box office

Star Wars: Rise of the Skywalker Crushes Christmas Day Box Office With $35 Million

Photo: Karwai Tang/WireImage

Middling reviews and upset fans were not enough to keep J.J. Abrams’s Star Wars: Episode IX — The Rise of the Skywalker from rising to the top of the box office on Christmas Day. Early estimates say the final film in the “Skywalker Saga†earned as much as $35 million on Christmas Day, making it the second-highest grossing Christmas Day showing after Abrams’s other offering to the Star Wars cannon, The Force Awakens, which made $49.3 million in 2015. The good tidings didn’t stop at Abrams, as Little Women and Uncut Gems had promising Christmas Day showings as well. Greta Gerwig’s Little Women made between $7 and $8 million on its opening day, while the Safdie brothers’ Uncut Gems expanded to wide release and made $6 million dollars. As for the cursed Cats? Tom Hooper’s monstrosity only lapped up $2 million on Christmas (not surprising considering that some of the movie’s stars have yet to see it), bringing its box-office gross to a grand total of $20.5 million, more than $70 million less than what it cost the studio to make. Here’s hoping Hooper has found a way to have himself a merry little Christmas despite the cat-astrophe that has been Cats.

Star Wars: Rise of the Skywalker Rules Christmas Box Office