5 Smallest Second Weekend Drops In Box Office History

2026 has been the year of movies sticking around at the box office. Whether it's "Project Hail Mary" blowing everyone away with its sturdy performance or "Hoppers" doing over three times its domestic opening weekend, 2026 moviegoers are keen on checking out motion pictures long after their opening weekends are finished. This reality has become clearer than ever with the incredible performance of the horror film "Obsession." After opening to $17 million, "Obsession" shattered all expectations by drastically increasing from its first to second weekend. A basically unprecedented development for a major horror movie, "Obsession" demonstrated what kind of box office feats are possible when your movie hits it out of the ballpark with audiences.

All the discussion around "Obsession" sticking around financially has gotten people talking about the best second weekend dips in history. The smallest of such declines may not be quite as impressive as titles like "Obsession," which increased from its debut. However, the five smallest second weekend drops in history (ranked below from least small to smallest) still demonstrate incredible cultural resilience. These kinds of legs don't come around every day, and the unique circumstances behind how and why these five films excelled like they did reflect that reality.

A few caveats before going forward: movies debuting in November, December, or over the Fourth of July holiday are exempted from this list, given tiny second weekend dips are common in those timeframes. This list also exclusively concerns movies playing in over 2,000 theaters.

A key way to tell if a movie is taking off or not is by tracking its day-to-day box office numbers. A title exhibiting strong holds from one Tuesday to the next is a great way to tell, for instance, if a movie that flopped on opening weekend will eventually become a box office hit. "Crazy Rich Asians" was off to a fantastic start instantly with its tremendous opening day numbers. Grossing $35.27 million within five days of release, "Crazy Rich Asians" was clearly striking a chord with audiences. However, those obsessed with daily box office numbers could first see that it would carry on this financial hot streak well beyond its initial opening days.

On its ninth day of release, "Crazy Rich Asians" grossed $3.64 million, a tiny 2.9% dip from its gross seven days earlier. That astonishing hold preceded the film having an amazing second weekend decline. As great word-of-mouth spread for this romantic comedy (and no major new titles entered the late August 2018 marketplace), "Crazy Rich Asians" went down only 6.4% from its $26.51 million debut. Bringing its domestic total to $76.61 million after just 12 days, this accomplishment signaled that this romcom was destined to become one of 2018's biggest moneymakers.

For many, this may have come as an immense surprise. For box office geeks carefully watching the day-to-day performance of titles like "Crazy Rich Asians," though, this dip was inevitable after its incredible weekly holds.

"The Fugitive," thanks to the star power of Harrison Ford and its popular TV show source material, got off to a rocking start at the domestic box office. It had the third-biggest launch of any film that year with a whopping $23.75 million, beating out the likes of "Cliffhanger" and "Last Action Hero" from the same summer. Theatrical features were way leggier back in 1993, but it also wouldn't have been shocking if "The Fugitive" had been relatively frontloaded. Perhaps only the diehard fans of the original "Fugitive" program showed up to multiplexes. With that crowd gone, maybe the film would collapse in the final weeks of summer 1993.

However, "The Fugitive" received an A+ CinemaScore grade from audiences, an early sign that it was headed for an extraordinary run that lasted far more than just a solitary weekend. In its second weekend, the movie only dipped 5.6% to gross another $22.43 million. In a staggering feat, that second frame was bigger than every other 1993 opening weekend, save for the bows of "Jurassic Park" and "The Firm." This crowdpleaser wasn't going anywhere, and "The Fugitive" continued to have extraordinary legs through October. It even topped the domestic box office for six consecutive weekends, an impressive testament to how much the movie resonated with audiences.

Some leggy features take time to find their box office footing. "The Fugitive," though, preceded its historic second weekend decline with an already impressive debut.

Online controversy surrounded "Sinners" in the first few days of its release. Specifically, controversy erupted over how publications like Variety adversely covered the film's opening weekend. Criticism from these publications over "Sinners" being potentially far away from profit after its $48 million domestic debut were lambasted for being short-sighted. Plus, there were the negative racial implications of criticizing a Black-led blockbuster for opening weekend numbers that these same publications had praised when applied to white-led films. There were all sorts of ways that the premature complaints about the "Sinners" opening weekend were ridiculous.

However, those complaints looked especially preposterous after the second "Sinners" weekend numbers came in. These figures crystallized that the film was becoming a box office sensation. After demonstrating incredible resilience on a day-to-day basis during the week, "Sinners" went down only 4.8% in its second frame to gross another $45.7 million. Given that this title's $48 million bow included $4.7 million in Thursday night preview grosses, "Sinners" technically went up from its first to second weekend in terms of raw domestic grosses. With $123.23 million in the bank after 10 days, "Sinners," Ryan Coogler's most ambitious film yet, was a full-blown phenomenon.

Making this extra impressive was "Sinners" securing such a strong hold given how so many horror films, like "The Devil Inside," had previously proven to be astonishingly frontloaded. Not so here. "Sinners" was the kind of movie that was going to keep on chugging endlessly, no matter what its opening weekend box office critics declared.

"The Sixth Sense," an iconic movie whose original story would've sent the film in a completely different direction, has a unique distinction among leggy movies. This was not a feature whose opening weekend numbers left some people underwhelmed before exhibiting historically strong holds in the weekends afterward. Instead, M. Night Shyamalan's breakthrough movie was a smash straight out of the gate when it hit theaters over the first weekend of August 1999. Its $26.68 million bow already made "The Sixth Sense" the 13th biggest opener of 2000. An original film like this opening higher than summer 1999 franchise fare like "Inspector Gadget" was mighty impressive.

This story of a young boy who sees ghosts, though, was just getting started. In its second weekend, "The Sixth Sense" had an incredibly small drop of -3.4%. Grossing another $25.76 million, these figures solidified that audiences were entranced by this melancholic and eerie story, including its now unforgettable twist ending. This incredible second weekend hold kicked off an amazing box office run for "The Sixth Sense," amassing over $20 million hauls each weekend for six consecutive frames.

Eventually, "The Sixth Sense" grossed $293.5 million domestically, the biggest North American haul of any 1999 movie besides "The Phantom Menace." One of those 1999 movies that changed Hollywood forever, "The Sixth Sense" proved unstoppable at the box office. That reality was inescapable after it followed up its impressive debut with one of the best second weekend dips ever.

Initially, it looked like "Puss in Boots" was a box office bust. Opening on October 28, 2011, this project was estimated to hit $40 to $45 million over its North American opening weekend. That would've been beneath every single "Shrek" sequel's debut, but in line with the bows of past autumn DreamWorks cartoons like "Megamind" and "Shark Tale." Instead, it debuted to $34.07 million, an opening considered so poor that DreamWorks Animation stock sank in the wake of this development. For a moment, it appeared "Puss in Boots" would join the ranks of other DreamWorks movies that bombed in their theatrical runs.

However, a miracle was on the way for this animated feature. In its second weekend, "Puss in Boots" eased only 3%, an unheard of drop for a mainstream animated film that didn't significantly bolster its theater count in its second frame. Grossing another $33.05 million for a 10-day domestic total of $75.52 million, "Puss in Boots" suddenly transformed from box office disaster to miracle. Factors like families being busy over the previous weekend (which did directly precede Halloween) and great word-of-mouth all coalesced to give "Puss" a vitally needed rebound.

Ironically, one of the ripple effects of its great hold was that, a week after it sent the same stock tumbling, "Puss in Boots" gave the DreamWorks stock a major boost. This feline hero was just getting started when everyone counted out "Puss in Boots" after one underwhelming weekend.