THE WEEKEND WARRIOR Early Edition December 13, 2025

Can either Kraven the Hunter or a Lord of the Rings animated prequel make a mark?

Well, that “Releaseapocalypse” was quite a big lot of nothing, huh?

I’m not sure I’ve seen a more disappointing weekend at the box office, especially after that insane Thanksgiving weekend that set all sorts of records. With all those projected “wide” releases, I think I counted only three or four movies in over 1,000 theaters and the widest release, Kyle Mooney’s Y2K, couldn’t even make $3 million. In fact, the biggest breakouts of the weekend was a Telugu-language action sequel from India, a rerelease of Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar in IMAX, and two concert movies. Everything else just didn’t make much of a mark, which is what happens when you release so many movies against each other in what is historically a terrible weekend.

This weekend might not be much better as two wide-released studio genre films will try to take on the unstoppable steamrolling triumvirate in Moana 2, Wicked, and Gladiator 2, although one of them probably will contend with the latter, while the other is an animated movie but not necessarily for younger kids.

The new wide releases are Sony’s Kraven the Hunter, starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson as the Spider-Man villain getting his own movie ala Morbius (yikes!) and the other is an animated prequel to Peter Jackson’s classic Tolkien adaptations with The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim. They each have their own challenges to face, so if you want to read my thoughts on their box office, feel free to sign up as a paid subscriber for a measly $5 a month, and then I’ll have reviews at least of one of them in the reviews portion of this column. (I won’t be seeing Kraven the Hunter until Thursday, but might review that closer to the weekend.)

Other limited releases this weekend include Paramount’s period drama September 5 and Ramell Ross’ acclaimed drama, Nickel Boys. More about the box office on the wide releases after the paywall and then info on all the new releases in the regular edition on Thursday.