weekend box office

Major holiday weekends are often huge for the box office, with millions of Americans taking advantage of their extra time off to head out to the movies. But this fourth of July weekend? Not so much. Despite three new releases, it was a surprisingly quiet time at the movies these past few days and it's hard to imagine anyone being particularly overjoyed with these numbers...

Look, everyone knows that it's your obligation as a human being to go see a new 'Transfomrers' movie when it comes out whether you want to or not. It's the only explanation for the success of the past three films (since no one actually likes them) and it's the only explanation for the massive first weekend of 'Transformers: Age of Extinction,' which had the biggest opening of 2014 so far.

Everyone expected '22 Jump Street' and 'How to Train Your Dragon 2' to open well, but you won't find many people who expected the raunchy R-rated comedy to open bigger than the family friendly animated adventure. But here we are! Both films opened well, but '22 Jump Street,' like the first film, is has taken a hammer to all expectations.

Ah, the summer. The time of the year where the box office is ruled by superhero movies, science fiction extravaganzas and, uh, slightly quirky cancer weepies. What? For reasons that will baffle some people, 'The Fault in Our Stars' effortlessly took the number one spot at the box office this weekend, gliding past its bigger, more expensive and more ferocious competition and making it look easy.

We're knee-deep in the summer movie season and the hits just keep on coming. Despite mixed buzz, 'Maleficent' opened very strong, not coming close to the massive numbers of the past few weekends, but certainly holding its own. However, the success of Disney's latest live action effort meant that the weekend's other big release, Seth MacFarlane's 'A Million Ways to Die in the West,' fared less well.

The Memorial Day weekend brought with it the third Marvel superhero movie of 2014 and like 'Captain America: The Winter Soldier' and 'The Amazing Spider-Man 2,' 'X-Men: Days of Future Past' opened to over $90 million at the box office. Sure, people online keep on wondering if audiences are getting tired of comic book films, but the box office keeps on saying otherwise.

This weekend saw a neck-and-neck race for the first spot at the box office, with the animated 'Rio 2' offering strong competition for last week's champion, 'Captain America: The Winter Soldier.' When the dust, debris and feathers settled, the one starring the superhero took the first slot, but there is no shame in a second place that strong.

Like 'Iron Man 3' and 'Thor: The Dark World,' the question was never whether or not 'Captain America: The Winter Soldier' would take the number one spot at the box office, but rather how much it would earn while sitting pretty at the top of the list. Also, like its "Phase 2" predecessors, the second Steve Rogers adventure proved that people are still punch-drunk in love with the Avengers

Insert your own "when it rains, it pours" joke right here. Darren Aronofsky's instantly controversial biblical epic 'Noah' overcame mixed buzz to win the box office this weekend, catering to both religious audiences and film buffs who like weird movies from unique, picky directors. But all was not well for everyone -- the latest film from a certain Hollywood action legend got washed away

If the main goal of 'Divergent' was to snag a large portion of the audience for 'The Hunger Games,' it looks like it succeeded. Although it didn't reach the absurd heights of Katniss' two movies, Shailene Woodley's dystopian adventure effortlessly nabbed the number one spot and, unless something bad happens next week, announced the arrival of a new big franchise.

If the goal for 'Need For Speed' was to replicate the success of the 'Fast and Furious' films, then the film's opening weekend is not promising. Opening in third place, the video game adaptation was overtaken by two of last week's releases, making this potential franchise D.O.A.

After seven years of waiting, no one knew if a sequel to '300' would do the business of its predecessor. And now we have a definitive answer: yes. '300: Rise of an Empire' effortlessly took the number one spot at the box office, proving that America still loves shirtless Greeks murdering each other in slow motion.