Welcome to Week 22 of the Knock on Wood Movie Fantasy League dispatch. Every week (more or less), we’ll bring you a recap of the past weekend’s box office, alongside an overview of the new release films and an updated leaderboard, complete with full teams and points!
The last month of the inaugural League is underway! The domestic box office is still falling behind the previous week, but without a major blockbuster to anchor it, that’s only to be expected. Spider-Man: Brand New Day remained on top, with The Odyssey comfortably holding onto its #3 spot. Other releases (including Insidious, The End of Oak Street, Mutiny, and Tony) fell a few places to accommodate newer arrivals, but the biggest success story this weekend is the indie horror film It Ends, which was saved from unreleased obscurity by Neon after a promising showing on the Letterboxd Video Store in December 2025. It added 335 theaters for a 1,074% increase, bumping it up from #32 to #13! It’s thrilling to see indie horror continuing to make waves this year.
To the surprise of many, the biggest release this week is Coyote vs. Acme, another movie saved from non-existence – in this case, it was rescued from deletion after Warner Bros. shelved it in favor of a tax write-off, deeming the movie “unreleasable” before Ketchup Entertainment swooped in to save the day. Check out the full story in the Ringer’s oral history of the film. Ketchup finally released the film, and it plays remarkably well both in and out of context – after all, the film follows classic Looney Tunes character Wile E. Coyote as he sues the Acme Corporation after decades of their inventions failing to kill his nemesis, the Road Runner. The story of an underdog fighting back against a seemingly unstoppable corporation rings truer today than ever, and the narrative paid off – Coyote vs. Acme debuted at #2 with $15.9 million! It might not be the biggest success story of all time, or even this year, but it’s still a remarkably strong showing for a film that came a hair’s breadth from never being seen by the general public. If you haven’t seen it yet, show up! It’s well worth your time.
It’s especially noteworthy that Coyote vs. Acme beat The Dog Stars, the latest release from accomplished director Ridley Scott. It has been years since Scott has been a reliable box office opener, but still, on paper, this movie should have been huge. Not only is Scott behind the wheel, but up-and-coming stars Jacob Elordi and Margaret Qualley are front and center. It didn’t necessarily do horribly – #7 with $7.7 million – but for a $70 million studio picture (on which you better believe some bets were hedged), it’s a poor showing, especially considering the talent involved.
Elsewhere, Casper Kelly’s Buddy had one of the best limited release openings of the year, finishing at #6 with $5.5 million from 1,277 theaters, doubling initial tracking projections. Charming Focus Features rom-com Finding Emily and IFC’s Idiots opened at #14 and #15 respectively with under $1 million each.
Consider me surprised that the big critical winner this week (in a sea of duds) is Mutiny, the Jason Statham revenge thriller that landed at 50% on Rotten Tomatoes. It came in with 2.5x the bonus points earned by Insidious: Out of the Further – a poor showing compared to the last few months of eligible releases, which have been unusually skewed towards critical acclaim.
Check out our leaderboard here. For the most up-to-date scoring on each movie, check out this spreadsheet. Additionally, I’ve made a Letterboxd list of every film chosen by our players for the Fantasy League. You can view that anytime here.
As the season winds down, eligible new releases are fewer and far between. Next week (actually, today – it’s a rare example of a mid-week summer release) is Fall 2: Deadpoint, the sequel to the 2022 underground hit. There’s only one eligible release per week for the last month of the League, so we better make ’em count!
If you like what we do here and have enjoyed the Movie Fantasy League, please consider buying me a popcorn! It helps keep this site ad-free, in addition to keeping the Movie Fantasy League at no cost to the player. Every little bit helps!
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