‘Toy Story 5’ Dethrones ‘Super Mario Galaxy Movie’ With a Franchise-Record $160 Million Opening Weekend
‘Toy Story 5’ landed in theaters this past weekend carrying three decades of goodwill, the kind of pressure that comes with following a trilogy many fans already considered a perfect send off. Pixar brought back Woody, Buzz Lightyear and Jessie for a fifth chapter, dropping the gang into a summer movie season that badly needed a guaranteed crowd pleaser.
The new threat to playtime this time around is not another toy or a careless owner, but a sleek tablet named Lilypad, voiced by Greta Lee, who becomes Bonnie’s new favorite distraction. Directed by Andrew Stanton, who conceived the story and co-wrote the screenplay with Kenna Harris, the film follows ‘Toy Story 4’ from 2019 as the fifth main installment in the series.
‘Toy Story 5’ ruled over the box office with $160 million from 4,425 North America theaters, securing the biggest domestic debut of the year over Universal’s ‘Super Mario Galaxy Movie,’ which opened to $131.7 million. Variety, which first flagged the milestone, noted the number landed on the higher end of industry expectations heading into the weekend.
The film also ranks as the largest opening in ‘Toy Story’ franchise history, surpassing the record set by 2019’s ‘Toy Story 4’ with $120 million, and it logged the second largest animated opening weekend ever, trailing only 2018’s ‘Incredibles 2’ at $182.7 million. The Friday gross alone hit a staggering $71 million, the second highest opening day for any animated film behind only ‘Incredibles 2.’
The per screen average landed at $36,158, and ticket buyers skewed 57 percent female, with kids under 12 representing the single largest age group at 25% of the audience. Internationally the film added $152 million for a global opening haul of $312 million, against a reported $250 million production budget.
In a historic first for the mainline series, the MPA rated ‘Toy Story 5’ PG for thematic elements and rude humor, breaking the franchise’s spotless run of G ratings dating back to the 1995 original. Audiences did not seem bothered by the shift, awarding the film an A grade on CinemaScore that matches the warm reception nearly every prior entry received.
Stanton has been candid about why he refused to make Lilypad a simple villain in the story. “When tech comes in, it wins,” he told Empire in an exclusive interview. “It happens to adults and kids. It just wins. So that was the more interesting slant to take, there’s no competition.”
With ‘Toy Story 4’ having been billed as the franchise’s emotional finale back in 2019, this kind of opening proves audiences were more than ready to hand Woody and the gang another chapter. Now that Lilypad has officially out earned a Mario powered weekend, do you think Bonnie’s toys have earned one more adventure after this, or is it finally time to let them rest on the shelf?
