Prepare for incoming Minions memes because Illumination/Universal's Despicable Me 3 is set to take the number one place at the box office this Independence Day weekend with $83.5 million domestically.
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The third installment in the Despicable Me franchise has been in theaters as early as mid-June in some markets and has already taken in $57.3 million dollars as of Friday. The film is expected to earn an additional $91.4 million dollars this weekend for a total of $112.7 million internationally. Combined with its projected domestic gross, Despicable Me should finish Sunday with a global total of around $196.2 million.
The Despicable Me franchise's overseas take is expected to be strong considering the series' history of earning more with each subsequent movie, a trend reinforced by that fact that, so far, it's had the biggest opening day for the franchise in 11 different markets. The first film earned $292 million overseas, the second $603 million, and the Minions spin-off earning $824 million.
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The film is going up against Edgar Wright's Baby Driver, which released on Wednesday and is currently tracking to make $27 and $28 million over its first five days in theaters.
In theaters now, Despicable Me 3 is directed by Pierre Coffin and Kyle Balda and features the voices of Steve Carell, Kristen Wiig, Trey Parker, Miranda Cosgrove and Steve Coogan.
(Via Deadline)