The Lord of the Rings films are outperforming some main 2026 titles earlier than even returning to theaters. The Peter Jackson-directed Lord of the Rings trilogy, which debuted in theaters between 2001 and 2003, collectively earned virtually $3 billion worldwide and received 17 Oscars. They’re returning to theaters in 2026 through Fathom Leisure in honor of the movie franchise’s twenty fifth anniversary.
Per Selection, the approaching Lord of the Rings re-releases (specifically The Fellowship of the Ring on January 16, The Two Towers on January 17, and The Return of the King on January 18) have bought roughly 407,000 presale tickets, which quantity to $5 million on the home field workplace.
This whole, which has been reached two days earlier than the primary screenings are set to start (in an more and more huge variety of theaters, as Fathom Leisure scrambles to react to viewers demand), sees the three Lord of the Rings films collectively outgrossing all however two of the foremost huge releases of 2026 thus far on the home field workplace.
The 2 titles that Lord of the Rings re-releases haven’t but surpassed are the creature characteristic Primate (which has a cumulative home whole of $11.9 million in 2,964 theaters on the time of writing) and the post-apocalyptic sequel Greenland 2: Migration ($8.9 million in 2,710 theaters).
Nonetheless, the 2026 films that they’ve already outgrossed embody the Daisy Ridley zombie film We Bury the Lifeless ($3.5 million in 1,172 theaters) and Angel Studios’ Syria-set drama I Was a Stranger ($1.3 million in 1,400 theaters).
Nielsen EDI defines a home huge launch as a movie taking part in in 600 theaters or extra, making the 4 aforementioned films the one huge releases of 2026 thus far.
The final time that the Lord of the Rings trilogy was re-released in theaters was 2024. On the identical level within the run of that re-release, the trilogy had solely bought 246,000 tickets.
That re-release went on to gross $8.2 million general, so if the 2026 re-release follows that very same trajectory, it may gross as a lot as $13.6 million, which might surpass the present home grosses of all 4 of the 12 months’s new huge releases.
This resurgence in curiosity within the Lord of the Rings franchise could possibly be a results of common pleasure surrounding the twenty fifth anniversary. Nonetheless, it may be the case that the re-release is benefitting from not coming to theaters in such shut proximity to a brand new theatrically launched installment within the sequence, as 2024 was the 12 months that the animated spinoff The Battle of the Rohirrim debuted.
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