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The *Shrek *franchise – which has by now grossed over a billion dollars domestically – made another splash at the box office this weekend, though not as emphatically as the last two outings. I doubt anyone will complain about Shrek Forever After](http://www.cinematical.com/2010/05/21/shrek-forever-after-review/)'s $71 million opening, but it is some $50 million less than Shrek the Third](Shrek the Third (2007) - Movie | Moviefone)'s and around $40 million less than overall series champ Shrek 2’s. The fourth film will almost certainly be the lowest-grossing in the franchise, which I think may be suffering from good, old-fashioned audience fatigue. (That Shrek the Third played a bit like a sitcom, albeit a funny one, probably didn’t help.) The movie does look like it will end How to Train Your Dragon](http://www.cinematical.com/2010/03/26/review-how-to-train-your-dragon/)'s tremendous run, as the new competition finally made that film drop like a stone in its ninth week of release.
Iron Man 2](http://www.cinematical.com/2010/05/07/iron-man-2-review/) fell to second place with $26 million; it doesn’t look like it will have the staying power of the first film, though it is still running ahead after three weeks. Holding up quite well was Letters to Juliet](http://www.cinematical.com/2010/05/14/review-letters-to-juliet/), which will shortly become Summit Entertainment’s second-highest non-Twilight release ever.
What to say about MacGruber](http://www.cinematical.com/2010/05/21/macgruber-review/)? Maybe it was its presence at SXSW that made the film (which is quite bad, really) a bigger deal in my eyes than it really was. $4.1 million is stunningly weak even for a Saturday Night Live movie – for some perspective, MacGruber got beaten out by the likes of Superstar](Superstar (1999) - Movie | Moviefone) and A Night at the Roxbury](A Night at the Roxbury (1998) - Movie | Moviefone), which both opened to more than twice as much back in the late '90s. I guess the notion of a movie made from the sketch (which never lasted more than a few seconds – understandable, since its only joke was the title character’s incompetence) struck even fans as incredibly dumb.
More, plus the top 10, after the jump.
Continue reading Weekend Box Office: ‘Shrek’ Wins the Weekend, ‘MacGruber’ Flops