Jacob Hall

Despite receiving overwhelmingly negative reviews, Suicide Squad opened with record-smashing numbers, obliterating the record set by Guardians of the Galaxy back in 2014. And yet, the box office of summer 2016 has taught us one thing: anything can happen after that opening weekend and it probably will. This certainly looks like a huge victory for Warner Bros. and their DC Extended Universe right now, but who knows what next week will bring?

Although the holiday weekend brought out a slew of new releases to compete for the top spot at the box office, this week’s top 10 was, once again, dominated by Finding Dory. The Legend of Tarzan, The Purge: Election Year and The BFG ultimately couldn’t quite match up to Pixar’s forgetful fish, but the final results were all over the place. This chart is very much a roller coaster of expectations being met and missed.

Someone had to dethrone Captain America: Civil War from its spot at the top of the box office top 10, so why not The Angry Birds Movie? The animated adaptation of the popular mobile game glided into first place with a fairly strong opening weekend, relegating Marvel’s latest adventure to second place.

In news that shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone with a child in their life, Zootopia held on to the number one spot at the box office this weekend and made it look effortless. And yet, 10 Cloverfield Lane’s second place opening is nothing to scoff at, especially for a modestly budged, small-scale thriller (although the “Cloverfield” in the title certainly helped).

Last year, SNL was hosted by Republican presidential nominee frontrunner Donald Trump and the response was unkind, to say the least. Back then, he still seemed like a big joke — just a loudmouth who was surely going to drop out at any moment. And now, as he wins primary after primary, the beloved sketch show has slowly turned on Trump, culminating in a faux campaign ad that lands like a punch to the gut.

The victory of of Kung Fu Panda 3 at the box office this weekend conjures one of the most common questions you have to ask yourself when keeping a constant eye on the charts: when is a hit not a hit? Sure, the third film in DreamWorks Animation’s series did open at number one and its numbers are very good, but they’re lower than you’d think. In any case, it still fared significantly better than the rest of the competition this week — all of the other new releases simply flopped.

When the 2016 Oscar nominations were announced nearly two weeks ago, the response to the overwhelmingly white line-up of talent proved instantly controversial. Film fans and industry veterans alike gathered around the #OscarsSoWhite hashtag to make their voices heard, especially decrying how films starring black actors and directed by black filmmakers — like Creed and Straight Outta Compton — somehow managed to only receive nominations for the white people involved in making them. With material this ripe, of course SNL was going to take a swipe at the Academy Awards this week.

The moment former Alaskan governor and 2008 Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin endorsed Donald Trump for President of the United States, you know the producers at SNL hurried to get Tina Fey on the phone. The beloved former cast member, who just hosted the show last month, famously took on the role of Palin eight years ago and many people believe that her scathing imitation actually did lasting harm to the real Palin’s political chances. In any case, this event allowed SNL to pair Fey’s Palin with Darrell Hammond‘s Trump. Thanks, reality!

It took Avatar two and half months to become the highest grossing movie of all time. Star Wars: The Force Awakens will surpass its domestic box office gross within the next day or two after less than three weeks in release. The big question now is when J.J. Abrams’ sequel will find its ceiling because as of right now, it’s showing no signs of slowing down.

SNL commercial parodies are at their best when they’re at their most scathing. The fake ad for a fictional dating app called Settl may not be as dark as that vicious, pro-gun parody from a while back, but it’s a different brand of cynical: Here is the app for people who are tired of trying to find the right person and just want to settle down with, well, any person.