‘Project Hail Mary’ tops box office with $54.5 million in 2nd weekend

LOS ANGELES – “Project Hail Mary” easily held onto first place at the box office in its second weekend of release, earning $54.5 million, according to industry estimates released Sunday.

The space drama starring Ryan Gosling already had the biggest opening weekend of the year so far with $80 million, topping the $63 million made by “Scream 7” in its opening at the end of February.

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Ryan Gosling attends the premiere of “Project Hail Mary” at Lincoln Center Plaza on Wednesday, March 18, 2026, in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)

Pixar’s “Hoppers” took second place in its fourth weekend with $12.2 million Friday through Sunday at North American theaters, Comscore reported.

The horror film “They Will Kill You” opened with $5 million for third place, just ahead of the four-hour Indian action epic “Dhurandhar: The Revenge,” which made $4.8 million in its second weekend.

Fifth place went to “Reminders of Him,” with $4.7 million in its third week.

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Rounding out the top 10 releases were “Ready or Not 2: Here I Come” ($4 million), “Scream 7” ($2.6 million), “GOAT” ($2.2 million), “Undertone” ($1.6 million) and “Forbidden Fruits” ($1.17 million).

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This image released by Searchlight Pictures shows Samara Weaving in a scene from “Ready or Not 2: Here I Come.” (Pief Weyman/Searchlight Pictures via AP)

“Project Hail Mary” stayed aloft in its second weekend, holding strongly with $54.5 million and adding to the long-term prospects of the year’s biggest hit thus far.

The Phil Lord and Chris Miller sci-fi adventure, starring Ryan Gosling, dipped only 32% after notching the best non-franchise opening weekend since 2023’s “Oppenheimer.” Amazon MGM’s yet, “Project Hail Mary” has grossed $300.8 million worldwide in two weeks.

“Project Hail Mary,” which cost nearly $200 million to produce, didn’t face any significant new competition and kept premium format screens largely to itself. Potentially the weekend’s most watched movie, the KPop documentary “BTS: The Return,” went straight to streaming on Netflix.

But “Project Hail Mary” is on an enviable trajectory. Its second weekend hold was even better than that of “Oppenheimer,” which collected $46.7 million in its follow-up frame.

Meanwhile, the weekend’s top new release, “They Will Kill You,” debuted with a disappointing $5 million for Warner Bros. The gory R-rated horror film stars Zazie Beetz as a woman who applies to be a maid at an apartment complex where she’s to become a sacrificial offering.

While the result was far from catastrophic for a movie with a modest $20 million budget, it did suggest that theaters may have become oversaturated in horror. David A. Gross, who runs the movie consulting firm FranchiseRe, noted that there has been a new horror film released every weekend for the last 14 weekends.

That included last week’s “Ready or Not 2: Here I Come” ($16.3 million domestically so far) and a second horror-comedy that also debuted this weekend. IFC’s “Forbidden Fruits,” about a coven of witches who work at a Texas mall, debuted with $1.2 million in sales.

Despite the glut, Gross is forecasting horror films will account for about $2.1 billion in North American ticket revenue in 2026, down from $2.75 million last year. While horror remains popular with audiences and relatively cheap to produce, the genre may be approaching overkill.

Meanwhile, family movies continue to thrive. The Pixar original “Hoppers” remained in second place with $12.2 million in its fourth weekend. The Walt Disney Co. release has accumulated $297.6 million globally.

Next weekend, though, it will face stiff competition in Universal Pictures’ “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie.” It’s expected to have the biggest opening of 2026. (With CNS and AP reports)

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