{"id":446614,"date":"2026-05-26T20:43:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T20:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/446614\/"},"modified":"2026-05-26T20:43:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T20:43:09","slug":"the-mandalorian-and-grogu-box-office-driven-by-families-not-fanboys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/446614\/","title":{"rendered":"‘The Mandalorian and Grogu’ Box Office Driven by Families, Not Fanboys"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the first \u201cStar Wars\u201d film in theaters in seven years<\/a>, you would hope that \u201cThe Mandalorian and Grogu<\/a>\u201d would make a little more noise than \u201cSolo: A Star Wars<\/a> Story.\u201d<\/p>\n

With an estimated $81 million opening weekend and $100 million domestic over the 4-day Memorial Day holiday, \u201cThe Mandalorian and Grogu\u201d was not the lowest opening for a \u201cStar Wars\u201d movie ever, as some had feared (not factoring in inflation), and it\u2019s roughly on par with the $84 million opening of \u201cSolo\u201d from 2018, the largely forgettable Han Solo prequel film<\/a>. Back when \u201cSolo\u201d opened, we might have said that\u2019s awful, but times have changed, and while it\u2019s not bad, it\u2019s not staggering either, despite being the fourth-largest domestic opening for a film in 2026.<\/p>\n

\"NEW<\/a> \"Christopher<\/a> <\/p>\n

Some of the early tracking for \u201cMando\u201d over four days, not three, was for an $80 million opening, and that would have spelled trouble. Instead, Disney is relieved to see an A- CinemaScore (\u201cSolo\u201d got the same grade, for whatever that\u2019s worth), 89 percent Popcorn Meter on Rotten Tomatoes, and even 52 percent of audiences seeing it in IMAX or other PLF screens, including a good chunk in 3D. IMAX gave \u201cThe Mandalorian and Grogu\u201d a three-week commitment, so it\u2019s going to hang onto those premium screens and surcharges for a while.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a plethora of other qualifiers and caveats you can make that could paint a solid picture for \u201cMandalorian and Grogu.\u201d It\u2019s a spinoff of a streaming show<\/a>, not a main part of a new \u201cStar Wars\u201d saga or the launch of a new franchise, and it\u2019s a standalone film that doesn\u2019t require backstory, so this will surely steer some people back to the show on Disney+, if they haven\u2019t watched it already. It\u2019s also cost way less than \u201cSolo\u201d did, budgeted roughly $166 million compared to $270 million, so that\u2019s certainly a plus. The $63 million it made internationally puts it well on its way to recouping that cost.<\/p>\n

But the numbers also paint a picture of the audience that Disney is really glad showed up for this film: families. Just 11 percent of the audience on opening night on Thursday was under-18 or included that family crowd, but that jumped to 25 percent over the weekend. The under-18 audience rated the film an \u201cA,\u201d and where Disney will truly make bank on this movie is in people buying Baby Yoda dolls and toys<\/a> and in parents bringing kids to Galaxy\u2019s Edge in Disneyland or Disney World. The Smuggler\u2019s Run ride in Anaheim recently got retooled to cross-promote the movie.<\/p>\n

This summer isn\u2019t getting less crowded at the theaters. Fanboys might turn their attention to \u201cMasters of the Universe\u201d in the coming days, Gen-Z might gravitate toward \u201cScary Movie\u201d or \u201cObsession\u201d that is still going strong, sci-fi fans will look to \u201cDisclosure Day,\u201d and families even have Nate Bargatze\u2019s \u201cThe Breadwinner\u201d as an option. But none of those are necessarily real competition for four-quadrant audiences until Disney\u2019s own \u201cToy Story 5\u201d in mid-June.<\/p>\n

The reviews suggest that the inoffensive, adorable touches<\/a> \u201cThe Mandalorian and Grogu\u201d achieves (it has an extended sequence sans-Mando and featuring only Grogu and some other cutesy, miniature creatures) were exactly by design. With former Lucasfilm<\/a> head Kathleen Kennedy now out of the picture in favor of Dave Filoni and co-president Lynwen Brennan<\/a>, you can maybe hold out a New Hope that \u201cStarfighter\u201d starring Ryan Gosling<\/a> might be more in line with what a more ravenous fan base wants to see from their favorite franchise. You might argue that Disney was right to court families again than the folks that have made some \u201cStar Wars\u201d discourse absolutely toxic.<\/a><\/p>\n

But whatever defined success for \u201cStar Wars\u201d films in the past, when it comes to \u201cThe Mandalorian and Grogu,\u201d now this is the way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the first \u201cStar Wars\u201d film in theaters in seven years, you would hope that \u201cThe Mandalorian and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":446615,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[5784,156,593,34476,409,111,139,69,1797,67310],"class_list":["post-446614","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-box-office","tag-entertainment","tag-film","tag-lucasfilm","tag-movies","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-star-wars","tag-the-mandalorian-and-grogu"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446614","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=446614"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446614\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/446615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=446614"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=446614"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=446614"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}