When Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves opened on Friday, it came with high expectations and it has not disappointed. If box office receipts have anything to say about it, the movie franchise has a very bright future ahead of it.
Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves takes viewers on a journey to Neverwinter and on a mission through the Underdark, and they’ve came away from that experience with wonderful reviews. With a 7.6/10 IMDb rating from 10,000+ votes and a 93% Rotten Tomatoes Audience score out of 500+ verified ratings, the movie has clearly resonated with viewers. By comparison, the first installment of Dungeons & Dragons in 2000 didn’t fare so well, earning a 3.6/10 IMDb rating and a 10% Rotten Tomatoes score.
With Chris Pine leading the way as Edgin, Michelle Rodgriguez as Holga, Rege-Jean Page as Xenk, and Hugh Grant as Forge, the star-studded cast is already enjoying gross sales of $15 million throughout the U.S. and Canada in its one-day run. Per Variety, box office sales are expected to reach $40 million over the weekend. With that pace, it looks likely that it will surpass the $150 million budget and justify an expansion into an entire DnD universe.
That’s a nice change from the $34 million worldwide gross Dungeons & Dragons experienced in 2000, failing to recoup the $45 million budget. Per Screen Rant, it was a massive failure despite starring Jeremy Irons and Thora Birch. As the article shamelessly outlines the reasons: bad performances, poor special effects, an inexperienced director, inconsistent story and tone, cheap costumes, and finally, a lack of connection to the role-playing fantasy tabletop game.
The new and improved 2023 film must have studied where the earlier installment went wrong because with John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein directing, the huge stars they cast for their roles, and 23 years of experience bringing special effects to life on film, how could it lose? So high is the confidence in the Dungeons & Dragons franchise to continue that Rege-Jean Page is already talking about how infinite the possibilities are for the DnD universe.
Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves is currently in theaters and Rolling Stones predicts its streaming release date mid-May on Paramount+ based on its most recent pattern of releasing films to its streaming platform a month and a half to two months after its theatrical release.