He’s back. After a long absence and a trial that kept the entertainment world on edge, the actor behind characters like Jack Sparrow and Edward Scissorhands returns to a wide release. It’s been eight years since Johnny Depp last topped the box office, and Ebenezer, Paramount’s dark reworking of A Christmas Carol, hits theaters against a crowded field of new openers and one stubborn holdover.
The question prediction market traders are weighing is whether that star power still has enough shine left to light up the box office.
Ebenezer Eyes $20 Million to $23 Million and Depp’s First No. 1 Since 2018
Paramount built Ebenezer around Depp as Ebenezer Scrooge. Ian McKellen, Rupert Grint, Daisy Ridley and Andrea Riseborough join him in supporting roles. The film is tracking for a domestic opening of $20 million to $23 million, which would give Depp his first No. 1 finish since Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald back in 2018. Paramount made the film for a reported $38 million, and Depp reportedly took a pay cut to star in it.
Traders on Polymarket are leaning toward the lower half of that range. The platform’s opening-weekend market currently favors the $19 million-to-$22 million bracket at 49%, with $16 million to $19 million close behind at 44%. Anything above $22 million is barely showing up in the pricing, with the two higher brackets combined well under 15%.
If the box office numbers end up beating both the trackers’ estimates and what the prediction markets are pricing in, Depp will have earned real bragging rights: his drawing power held up, scandals included. That would hold true even if the reviews didn’t come along for the ride… more on that below.
A weaker opening tells a different story. Ebenezer would then be chased by other kinds of ghosts. Within weeks it will have to share screens with franchises like The Hunger Games, titles like I Play Rocky, and the release of a cultural event on the scale of GTA VI, which is expected to pull attention away from theaters industry-wide. In that scenario, Ebenezer would have to lean on word of mouth and hope its week-to-week drop-off stays manageable.
Rotten Tomatoes: Mixed Reviews at 50%
Critics have landed right in the middle. Ebenezer sits at 50% on the Tomatometer, officially “rotten,” with Metacritic’s critic average not far off at 48. Kalshi’s score tracker shows just how unsettled that number has been: the implied score swung from the mid-50s in early tracking down to the high 30s by late October before climbing back to roughly 50% in the days before release.
Polymarket’s contracts show a similar split. Traders are nearly certain Ebenezer clears 40% (98%) and 45% (98%), but confidence drops sharply at the 50% line, priced at just 64%. That threshold is also drawing more trading activity than any other bracket, a sign the final certified score is still very much in play.
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Godzilla Minus Zero’s Second Weekend: $12 Million to $15 Million
Last week’s box office winner isn’t fading fast. Godzilla Minus Zero, fresh off the biggest opening ever for a live-action foreign-language film, pulled in $3.11 million on Wednesday and has climbed to $39.1 million domestically after 6 days, still playing in more than 3,250 theaters. Its second weekend is projected at $12 million to $15 million, enough to hold a top-3 spot.
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The Cat in the Hat and the Rest of the Top Five
The Cat in the Hat should land a second or third-place finish with $10 million to $13 million. Warner Bros.’ Dr. Seuss adaptation won’t face competition for family audiences before Disney’s Hexed lands on Nov. 25. Here’s how the top five is projected to shake out:
| Film | Projected weekend |
| Ebenezer | $22 million |
| Godzilla Minus Zero | $13 million |
| The Cat in the Hat | $11 million |
| How to Rob a Bank | $7 million |
| You Can See Everything | $6 million |
That last spot belongs to a holdover, not a new title. A24’s Elizabeth Holmes documentary You Can See Everything has outpaced projections week after week, and its $79.8 million haul so far puts a $90 million finish within sight.
New Releases: How To Rob a Bank, Ghost Soldier and Victorian Psycho
How to Rob a Bank, David Leitch’s heist thriller with Nicholas Hoult, Zoë Kravitz and Pete Davidson, is tracking for a fourth-place debut at $6 million to $8 million. That’s a sharp comedown for a director whose The Fall Guy and Bullet Train both opened near $30 million, and the reviews back it up: 42% on Rotten Tomatoes, the worst of Leitch’s career, with a 45 on Metacritic.
Ghost Soldier could complicate that order. Sony got a jump on the weekend by opening William Eubank’s action thriller, starring Jim Caviezel, on Wednesday for Veterans Day, and it’s tracking for $4 million to $8 million. Reviews are also rough, at 40% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Victorian Psycho, Bleecker Street’s gothic horror film starring Maika Monroe as a governess with a dark secret, is the best-reviewed wide release of the weekend at 77% on Rotten Tomatoes, even without the box office numbers to match.
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