weekend, taking just $8 million (£6.3m) from 3,330 cinemas across the United States and Canada, a haul that left the Disney and 20th Century release in fifth or sixth place depending on how the chart is cut. Adding roughly $11.3 million from overseas territories, the film's worldwide opening comes to around $19 million, a disappointing return on what has been reported as an $80 million-plus production budget. Given the scale of the outlay, industry watchers expect the film to lose tens of millions of dollars over its theatrical run, marking one of the more painful setbacks of Scott's long career.
Adapted from Peter Heller's 2012 novel of the same name, the film follows Jacob Elordi as Hig, a pilot eking out a guarded existence in a ravaged world alongside a hardened survivalist, played by Josh Brolin, until a stray radio transmission sends him off in search of other survivors. The supporting cast includes Margaret Qualley, Guy Pearce, Allison Janney and Benedict Wong. Neither critics nor cinemagoers have been especially kind: Rotten Tomatoes places the reviews in the low 40s per cent, tipping into 'rotten' territory, while a CinemaScore poll of opening-weekend audiences returned a middling C+. Notably, ordinary audience ratings on Rotten Tomatoes have been reported as considerably higher, around 70%, suggesting a disconnect between critical reception and the experience of those who actually turned out. Commentators have likened the misfire to Scott's 2021 historical drama "The Last Duel", which similarly opened softly, on roughly $4.7 million against a $100 million budget, despite faring far better with reviewers. His commercial high-water mark remains 2015's "The Martian", which took in $630 million globally and picked up seven Oscar nominations, including best picture.
The weekend's other notable debutant fared rather better. "Coyote vs. Acme", the live-action/animation hybrid pitting Wile E. Coyote against the Acme Corporation in a courtroom battle, opened to a domestic figure reported variously as roughly $13.5 million to $15.5 million, landing somewhere between second and third place depending on the source, with a further $8.4 million internationally taking its global total towards $24 million. The film had a fraught path to cinemas: originally developed by Warner Bros., it was shelved for a purported tax write-off before backlash from fans and industry figures helped persuade Ketchup Entertainment to rescue it and secure a theatrical release. Directed by Dave Green from a script by Samy Burch, it stars Will Forte, Lana Condor, John Cena and Luis Guzmán, among others, and its comparatively solid showing has been framed as vindication for the campaign that saved it.
Sony and Marvel's "Spider-Man: Brand New Day" retained top spot for a fifth consecutive weekend, adding $22.2 million domestically, a comparatively gentle 44% decline that pushes its North American total to roughly $891 million and puts it within reach of becoming the highest-grossing film of all time at the US box office. Coverage of the weekend framed "The Dog Stars" as capping an uneven summer for Disney, one that delivered big wins with "Toy Story 5" and "The Devil Wears Prada 2" but also underwhelming returns from the live-action "Moana" and "The Mandalorian and Grogu" relative to their budgets, with the studio's attention already turning to "Avengers: Doomsday" as its major awaited release later in the year.
Where outlets differ
The two reports give different domestic opening figures and rankings for 'Coyote vs. Acme' — one puts it at roughly $13.5 million and third place domestically, the other at about $15.5 million and second place domestically (fifth globally); this account presents both rather than picking one.
Rotten Tomatoes scores for 'The Dog Stars' are cited slightly differently (40% versus 41%), a marginal but notable discrepancy between outlets.
One report emphasises the wider context of Disney's summer box office performance (citing 'Toy Story 5', 'The Devil Wears Prada 2', the live-action 'Moana' and 'The Mandalorian and Grogu') and details on 'Spider-Man: Brand New Day's milestone chase, while the other focuses more on the film's literary source material, critic quotes (including an IGN score) and the gap between critical and audience reception.
Only one outlet reports the positive ~70% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, which sits in tension with the otherwise negative coverage of the film's reception.