‘Jurassic World Dominion’ Nabs $15 Million Tuesday For $173 Million Cume

Jurassic World Dominion topped the box office on Tuesday, earning another $14.7 million to bring its five-day cume to $172.5 million. That’s a 16% jump from Monday, thanks partially to “cheap ticket Tuesday, which positions Universal and Amblin’s $185 million dino threequel (or six-quel) to pass $200 million domestic and $500 million worldwide on Friday. It should pass the half-billion-dollar mark on Thursday, presuming it keeps its 37/63 domestic/overseas split. That would put its current global total at $466 million, just below Godzilla Vs. Kong ($469 million) and well ahead of Rampage ($430 million) and Pacific Rim ($411 million). By Saturday, it’ll have passed the $527-$568 million likes of Godzilla, The Meg, Peter Jackson’s King Kong and Kong: Skull Island among all mega-budget monster movies.

Save for the Jurassic series, five of six of them anyway, no big-budget monster movie has topped even $600 million worldwide. The core appeal of dinosaurs, along with the Jurassic brand and all that entails, makes the franchise one that gets attendance from kids too young for “scary” monster flicks and adults otherwise too old for a monster mash. Again, the Jurassic series is incredibly popular among general moviegoers, the ones who don’t obsess about it online or make it a definitive part of their personality. That the films haven’t tried to go all “cinematic universe,” at least not yet, and only exist as “once every three or four years” theatrical attractions make them continue to be events even amid a marketplace dominated by would-be event movies.

Yes, we have video games, toys and Netflix’s (terrific) Camp Cretaceous animated series (about a handful of kids trapped in Jurassic World during the events of Jurassic World), but the Jurassic brand is still defined by theatrical movies. We’ve “only” had six of them in the last 29 years, with three from 1993 to 2001 and three from 2015 to 2022. In a world where every studio wants to stretch every hit property as thin as humanly possible (even ghoulish ideas like a Squid Game reality show), it’s worth noting that Universal is both A) not advertising the notion of streaming-specific Jurassic content and B) isn’t even hinting at what the theoretical next Jurassic movie might be. These conversations, if they are happening, aren’t being made public.

When Jurassic World debuted in June of 2015, I noted that I was impressed that the pre-release marketing campaign was entirely focused on the movie that was about to open and not theoretical or already-in-development sequels. We didn’t even know what Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom would be about until we got the first trailer in late 2017, and it was only because of Fallen Kingdom’s “dinos are in the real world now” cliffhanger that we had any clue as to what would become Jurassic World Dominion. Director Colin Trevorrow told us early on not to expect a Jurassic variation of Rampage or Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. But I digress, the cone of silence allowed Universal to sell Dominion as a series finale.

Aside from the fifth and final season of Camp Cretaceous arriving July 21, Dominion really is the end of Jurassic (for now). I’m guessing we’ll get another movie down the line, if only because the Jurassic films have averaged out to $1 billion worldwide each and are the most profitable (in terms of global gross vs. production budget rate of return) of any modern mega-budget franchises. Moreover, in a world where every studio needs tentpole franchises and launching a new-to-cinema A-level franchise is almost impossible due to consumers being unwilling to try anything new, I’d argue Universal can’t afford to end the franchise. But since we don’t know what will come next, or when it will come next, this does feel like the end.