Sonic the Hedgehog 3 has taken the lead over Mufasa this weekend in box office sales. Ahead of Christmas on Wednesday, Paramount’s $122 million video-game inspired movie had a $62 million opening in North America. The film easily surpassed Disney’s $200 million prequel Mufasa, which had a $35 million start in the U.S. According to Variety, Paramount’s third movie about the famous video game character beat the first of the trilogy, which released in February 2020 at $58 million. It just came below the sequel, which was released in March 2022 with a $72 million start. “We saw a window in the marketplace in December where we thought we could stand out,” Paramount domestic distribution president Chris Aronson said. “Sonic is going to dominate through the holidays.” The movie received an 86% Rotten Tomatoes score with high audience reviews. Mufasa, on the other hand, is trailing far behind. The Disney movie that was a prequel to The Lion King landed $35 million. Variety reported that an above $200 million production had a $100 million promotion budget worldwide, and fell far behind expectations of a $50 million start. The film also had relatively high reviews from audiences, with a 56% score on Rotten Tomatoes.
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