Tavern Talk: Video Review - SPACE JAM: A NEW LEGACY

While it was expected that Marvel’s Black Widow would be repeating as the number one film at the box office this weekend the spirit of the NBA Finals apparently made a crossover with movie-going audiences as LeBron James' twenty-five year-later sequel to 1996's Michael Jordan-vehicle, Space Jam, turned out to be a much bigger hit than anyone was expecting. The Warner Bros. property (meaning it began simultaneously streaming on HBO Max on Friday) debuted well ahead of early predictions (most in the $20 million range) with a $31.7 million domestic showing easily giving Space Jam: A New Legacy the biggest opening for a kids-targeted film since the COVID-19 pandemic began. Because the film was also available free of charge to HBO Max subscribers and because it was more or less demolished by critics it seemed the momentum had somewhat stalled for this sequel that I - as someone who loved basketball, Michael Jordan, and movies as a child, was pretty anxiously awaiting - all the more sweet. Is the movie very good? No, not really - it's pretty patchy until it gets to the meat and potatoes of what it was explicitly made to do, but at the same time this is a movie whose critical reception was never going to sway or change the minds of the target audience thus not making it that much of a surprise if not still as impressive that James and the Looney Tunes collected a $7,982 per-screen average in 3,965 theaters. In fact, opening weekend audiences scored the film an ‘A-‘ CinemaScore. Back in '96, the original Space Jam premiered to the "toon" of $27.5 million while going on to gross $90.4 million domestically and $230.4 million worldwide. While it's impossible to know where A New Legacy will end up especially with today's theatrical climate and distribution model constantly shifting and a slew of big, new releases upcoming it should be noted that there is a distinct lack of family-friendly material until maybe Jungle Cruise (though it is PG-13), but more likely until August 20th when Paw Patrol: The Movie premieres as Space Jam would seemingly share a bigger portion of it's audience with that film. In second place, Black Widow suffered a pretty severe -67.3% drop from its first weekend, but while the film has accumulated upwards of $132 million in North America and another $100.7 million from international markets, it has yet to open in Chins where Marvel tends to do big business. For a film that cost an estimated $200 million to produce, is also available on Disney Plus for a $30 charge (where it apparently did very well in its first weekend), and has thus far managed to collect a cumulative worldwide gross of $232.7 million (during a pandemic nonetheless), I don't think it's time to start writing the "Is the MCU dead?" pieces just yet. As always, be sure to follow the official TAVERN TALK by Initial Reaction YouTube channel as well as on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter where you can find a new review (or reviews) each week!