Relocating!

Moving can be fun. It can also be annoying because of all the packing and the boxes and really wouldn't it just be easier to abandon your possessions and move from city to city, adopting new identities like Don Draper? In any event. If you've enjoyed the comedic stylings of Digressions, mosey on over to this site.

BREAKING: Arbitrary Metric Suggests "Twilight" Is Bigger Than "Harry Potter," World Cup, Entirety of Earth

I POLITELY SAY "WELL, DUH, SHERLOCK": BREAKING MEGA-IMPORTANT NEWS, that is in no way driven by an desire for easy pageviews and traffic! The "Twilight" Facebook page has more fans than "Harry Potter," "Toy Story," "Transformers" and "Iron Man" COMBINED, according to Nikki Finke! That's 6.665 MILLION fans, people. Do you understand what this means? No, it doesn't mean that a large number of people using this social networking platform have enjoyed the bestselling books or films, and that clicking "Like" is a meaningless action providing no financial benefit to the series or its beneficiaries.

It means that "Twilight" is obviously bigger than religion and now J.K. Rowling just went and killed herself. Good work, "Harry Potter" fans. If you had just "Liked" the "Harry Potter" page we could have avoided this whole thing. "Toy Story 3" might have overwhelming critical support and be well on its way to $400 million in domestic box office, which is way more than what the "Twilight" film will earn, but these are just meaningless "actually relevant facts" that tell you "actual information." What's important here is that each Facebook fan is actually worth $1 million Space Bucks, and sometime today "Twilight" will become the largest holder of weath on the planet and the globe will be renamed "Planet Renesmee." (Also did you know that more Tweets mentioned "Twilight" between the hours of 5 and 6 a.m. last Thursday than mentioned soccer, President Obama and Cheerios? Based on this meaningless and arbitrary number, "Twilight" now also gets a seat in the U.S. Senate and the House of Commons.)

And Nikki Finke is posting this solely because it's newsworthy and relevant information for her audience, NOT because she will post anything and everything relating to "Twilight" (for the traffic) and "Tilda" (for her own benefit, though she's yet to put anything on the site explaining the conflict of interests inherent when she has a financial stake in a show based on her life, which of course says nothing about the PR boost she gets if a show based on her is a success, BUT apparently none of that is important or needs to be said so lets post anything we can about "Tilda," cool?).

The "Mad Men" Season Four Poster

They say the spartan, modern look was big in 1964. Also, Am I the only one who thinks this is the daytime version of the posters for Christopher Nolan movies? [via Ausiello]

The upside of criticism

A look at the benefits of tough criticism. Go read it, you ninny. [Chronicle of Higher Education]

Bad words and newspapers

When a nominee for the Supreme Court has used lots and lots of bad words in the past, the news articles are sure to be fun. And they are! Watch the NYT squirm to avoid actually using a naughty word out of fear that somebody under 18 might read the story or something.

New Radiohead Album Almost Done?

The new Radiohead album could be done in "a matter of weeks." Just in time to get a song on the soundtrack for the next "Twilight" movie, I begrudgingly suppose. [This via that]

"Shakedowns" aren't what they used to be

Just to clarify. Curious what a "shakedown" entails?

BP successfully argued it shouldn't be liable for most of the broader economic distress caused by the president's six-month moratorium on deep-water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. And it fended off demands to pay for restoration of the Gulf coast beyond its prespill conditions.

After the high-profile meeting of administration and BP officials on Wednesday, it was in the interest of neither to discuss such details. BP wanted to look contrite and to make a grand gesture, and the White House wanted to look tough.

Okie doke.

[WSJ]

Summer Begins!

Happy First Day Of Summer, everybody! It's hotter than hell outside. Might even top 95 degrees in the District this week! Global warming officially exists again, until it doesn't later this year when temperatures inexplicably cool.

"Toy Story 3" Drinks Your Milkshake (Because I Haven't Said That In A While)

WEEKEND BOX OFFICE ROUNDUP | JUNE 18-20, 2010

As expected, "Toy Story 3" dominated the box office this weekend. As expected, nobody remembered "Jonah Hex" was coming out. Let's get to it. There will be a LOT of numbers here, so if that's not your thing feel free to skip this one.

Amazing news in the world of popular cinema this weekend. A movie came out -- a surefire summer blockbuster! -- and it WASN'T terrible. Predictably, it had to be the work of the mad geniuses at Pixar, who simply refuse to make something that isn't simultaneously A) good-or-really-really-really-great and B) insanely profitable. Their movies typically open big, but when you factor in the sequel aspect (and, therefore, the built-in audience) and the 3-D ticket prices (which are still atrocious and not worth it but if people will pay, I suppose that's life), this was gonna be a big one.

"Toy Story 3" was obviously the runaway champ this weekend. How big? An estimated $109 million big. That set some records, which we'll get to in a moment. But let's pause for a second and recognize the rareness of the feat we saw this weekend. Not just Pixar's streak of 11 straight commercial and critical hits (yes, even "Cars" wasn't that bad). But the fact that a threequel came out and was terrific -- living up to the significant examples set by its predecessors. And the fact that a good -- possibly great -- film came out, and people showed up in droves. That's...well, that's unusual.

SO, the good news. As I said, an estimated $109 million for the weekend. (Assuming, for the rest of this post, that the number holds.) That's the 10th-biggest opening weekend in box office history, and the fifth time in the last year a film opened to at least $108 million. (For the record, no, that's never happened before. The biggest stretch of openers beforehand was the span from July 2006 to May 2007, wherein four films opened with at least $114 million, or the span from May 2007 to May 2008, wherein five films opened with at least $98 million, but that's besides the point and I don't want to bore you with too many numbers.

Again, assume it remains the 10th-biggest opening in box office history (a number which is less than $1 million ahead of "Transformers 2," "Star Wars: Episode III" and "Shrek 2," so if the estimate is too high it will dip to no worse than the 14th-biggest opening ever; and it is $5 million behind the ninth-biggest debut ever, the third "Pirates of the Caribbean," so it's unlikely to take that slot). That makes it the second-biggest cartoon opening ever, following "Shrek the Third." (Also, amusingly, it is the fourth threequel to notch one of the 10 biggest debuts.) If the number holds, it is the biggest June debut ever (ahead of the $108.9 million opening of "Transformers 2," and way ahead of the $93 million debut for the third "Harry Potter" back in '04).

The film also posted some incredibly impressive daily numbers. The $41 million opening day gross on Friday (counting midnight showings, because, yes, people showed up for a midnight showing to what is ostensibly a movie for children) is the eighth-biggest Friday take in box office history. It's the 12th-biggest opening day ever.

And it is, obviously, a record for Pixar. Their previous best opener was "The Incredibles," which earned $70.4 million on the first weekend in November 2004. During the last decade, they have reliably oepned their movies in the $60-70 million range, failing to do so just once before ("Ratatouille," which opened with $47 million in 2007).

However. While this debut is impressive -- and it IS, and it's HUGE, et cetera -- there are some reasons to pause slightly.

Take the day-to-day numbers this weekend. While the opening day was nearly twice as big as that of any other Pixar movie opening over the summer (they all opened in the $16-23 million range), it wasn't all good news from there. The Friday-to-Saturday decline was bound to be larger, because sequels intrinsically have more audience turnout on Fridays, but that was in direct opposition to the Friday-to-Saturday uptick for family movies (which stems from families turning out for matinées).

This movie dropped 9.8 percent from Friday to Saturday, earning $37 million in its second day. While that's still good -- and, again, that is bigger than any other day any other Pixar film has had -- the dip was more than twice as big of Pixar's previous biggest Friday-to-Saturday dip for a summertime hit. In 2008, "Wall-E" debuted with $23 million (Pixar's previous best Friday debut in the summer) and fell 4.5 percent on Saturday. The other films all saw increases of the minor to major variety -- "Up" rose 22.9 percent, "Finding Nemo" went up 38.6 percent and "Ratatouille" went up 3.2 percent.

There's something telling in those digits. "Nemo" and "Up" -- the two biggest Pixar films at the box office -- saw the two biggest Saturday upticks. They also had negligible second weekend drops (between 33 and 35 percent). "Wall-E" -- which, like "Toy Story 3," set a record for a Pixar opening day, opening weekend and Friday-to-Saturday dip -- fell 48 percent in its second weekend.

(The Sunday numbers will be important, but they are an estimate right now so it's hard to gauge them. The $31 million estimate suggests a Saturday-to-Sunday dip of 16.2 percent, which is smaller than any of the other films. "Wall-E" and "Ratatouille" both fell 19 percent on Sunday; interestingly, "Up" and "Nemo" fell 23 and 21 percent, respectively, suggesting they reaped the benefit of their good buzz on Saturday. With Father's Day falling on Sunday, I have to think the dip will be bigger than estimated. However, the word of mouth is so golden I don't think it'll hit the 23 percent of "Up." Even a 20 percent dip would push the gross down to about $30 million on Sunday and $108 million for the weekend.)

Of course, I'm not suggesting "Toy Story 3" is going to fade fast. For starters, the $109 million already puts it halfway to topping "Wall-E" and "Ratatouille" (which finished with $223 million and $206 million, respectively). But it makes it unclear how far this one goes. "Wall-E" had the smallest opening weekend-to-final-domestic-tally ratio of the above films (and the opening-to-final multipliers are phenomenal for Pixar movies. )It earned 3.5 times its debut. Compare that to 4.3 for "Up" or 4.8 for "Nemo."

What does this mean for the long term of "Toy Story 3"? It's hard to gauge. Obviously it's going to be a gigantic hit and make big bucks and all that. As I said, the word of mouth is positively glowing. The reviews are preposterously good. And there is little direct competition coming down the road. But just HOW big will it be? As always, the second weekend dip will be crucial. Will it be Pixar's first 50 percent decline over the summer? Possibly. Next weekend's films -- Adam Sandler & Co. in "Grown Ups," Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz in "Knight and Day" -- are star-packed but not directly competing with this film. After that, the movie loses 3-D screens and audience members to "The Last Airbender" and "Despicable Me."

In the long run, this is still going to be Pixar's biggest film. "Nemo" holds that crown with $339 million (in unadjusted 2003 dollars). This flick is guaranteed to hit $300 million and then some. If it has the 3.5 multiplier of "Wall-E" -- a film it appears to resemble, based on the day-to-day percentages -- it approaches $380 million. (I don't want to live in a world where this and "Transformers 2" open with the same amount, and the Michael Bay film hits $400 million.) In my head, I think it will slow before that (closer to $350 million) based on the day-to-day dips. But I look at the track record, the release schedule and the likelihood people encourage their friends to go see this -- especially in lieu of another similar release -- and I think this could get closer to the $380-400 million mark. So I haven't given up on thinking it's Pixar's first $400 million release, no. At the very least, it's going to top "Nemo" -- as well as this spring's "Alice in Wonderland," which is still the No. 1 movie of the year (with $333 million).

ALSO at the box office:

-- "Jonah Hex" earned a horrid $5 million this weekend, averaging an atrocious $1,800 per screen and debuting at No. 8 this weekend.

-- "The Karate Kid" tumbled an impressive 47.9 percent in its second weekend, earning $29 million (impressive because of the family demographic it lost to "Toy Story 3," plus it's a remake with a built-in audience) (and seriously, if this film only dips 48 percent, no way Pixar can dip more, right!?). With $106 million in the bank so far, this thing is gunning for $185-190 million.

-- "The A-Team" actually fell less than "The Karate Kid," dipping 46 percent for $13 million in its second weekend. But when you open with that much less, it's not so impressive. The $49 million gross so far suggests it's heading for an unimpressive $75-80 million.

-- "Get Him To The Greek" declined slightly (just 38 percent this weekend), adding $6 million to give it $47 million after three weekends. The competition from next weekend's "Grown Ups" will hit it hard next weekend, but finishing with $60 million after a $17 million opening isn't that bad.

-- "Shrek No. 4,148" was hit hard by "Toy Story 3," falling 65 percent to earn $5.5 million in its fifth outing. The $222 million gross thus far is impressive, considering it opened so much weaker than its predecessors, but it's still going to top out at $235 million -- a franchise worst.

-- "Prince of Persia" earned another $5 million this weekend, and now it's earned $80 million! Slowly but surely, it is catching up on "Sex and the City 2."

-- Killers" fell a decent 36 percent, and the $5 million weekend take pushes its gross to $39 million. WORLD'S BIGGEST SUPERSTAR Katherine Heigl can make ANYTHING profitable. This $75 million production will be hit hard by the similar-but-made-by-better-talent "Knight and Day" next weekend.

-- "Sex and the City 2" fell out of the top 10 this weekend, coming in at No. 11 with $2.4 million. It fell 55 percent in its fourth weekend. The $100 million production has earned $90 million so far and is going to top out at $95 million.

Vuvuzelas have caused one (ONE) good thing, I guess

Just see the gif. [via TBL]