What kind of poison is invading the box office this weekend? It’s Venom 3, aka Venom: The Last Dance! Another superhero (villain?) film taking a bite out of the movie theaters, Venom 3 is following a slump in comic book films at the box office, like Joker 2. Unfortunately, they will never match up to Deadpool’s impact. It’s hard living in Ryan Reynolds’s shadow. The Tom Hardy-led Sony/Marvel film is estimated to earn $52 million domestically this weekend— less than its projected total of $65 million and way less than 2021’s Venom: Let There Be Carnage’s opening of $90 million. Maybe it’ll find its audience once Halloweekend and the World Series are over.
It’s easy enough to compare the comic book-inspired movies against each other, but how would everyone do on the dance floor? Venom 3 isn’t the only movie in the title where executives wanted to highlight the suspense of a final tango. Save The Last Dance (2001) had a $23 million opening, exceeding the film’s budget of $13 million and our minds of what a final audition could look like. Sharon Stone’s 1996 film Last Dance earned $2 million, and more recently, Magic Mike’s Last Dance (2023) had $8 million for a Galentine’s Day peg. So at least Venom is topping the “Last Dance” charts.