Weekend Box Office: Pets 2 and Dark Phoenix fight for the top—and for franchise rock bottom

The secret is out: “the secret life of pets” hasn’t been a secret for three years, and no one cares anymore.

While The Secret Life of Pets 2 topped the box office, its sub-$50 million opening wasn’t even half the original’s $104 million first weekend. The latest tired X-Men, Dark Phoenix, handily took a second-place $33 million opening, but it too is a fittingly dark spot on its franchise. It’s getting clobbered by critics (we did not like it much at all, but we’d still say Apocalypse is the shittier if more laughably enjoyable low-point) and now also holds the distinction of also being the series’ poorest opening at just $33 million. You’d think inflation alone would put it above 2000’s X-Men, but here we are, clearly ready for Disney-Marvel to dismantle this garbage.

Rounding out the top five, we saw Aladdin drop a spot to third ($24.5 million), Godzilla: King of the Monsters fall from box office king to a $15.5 million second weekend, and Rocketman take fifth with $14 million.

This weekend: we see whether Men in Black: International or Shaft’s soft reboots can (almost certainly) take the top spot. And whether they can (less certainly) take at all.

Please help these sad nobodies and: