Bad Boys: Ride Or Die Provides Box Office Backup With $56 Million Opening Weekend

Update 06/15/2024: By Monday, "Bad Boys: Ride or Die" had pulled ahead of earlier tracking with a $56.5 million opening weekend. The headline has been updated to reflect this. Original article follows.

In case you hadn't heard, the summer 2024 box office has been bad. Really, really, really, ridiculously bad. And when a situation is this bad, you need some bad boys to ride in and fix it — or die trying. As luck would have it, "Bad Boys: Ride or Die" arrived in theaters this weekend, bringing with it the oxygen mask of an estimated $53 million opening weekend. The fourth movie in the action-comedy series starring Will Smith and Martin Lawrence brought in $21.6 million on Friday, including $5.9 million from Thursday previews, which puts it on track to slightly outperform early projections (per The Hollywood Reporter).

That number isn't far behind the $61 million debut of "Transformers: Rise of the Beasts" during this same weekend a year ago. Under ordinary circumstances, a $53 million opening weekend wouldn't be considered one of the high points of the summer box office, where movies will frequently open north of the $100 million mark. But thanks to Hollywood studios' efforts to starve out striking writers and actors last year, these are not ordinary circumstances.

This is the second time in recent memory that a "Bad Boys" movie has come out on top during turbulent times. The previous franchise entry, "Bad Boys for Life," was released in January 2020 and, due to the global pandemic lockdowns that kicked in a couple of months later, ended up becoming the highest-grossing movie of the year domestically, and the third-highest-grossing movie worldwide. "Bad Boys: Ride or Die" is on track for a smaller opening weekend than "Bad Boys for Life" ($62.5 million), but it's still a much-needed hit in the midst of a suffering summer box office.

M. Night Shyamalan isn't just a box office wild card — he's also a certified #GirlDad. His 2021 movie "Old" was a real family affair, with Saleka Shyamalan writing and performing the tie-in song, and Ishana Night Shyamalan serving as second unit director. The tables were turned for "The Watchers," Ishana's feature directorial debut, for which M. Night directed second unit shots. He also produced and provided financing for the movie (as he has done for his own movies since 2015's "The Visit"), but it was picked up for distribution by Warner Bros. Pictures for the substantial sum of $30 million (per The Wrap).

"The Watchers" stars Dakota Fanning as an artist who finds herself stranded in an Irish forest and finding shelter with a group of strangers, unable to return to civilization because of the mysterious creatures that hunt them at night. Reviews are mixed-to-poor, with a 30% score on Rotten Tomatoes as of this writing (read /Film's review here). According to the Hollywood Reporter, "The Watchers" is looking at an estimated $7 million opening weekend, which would give it a fourth-place debut behind "Bad Boys: Ride or Die," "The Garfield Movie" and "IF."

We're getting two Shyamalan thrillers this summer, as M. Night's "Trap" will help round out the season with its August 9 release. Given the twists and turns of the director's track record, I'm not even going to attempt to guess whether that one will be a hit or a flop.