UPDATED, Thursday AM: Sony’s Angry Birds 2 ranked 4th yesterday with $1.6M, -36% for a running two day total of $4.2M. Disney’s Lion King and Universal’s Hobbs & Shaw are currently fighting over No. 1 Wednesday with $2.3M a piece. CBS Films’ Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark took third place with just under $2M and six-day total of $28.5M. Paramount’s Dora and Sony’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood are wrangling over 5th with $1.5M a piece.

By the way, this whole flooding of the early August marketplace with several wide releases was going on last year at this time, however, it was four wide entries each for the first and second weekend, not five like this year. The only difference is that we had powerful pics like Meg and Crazy Rich Asians rising to the top last August while distributors are largely delivering low budget fare. Other current running domestic totals are as follows: Hobbs & Shaw ($117.6M), Lion King ($482.3M), Dora ($24.1M) and Hollywood ($105.4M).

UPDATED, Wednesday AM: Sony’s Angry Birds 2 flew in line with what we were seeing last night for a $2.6 million opening day Tuesday, ranking fifth among pics on the day behind Universal’s Hobbs & Shaw ($4.3M, $115.4M gross), Disney’s The Lion King ($4.1M, $480M), Paramount’s Dora and the Lost City of Gold ($3.3M, $22.7M), and CBS Films’ Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark ($3.2M, $26.5M).

Directed by Thurop Van Orman and featuring the voices of Jason Sudeikis, Josh Gad, Leslie Jones, Bill Hader, Awkwafina, Tiffany Haddish, Eugenio Derbez, Peter Dinklage, Pete Davidson and more, Angry Birds 2 received a B+ CinemaScore. That’s better than the B earned by Sony’s late July 2017 animated The Emoji Movie, which turned around a 3.5x multiple off its $24.5M opening for an $86M final domestic take.

In ComScore/Screen Engine PostTrak exits, Angry Birds 2 drew 4 stars with parents and kids under 12, who all in repped 66% of yesterday’s audience. Moms outweighed dads in attendance, 56% to 44% with girls and boys under 12 a near even split. Parents gave the pic a 72% definite recommend with kids at 59% saying it’s a “must see” right away.

For Sony, these first few days of Angry Birds 2 are like previews with more business, natch, on the weekend. Six-day outlook is $16M-$18M for this $65M production which, like Dora, is going to need help from overseas. The first Angry Birds back in 2016 made 70% of its global $352.3M from abroad.

PREVIOUSLY, Tuesday, 7:08 PM: Similar to last weekend before everybody rushes back to school, studios and distributors are trying to grab as much cash as they can. Today, for example, in the wake of Paramount opening Dora and the Lost City of Gold last weekend, Sony decided to have Rovio’s Angry Birds Movie 2 fly at 3,869 screens in what looks to be a $2.5 million Tuesday.

Per ComScore, there are still 70% K-12 schools out today, but that number dwindles to 56% by Friday and 38% the following Friday (August 23). The M.O. by the majors is to get as many of these pics that couldn’t be fitted on the regular summer schedule out before the new school season pulls people out of the multiplex.

The six-day outlook for Angry Birds 2 is north of $16M. The animated pic before distribution and marketing expenses cost $65M. The first movie released in May 2016 cost $73M and grossed $352.3M worldwide. The sequel has already earned around $3M abroad from territories including China, the UK, Ukraine, South Korea and Norway among others.

For the most part, box office analysts see the majority of this weekend’s holdovers and new entries (another five) posting tickets sales in the low double digits. Universal’s Hobbs & Shaw is the exception, with a forecast third-weekend take in the high teens. Through yesterday, the David Leitch-directed spinoff has collected $111M.

Entertainment Studios

Then there’s a slew of pics posting or debuting in the $11M-$12M range including the second weekend of CBS Films’ Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark (up to $23.3M through four days), Entertainment Studios’ new shark sequel 47 Meters Down: Uncaged starring Nia Long and Sylvester Stallone’s daughter Sistine Rose Stallone, The Lion King‘s fifth weekend (current stateside total $475.9M) and Universal/Point Grey’s fresh potty-mouth R-rated comedy Good Boys.

SXSW

Young females, the ones who already saw Scary Stories, are the prime demo for 47 Meters Down 2, booked at 2,850 theaters with 7 PM previews on Thursday. Good Boys, in north of 3,000 theaters, is one pic that if analysts had to guess could pop, it’d be this comedy from the filmmaking team of Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky. The trick is whether Uni can get the 17-34 crowd out to see this little kid version of Superbad (a movie, by the way, which is already 12 years old). Critics, who usually hate R-rated comedies, so far are enjoying it at 85% on Rotten Tomatoes. Thursday previews start at 7 PM.

Meanwhile, Dora in weekend 2 is expected to see between $8M-$9M. Through four days, she counts $19.3M.

UAR

Two films, aimed at adults and which look a lot like specialty releases, are going wide and will come up with an estimated $4M-$5M apiece: Annapurna/ UAR’s Richard Linklater movie Where’d You Go, Bernadette? based on the 2012 Maria Semple comedy novel, and New Line’s Sundance acquisition Blinded By the Light.

New Line Cinema

At a time when the industry demands diversity behind and in front of the camera, here are two releases trying to make a difference, and it’s extremely unfortunate, but the forecast is that audiences won’t be going out of their way to watch them.

Bernadette, at 2,400 locations, stars two-time Oscar winner Cate Blanchett. In the movie, a loving mom becomes compelled to reconnect with her creative passions after years of sacrificing herself for her family. Her leap of faith takes her on an epic adventure that jump-starts her life and leads to her triumphant rediscovery. Previews begin at 7 PM on Thursday.

Blinded By the Light from Bend It Like Beckham director Gurinder Chadha was acquired by New Line out of Sundance for $15M, as exclusively reported by Deadline. The film, which killed at its packed premiere in Park City, and tells the story of a Muslim teen in 1987 Britain who learns to live life, understand his family and find his own voice through the music of Bruce Springsteen. Older females and males are currently the prime demo. Pic has the best RT score for wide entries this weekend at 93% Certified Fresh. No RT scores yet on 47 Meters Down 2 or Bernadette.

Hopefully, summer doesn’t ratchet down too much, because currently, according to ComScore, the period of April 26-August 11 is currently raking in $4.3 billion, 1.4% ahead of the same frame a year ago. Even with five new wide entries last weekend, the weekend box office was off 10% from a year ago at $132.2M.