'Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker' Ticket Sales On Par With 'The Last Jedi'

With just one day before Thursday night previews bring Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker to entire world, it looks like online ticket sales for the movie's opening weekend are pretty much on par with where The Last Jedi was at the same time in the sales cycle. What do The Rise of Skywalker ticket sales numbers mean for the box office success of the movie? Let's talk it out below.

The fact that online sales from Fandango, announced by the company in a press release, are only on par with The Last Jedi instead of ahead is somewhat surprising. Meanwhile, Atom Tickets is seeing sales that put The Rise of Skywalker coming in just behind The Last Jedi. That comes after The Rise of Skywalker set ticket presales records.

We would have thought that the finale of the Skywalker saga would be receiving more interest. But maybe people are looking to avoid crowds or waiting to hear word of mouth before they rush out to see it. It is the last full weekend before Christmas, after all, and people need to get last-minute shopping done. There's a chance some may wait to see it with families coming into town for the holiday as well.

As of now, The Rise of Skywalker represents more than 70% of Fandango's daily ticket sales, so it'll still do huge business this weekend. But we may not be looking at record-breaking box office, both as a Star Wars movie and a blockbuster in general. Even so, there's still excitement for the franchise out there among the younger crowd. Fandango surveyed more than 1,000 millennial moviegoers, and here's what they learned:

  • 91% are preparing for The Rise of Skywalker by watching 2017's The Last Jedi, while 86% are watching 2015's "The Force Awakens."
  • 83% are taking a break from social media to avoid all spoilers for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.
  • 82% claim that Star Wars is among their favorite film franchises.
  • 73% have seen every single film in the Star Wars franchise.
  • Nearly half plan on seeing Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker on the big screen at least twice during the holidays.
  • Will that allow The Rise of Skywalker to follow in the box office footsteps of the final installments of the previous two Star Wars trilogies? Both Return of the Jedi and Revenge of the Sith saw an uptick in box office when compared to their predecessors, The Empire Strikes Back and Attack of the Clones. The rise in box office for Return of the Jedi was only around $20 million domestically, and the international box office actually dropped. Meanwhile, Revenge of the Sith saw a jump of $70 million domestically, and roughly $130 million internationally.

    Looking at this new sequel trilogy, The Last Jedi saw the expected box office drop that sequels typically have. It was a bit more steep of a drop since Force Awakens revived Star Wars in such a big way. Domestically, The Last Jedi earned $316 million less than its predecessor, and internationally, it made nearly $420 million less.

    So will there be an uptick in box office between The Last Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker? That remains to be seen. This analysis of ticket sales was done before the reviews and social media reactions started hitting the web, so there's no way to know if the divisive or negative reactions from critics so far will have any impact on the movie's box office. What could help or hurt the results is word of mouth once the opening weekend crowd starts posting their reactions. It will certainly be interesting to see how general audiences react to the finale of the Skywalker saga and whether it ends up being satisfying to both fans and the studio.

    Thanks to Box Office Mojo and their terribly redesigned site for all the box office numbers in this story.