It was inevitable, and quite understandable, with the tragedy of the Aurora shooting, that there would be a period of time in which people would be hesitant to go to the movies. Luckily for Christopher Nolan and the rest of the rest of the Dark Knight Rises team–not to mention everybody out there who would have hated to see the cinematic tradition be done in for good by a senseless, horrible tragedy–the film seems to have rebounded somewhat, managing to set some records despite the pitfalls.
The film’s gross box office dropped a hefty 60% in its second weekend, bringing in about $64.1 million domestically. It’s a dent, sure, but it’s nowhere near as bad of a blow as many were predicting given everything that’s surrounded the release of this film–the biggest and most notable of course being the horrific news of the shooting, but on top of that the film’s also got the Olympics to compete with, not to mention just a general decline in box office attendance.
Still, The Dark Knight Rises has managed to rank a spot as the third fastest to reach $300 million, nestled comfortably behind only The Dark Knight and The Avengers. The film even jumped up by 42% from Friday to Saturday, after the Olympics opening ceremony aired and people weren’t glued to their couches quite as heavily. Worldwide, the film’s grossed $540 million worldwide so far.
Given that it’s only been a week since The Dark Knight Rises premiered, it’s kind of amazing given all that’s happened that they’ve even managed this much. People are still very hesitant to go to the movies, and Warner Bros. is taking the relatively classy route by not boasting about these records in the wake of the Aurora tragedy.
We are of the opinion that fans and moviegoers everywhere should not let the horrific acts of one individual stand in the way of the tradition of the group celebration of cinema that is the movie-going experience. The tragedy deserves to be recognized, and discussed, and the victims mourned, most definitely; but we should not let it stand in the way of a landmark franchise that has been in the works for upwards of seven years, nor in the way of our own enjoyment of the film itself. We would be paying a disservice to fandom if we let it.
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