Note: All figures discussed here are three-day grosses. This piece was written on May 25, 2025.
Only twice in the history of the domestic box office have two new movies simultaneously opened to $60+ million.
The first was over June 21-23, 2013. That's when Monsters University and World War Z both dominated the box office.
Then there was the Barbenheimer craze of July 21-23, 2023. Barbie and Oppenheimer were simply unstoppable that frame.
Now, we have a third instance of this rare phenomenon. The May 23-25, 2025 frame saw Lilo & Stitch and Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning each score $60+ million three-day bows. It’s hard to believe this eye-popping feat could occur just two months after the domestic box office had six consecutive weeks in where the top ten grosses were stuck in the $45.48-$69.41 million grosses. That’s what happens when you put out a lot of different films aimed at different audiences. Pitting Lilo & Stitch against a Tom Cruise blockbuster aimed at older folks worked well in June 2002. Now, the 2025 domestic box office flourished thanks to a super-charged iteration of that Lilo & Stitch and Minority Report showdown.
At the top of the box office was Lilo & Stitch with a whopping $145.5 million. By far the biggest three-day Memorial Day weekend launch in history (easily surpassing Top Gun: Maverick $126.7 million three-day bow), Lilo & Stitch also came in way ahead of most other live-action Disney remake opening weekends. It opened 50% ahead of 2019's Aladdin, for instance, and 41% ahead of 2016's The Jungle Book. Only Beauty and the Beast and the realistically-animated The Lion King had better debuts. This is also the second-biggest domestic launch amongst all 2025 movies, only behind A Minecraft Movie.
Stitch is beloved. That simple fact explains how we got here. Two months ago, Snow White was tasked with making a must-see live-action tentpole out of a property that’s historically important but not exactly a household staple of even Disney Adults. Stitch, meanwhile, has never left the popular conciousness thanks to endless merchandising and nostalgia for the 2002 original. That ubiquity gave this live-action remake a sense of must-see urgency for general audiences. Meanwhile, Lilo & Stitch also continued the trend of post-1988 Disney Animation movies inspiring the most lucrative remakes.
Exceptions like Maleficent and The Jungle Book exist, true. However, the only Disney remakes that soaring past $290+ million domestically (save for Alice in Wonderland and Jungle Book) are rehashes of The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King. There’s a reason Pinocchio and Peter Pan & Wendy got shuffled off to Disney+. Disney remakes excel most at the box office when they play on more recent forms of nostalgia centered on the Disney Renaissance titles or, in Stitch’s case, a project from Disney’s early 2000s.
These Disney remakes are shockingly leggy things, as seen by Maleficent doing 3.5 times its opening weekend and Aladdin doing four times its three-day debut, Heck, Beauty and the Beast, despite opening to a whopping $174 million, still did 2.95 times it bow in its lifetime North American haul. Needless to say, Lilo & Stitch has a good shot at clearing $450 million domestically. Thanks to strong overseas numbers this frame, a final worldwide total of $1+ billion looks likely. To think, this was once set to go to Disney+. It’s almost as if dumping films on streaming platforms is a bad idea in every respect…
Though the Mission: Impossible movies have been going on for 30 years, they've never brought in the massive $100+ million openings of other franchises. Even the James Bond saga got to an $88 million debut with Skyfall. Like fellow Paramount Pictures saga Star Trek, Mission: Impossible's original installments (specifically the first two films) had opening weekends that were record-shattering at the times of their release. However, whereas Star Wars and the Batman movies kept on increasing their opening weekends over time, there's been a clear ceiling for Mission: Impossible films. Again, like Star Trek, there’s only so high modern installments can go. The Force Awakens and The Dark Knight brought old and new fans alike to the theater with their explosive $150+ million opening weekends. Not so much for post-2000 Mission: Impossible films.
Only one of these pre-2025 Impossible titles opened to $60+ million domestically. Now Mission: Impossible- Fallout has some company since Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning opened to $63 million. Let’s put all cards on the table here: this film has a reported budget of $300-400 million. There’s no way it’ll be profitable for Paramount Pictures/Skydance Productions and other financiers in its initial theatrical run. The question is simply if it can improve on Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning (no longer Part One, at least in title) at the box office since that 2023 entry was the lowest grossing Mission: Impossible in 17 years.
That looks to be affirmative, with The Final Reckoning getting more mileage with viewers thanks to dealing with less competition than its predecessor (it didn’t have to open one weekend before Barbenheimer, specifically), having exclusive access to IMAX screens for three weekends, and a promotional campaign that emphasized this was the last go-around for the steady franchise. Being the eighth installment in a long-running franchise undoubtedly warded away some casual viewers, who didn’t want to deal with all the lore. However, in raw numbers, The Final Reckoning did fine, especially by Mission: Impossible standards. These titles have smaller openings, but they have good legs (the fifth and sixth entries both did more than 3.5 times their respective debuts). Don’t be surprised if The Final Reckoning gets past $200 million in North America.
Final Destination: Bloodlines fell 62% to gross another $19.65 million this frame. With $89.78 million after ten days of release, it's on track to become the first Final Destination movie to exceed $100 million. What an incredible feat for a sixth installment in a 25-year-old horror saga. In fourth place, Thunderbolts* eased 45% to gross another $9.16 million for a $171.37 million domestic total. Can it get the extra $28.63 million necessary for a $200 million domestic finish? I'd say yes but just barely, but we'll see.
In its sixth weekend of release, Sinners finally had a normal weekend-to-weekend decline. Even so, it still only dropped a not too shabby 42% to gross another $8.75 million. Among all sixth weekends in history, Sinners had the 93rd biggest in history, coming in ahead of titles like Captain Marvel, Oppenheimer, Avengers: Endgame, Deadpool, Inception, and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest. What an extraordinary run this title's had and it's still got plenty of road to still run. This title's now grossed $256.55 million domestically
The Last Rodeo, the latest Angel Studios wide release title, pretty much opened in the same range as all of the studios post-Sound of Freedom live-action titles. Grossing $5.26 million on opening weekend, it debuted better than Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin and last year's Memorial Day Angel Studios newcomer Sight. Nothing to write home about with this bow, but at least it's another $5.26 million for movie theaters.
This weekend didn't just belong to the big blockbusters, though. There was actually a breakout indie hit in here too. That's the most important thing of the weekend, seeing an original independent film soar in theaters. Tim Robinson and Paul Rudd's hysterical Friendship grossed an outstanding $4.5 million in its first weekend of wide release. Playing in 1,055 theaters, it grossed $4,352 per theater, a terrific haul. Having grossed $6.6 million after 17 days of release (and just three days of wide release play), Friendship is destined to become only the second 2025 limited release (following Becoming Led Zeppelin) to crack $10+ million domestically.
Look Hollywood! Theatrical comedies can make money if you have them star people that are relevant to younger audiences! Making them funny and well-received doesn’t hurt either.
A Minecraft Movie fell 63% in the face of Lilo & Stitch, which gave it another $2.21 million for a $420.84 million domestic total. Stitch will eventually surpass it, but Minecraft currently remains 2025’s biggest movie domestically by a massive margin.
The Final Reckoning took away some of The Accountant 2's novelty in the marketplace, as the title dropped 59%. Grossing another $1.97 million, this sequel's now amassed $62.87 million in North America.
Hurry Up Tomorrow plummeted in its second frame, falling 78% to add $740,000 for a $4.8 million domestic total.
Sony Pictures Classics launched another European arthouse title aimed at the older crowd (in the vein of the label's previous U.S. distribution titles The Lady in the Van, Maudie, The Miracle Club, The Phantom of the Open, The Duke, The Leisure Seeker, etc.) The latest foray in this territory was Jane Austen Wrecked My Life, which opened to $269,000 from 61 theaters for a middling $4,410 per theater average. These older-skewing features tend to stick around a while in the marketplace, so maybe this one will keep going when it expands wider next weekend.
This was handily the biggest Memorial Day weekend in history at the domestic box office, a spectacular win for theatrical exhibition. Over this three-day frame alone, the top ten movies at the domestic box office seized a massive $260 million. The 19th biggest weekend in history, this frame dethroned May 4-6, 2012's longstanding $258 million record to become the biggest May weekend ever domestically. This was also the fifth-biggest domestic opening weekend since movie theaters closed for the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020.
Best of all, the love got spread around in the marketplace as five separate movies grossed $8.7+ million each. For comparison’s sake, 2024's biggest frame, the July 26-28, 2024 frame where Deadpool & Wolverine bowed, only had three separate movies grossing $8.7+ million each. With everything from a big new family movie to a summer blockbuster epic to an indie comedy smash, there was something for everyone this frame. The dire and limited crop of theatrical newcomers that plagued theaters at the start of 2025 were nowhere to be found in a weekend that had lots of genres and tones to offer.
Before even the big Memorial Day Monday arrives, May 2025 has already grossed a little over $735 million domestically. Even with only five days left in the month after Memorial Day Monday, this month should have no problem getting past $850 million. This is a fantastic kick-off to the summer moviegoing season and independent theater owners are surely crossing their fingers that this momentum is kept up through June and July. Stitch and Tom Cruise made a potent box office combo back in June 2002, but they were a downright unstoppable pair 23 years later.