Disney’s Mufasa: The Lion King has a lot of work ahead of him.

As it stands now, Paramount’s Sonic the Hedgehog 3 plans to open to $55 million over the Dec. 20-22 weekend, compared to $50 million for Mufasa: The Lion Kingaccording to sources with access to data from leading research firm National Research Group.

It would be a surprise if sound managed to beat Mufasaconsidering the remake is happening in summer 2019 The Lion King The company opened to an impressive $191.8 million domestically and is on track to make $1.7 billion worldwide. Like this movie, Mufasa is a live-action film that relies heavily on photorealistic images.

Many doubted that the 2019 Jon Favreau-directed film would work, much like the discussion currently circulating Mufasa.

Disney has delayed its big marketing push until after Thanksgiving and expects tracking to steadily increase in the coming days. The final step is to play a trailer of the film beforehand Moana 2which opened on Wednesday and is off to a record-breaking start.

Paramount also says it has only now started spending larger sums on it Sonic3. (The studio was busy Gladiator II.)

Directed by Barry Jenkins, the film is steeped in music Mufasa sees Donald Glover, Seth Rogen, Billy Eichner, John Kani and Beyoncé Knowles reprising their roles from the 2019 film. Newcomers include Aaron Pierre, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Thandiwe Newton, Lenni James, Anika Noni Rose and Blue Ivy Carter in her feature film debut. Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote the film’s songs.

The origin story follows the adventures of two young lions, Mufasa and Taka, who become fast friends after Mufasa is orphaned and adopted by Taka’s royal family. Mufasa eventually becomes the King of the Pride Lands and father to Simba, while Taka takes a darker turn and becomes known as Scar.

sounda live-action/CGI hybrid based on the Sega video game, was a goldmine for Paramount and a huge success story. The first Sonic the Hedgehog The film opened well above expectations with a $58 million domestic debut in February 2020, a month before theaters closed due to the pandemic. This was followed by a $72.1 million domestic opening in March 2022 sound Titles distort male, the sequel saw robust family business, meaning Sonic3 could represent direct competition Mufasa.

The latest installment in the Sonic series introduces Keanu Reeves as the popular video game character Shadow. He is dark and edgy, but has powers similar to the heroic hedgehog. In the threequel, the franchise antagonist is Dr. Robotnik (Jim Carrey) depressed and out of shape. He gets back in the saddle because he created Shadow to defeat Sonic, voiced by Ben Schwartz.

Mufasa And sound anchor the Christmas calendar this year. As always, films released the weekend before Christmas aren’t exactly known for their big openings, as many moviegoers are otherwise busy making final preparations for the holidays. Rather, Hollywood studios are expecting larger-than-average movies in which children don’t go to school and adults don’t work during the end-of-year holidays.