Following a busier than usual September, the fall box office is set to continue breaking records as two blockbuster titles will face off this weekend; Sony’s Venom will roll into theaters (not dissimilarly to a turd in the wind), while Warner’s much buzzed about music drama A Star is Born hopes to turn its hype and critical praise into a big opening.

Venom is the latest in Sony’s attempts to kickstart a franchise with the Marvel characters they have access to, after losing the titular hero to the MCU and failing to turn The Amazing Spider-Man into the blockbuster they hoped for. Venom carries a smaller budget at $100 million (a third of which was reportedly financed by a Chinese company. This kind of smaller budget should help, especially considering the flick has been ripped apart by critics and received decidedly mixed reception from fans. Tracking has it pegged at around $57-70 million for the weekend, which sounds about right.

A Star is Born is somewhat of a wildcard, though more-so in the sense that it’s hard to tell whether it’s going to do well, or whether it’s going to be massive. With a budget of just $36 million and plenty of buzz, there’s essentially zero chance it ends up flopping, but the question is whether it ends up on the $25-30 million end of tracking, or blowing expectations out of the water and goes for $40-50 million. It’s hard to say, but pre-sales have been quite impressive for a non-franchise R rated title like this. The music drama held a number of early screenings in Dolby Cinema on Tuesday and Wednesday, similarly to Ocean’s 8 from back in June. It seems as though the screenings sold quite well, but no numbers are officially available yet.

It’s worth mentioning that there’s a feasible scenario here where A Star actually opens higher than Venom. Pre-sales have been much closer than would have been expected, and the question is whether or not it ends up being much more walk-up heavy than Venom, or if this rush to get tickets as soon as possible can be attributed to the buzz surrounding the film – notably due to Lady Gaga. As of the time of this writing, A Star is Born is 2% ahead of Venom on MovieTickets.com – 30.5% to 28.5%.

Among holdovers, Night School and Smallfoot will likely be neck and neck for the weekend, while The House With a Clock In Its Walls should stabilize a bit after last weekend.

Predictions

Venom – $49 million A Star is Born – $42 million Smallfoot – $14 million Night School – $12.5 million The House With a Clock In Its Walls – $7.5 million