Welcome back. Here we are, gathered together once more. First things first, there’s a Podcast, you know.

[CONTENT WARNING] This podcast contains foul language and has been known to cause dementia in ordinary office supplies.

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That’s right, kids, that means it’s time for another session of Monday Morning Box Office Quarterbacking. Make sure you follow along at Box Office Mojo.

Superman Returns took the top spot, and no surprise there. Still, they were hoping for more. The podcast goes into more detail, but suffice to say it underperformed. They were hoping for Spider-Man 2 numbers, or at least something close, and–since I’ve renewed my Box Office Mojo subscription, I can do this by creating a custom chart–comparing it to Batman Begins, Hulk and Fantastic Four it outperforms them thus far, but not by a healthy enough margin. Not for a flick that cost as much as two of those three put together, anyway. The true test will be next weekend, when we see what sort of legs it has: Batman legs or Hulk legs.

Devil Wears Prada came in second because Fox was smart and counter-programmed against Superman, and it paid off. I’m sure Fox is delighted at the take.

Click dropped a tad over fifty percent, which, you should know is pretty much standard for second weekend take. If you’re in wide release and drop less than fifty percent second weekend out, you’ve got a hit on your hands. Again, Sandler movies have excellent shelf life, so anything this thing doesn’t make back in the box office it’ll do well for you folks at home.

Cars stays strong in its fourth weekend, bringing its worldwide take to more than $200 million. It’ll at least break even and then kick ass on DVD. Of course, the real question is how do you bring the characters to the theme parks? Can you imagine walking around in a Lightning McQueen suit? And now that we have Star Wars Transformers, how long until we get some Cars Transformers?

With Nacho Libre we finally come across a film that’s now turning a profit. It’s still got a few weeks left in it and then it will hit DVD and it’s all gravy. I actually ran into somebody today in Second Life wearing a Nacho Libre avatar. That was kinda freaky.

As for The Lake House, Fast and the Furious 3, and Waist Deep, we have no idea how much they cost so we can’t say how well they’re doing. Sandra Bullock feels good about using all that collateral cred from Crash I’m sure. Fast and the Furious might give us a decent soundtrack, but my favorite commentary on this film came from the guy sitting behind me the other night in the cinema, “Great; how long you think before some damn kids start doing that here?” Yes, my thoughts exactly: Ford trucks are exactly the right kind of vehicle to dry drifting in. Good call! Waist Deep is actually probably already in the green, though, seeing as how it was no doubt made on the cheap.

The Break-Up is a money-making machine at this point and DaVinci Code is worldwide monster. It’s coming up on a quarter of a billion dollars. So yeah, you can bet everyone’s leaning on Brown to crap out another blockbuster novel. It’ll be the biggest thing to hit book sequels since The Lost World or…dare I say it…Hannibal!

Join us next time for when we’ll discuss Pirates 2 and some other stuff.

Special thanks to Exit Mindbomb for letting me use “Godzilla Will Rule You” from their album Happy Accident for my new WGO music. Check them out on MySpace here and I tried to link up as many songs as I could here.

Widgett Walls is the chief cook and bottle washer for Needcoffee.com. He’s also the author of Mystics on the Road to Vanishing Point and Magnificent Desolation. His personal blog is at OneTusk.com, which he updates when he feels like it. He lives and works in Atlanta, Georgia. He hardly ever sleeps.

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