That's not correct. It's been seven years since a Trek movie, the Trekkie fanbase is massive,
Since when was the Trekkie fanbase ever massive. None of the previous Trek movies made over 100million domestically and never made good foreign money. Star Trek was always a struggling franchise that endured premature series cancelations(TOS, Enterprise), poorly reviewed series(STar Trek Voyager, Enterprise) and small movie budgets due to a support but, moderately sized fanbase.
levels of anticipation were massive,
That's simply not true. In the past few weeks I've seen articles, blogs, and video clips of Trekie's who wouldn't see this movie simply because of the way it looked. The levels of anticipation you're referring to was generated mostly by non trek and casual trek fans like myself who were excited for this film.
and on top of that the reviews were favourable. ,
That helps, but strong reviews don't guarantee a strong opening weekend. Serenity, Hellboy, and Hellboy 2 are the perfect examples of this.
A strong opening weekend was guaranteed whether the film was good or not, purely based on anticipation for this revival of the franchise.
That's not true. Some experts predicted Star Trek would make around 50million for the weekend. The extra 29million that was made didn't come from diehard Star Trek fan repeat viewership. The diehard fanbase was never large enough to accomplish something like this.
It's the general audience that had a major impact on Star Trek's weekend gross and the grosses of other blockbuster films and franchises. The only diehard fanbase that could successfully accomplish something like this without the help of the general audience would be Star Wars and even that idea is far-fetched.
Opening weekends do not necessarily mean the film is unanimously considered fabulous. Need I remind you of X3's huge debut weekend?
Of course. However, I find it interesting that so many blockbuster films with mixed and poor reviews had large second weekend dropoffs.
X3 huge opening. Mixed reviews. 66.9% dropoff.
Wolverine good opening. Bad reviews. 69.0% dropoff.
Watchmen decent opening. Mixed reviews. 67.7% dropoff.
Hulk decent opening. Mixed reviews. 69.7% dropoff.
Matrix Revolutions. good opening. Bad reviews. 66.1%
The Village decent opening. Bad Reviews. 67.5% dropoff.
Fantastic four 2 decent opening. Bad reviews. 65.5% dropoff.
2Fast 2Furious decent opening. Bad reviews. 63.0% dropoff.
Twilight good opening. Bad reviews. 62.2% dropoff.
Fast and Furious good opening. Bad reviews. 61.6% dropoff.
Pirates of the Caribbean 3 great opening. Bad reviews. 61.5% dropoff
Spider-man 3 great opening. Mixed reviews. 61.5% dropoff.
Quantum of Solace good opening. Mixed reviews. 60.4% dropoff.
Incredible Hulk decent opening. Mixed reviews. 60.1% dropoff.
Honerable mentions
Van Heling decent opening. Bad reviews. 59.9% dropoff.
Matrix Reloaded. great opening. Mixed reviews. 59.8% dropoff.
Well, in relative terms Wolverine's drop isn't too bad. Wolverine fell 69 per cent against Star Trek,
Wolverine fell 69percent to a dead franchise that had never made big money that had previously been forcasted to make 50million during it's opening weekend. The dropoff is bad.
X3 fell 67 per cent against a crappy comedy. So, you could argue that Wolverine is a stronger draw because it had a stronger film to compete against.
You can also, argue that a 67 and 69 percent dropoff are still significant since not all blockbuster films drop this much during the second weekend inspite of significant competition.
Blockbuster films released from 2000 to 2008 that didn't suffer a second weekend dropoff of 60% inspite of facing stiff competition
2000 X1(56.8%dopoff) blockbuster competition(what lies Beneath) The Perfect Storm(34.4%dropoff) blockbuster competition(Scary Movie)
2001 Rush Hour 2(50.8%dropoff) blockbuster competition(American Pie 2, The Others)
2002 Austin Powers 3(57.3%dropoff) blockbuster competition(Signs) The Bourne Identity(44.4% dropoff) blockbuster competition(Minority Report) Minority Report(39.4%dropoff) blockbuster competition(Mr. Deeds)
2003 Bruce Almighty(45%dropoff) blockbuster competition(Finding Nemo) Finding Nemo(33.6%dropoff) blockbuster competition(2Fast 2Furious) Terminator 3(55.7%dropoff) blocbuster competition(Pirates 1)
2004 I-Robot(58.3%) blockbuster competition(The Bourne Supremacy) The Bourne Supremacy(53.9%dropoff) blockbuster competition(The Village)
2005 Mr. and Mrs. Smith(48.2%dropoff) blockbuster competition(Batman Begins) Fantastic Four(59.3%dropoff) blockbuster competition(Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Wedding Crashers)
2006 Click(50.2%dropoff) blockbuster competition(The Devil Wears Prada) Over the Hedge(29.5%dropoff) and Davinci Code(55.8% dropoff) blockbuster competition(X-Men 3) Superman Returns(58.4%dropoff) blockbuster competition(Pirates2)
2007 Transformers(47.4%) blockbuster competition(Harry Potter 5) Shrek The Third(56.3%dropoff) blockbuster competition(Pirates 3) Die Hard 4(46.8%dropoff) blockbuster competition(Transformers)
2008 Chronciles of Narnia(58.5%dropoff) blockbuster competition(Indiana Jones) Wall-E(48.4%dropoff) blockbuster competition( Hancock) Journey to the Center(41.2%dropoff) blockbuster competition(The Dark Knight)
These statitistics prove that blockbuster films don't automatically suffer a huge dropoff if their second weekend competition is significant.
Remember, Hellboy 2 plummeted 71 per cent on its second weekend in the USA because The Dark Knight opened and blasted it to bits (note that Hellboy opened later in other territories).
This isn't a fair comparison. Since when did Hellboy have a significant audience? The first film grossed a whopping 59million domestically and didn't even make it's money back. The second film failed to do the same and was outgrossed by a mixed reviewed awful looking 3D crapfest film that didn't appear to have fanbase. Hellboy 2 killed itself during it's opening weekend after all of it's microsized fanbase were done watching it.
Hellboy was never going to make big money. Opening weekends of 21.7mil of 34.5mil for both films proves the general audience have little interest in this franchise. The only thing unusual about Hellboy 2's dropoff is what you're trying to compare it to.
Second weekend drop-offs are not purely down to audience reaction, they are also down to the competition faced by the film.
Sometimes they are and many times they aren't. However, after anaylzing all of the above films I'm convinced the general audience reaction plays a much bigger role in determining the dropoff percentage.