Now we're slap-bang in the middle of the summer box office season, it stands to reason that everyone wants to go and see a film where a helicopter turns into a robot and gets all "Nyyyyeowww" with the rotor on a whole freaking city.
And, whaddaya know, Transformers appears to be that movie. Transformers is the top movie at the weekend box office, taking more than double what its second-placed competitor could manage. Most of Transformers' weekend box office success has been attributed to the fact that everyone who like the Transformers toys and cartoons as children are now old enough to afford their own cinema tickets and stuff. Not only that, but some of them are also successful award-winning entertainment bloggers who can buy their own Optimus Prime toys and take them to school and laugh at everyone else who can't afford one. You hear that, Matthew Roberts? We can afford our own Optimus Prime now. And you work at Superdrug. Ha!
Transformers is number one at the US weekend box office, but let's not get too excited. Although it might be fun to watch Michael Bay direct two hours of giant robots smashing up sports stadium and throwing tanks into petrol stations for now, remember that Transformers topping the weekend box office will only spark off more movie remakes of 1980s cartoons, with a He-Man movie, a Voltron movie and a Thundercats movie already on the cards. But we promise you, the day that we see a CGI Chorlton running away from an army of exploding Wheelies, that's the day we start spiking popcorn with anthrax. Here's the US weekend box office top five:
1 – Transformers (We're chronically unable to take Transformers seriously as a credible winner at the weekend box office this year. Now, if it was a shitty, phoned-in third sequel to a franchise that's already way past its best, then we'd be talking) $67,600,000
2 – Ratatouille (It's quite a leap for Pixar to go from a movie about happy cars making friends to a movie about a rat dipping its shit-ridden paws into a load of food. Next time, here's hoping we can look forward to seeing a family-friendly animated movie about a mentally disturbed woman who cuts herself and fills the wounds with her own poo because she had an abusive childhood next time) $29,029,000
3 – Live Free Or Die Hard (For some reason called Die Hard 4.0 in the UK – possibly in anticipation of a British-only Die Hard 4.1 which fixes previous known bugs like the implausible bit with the fire hydrant and the old bald man playing the lead character) $17,400,000
4 – Licence To Wed (A romantic comedy starring Mandy Moore? With Robin Williams playing a hilarious clergyman? We can't think of anything we'd like to see less, and it's not been long since we thought of a film with poo-wounds in it) $10,400,000
5 – Evan Almighty (Now that Evan Almighty has been officially deemed a flop, it looks like the heartwarming family comedy about a struggling career-man called upon by a horned lamb to make seven trumpets that will signify the violent end of all human life might not be getting made any more) $8,114,000
Read more: