"The night she came home!" Madea returned to the Halloween season with a vengeance this past weekend to slice into the top spot of the box office.

According to Box Office Mojo, Tyler Perry's new horror comedy Boo 2! A Madea Halloween enjoyed an estimated $21.65 million opening in the US in its opening weekend, taking the top spot from Happy Death Day, which raked in an estimated $26.5 million over Friday the 13th weekend and moved to the third slot in the box office rankings after bringing in $9.37 million in its second weekend in theaters.

The first Madea Halloween film grossed around $73 million in the US, and it looks like the follow-up film (featuring Perry's trademark approach to comedy and his iconic character) is on a similar track to success.

Despite Happy Death Day dipping down quite a bit from its $26.5 million opening weekend, the Blumhouse film has now raked in around $40 million domestically, and with Halloween right around the corner, it might continue to stay alive in the box office for moviegoers looking to enjoy some scares on the big screen, but it will also have more horror-centric competition when Jigsaw (another Lionsgate film) is released in theaters on October 27th.

Geostorm, meanwhile, took the second slot with $13.3 million in its first weekend at the box office, while Blade Runner 2049 only brought in $7.15 million its third weekend on the big screen, making its total US sum about $74 million (against an estimated budget of $150–$180 million). The sequel to Ridley Scott's Blade Runner is getting some international support, however, with a current worldwide total of just under $195 million.

Universal's new thriller The Snowman got off to a slushy start in its opening weekend, taking the eighth spot in the box office with only $3.4 million in the US.

Other films on genre fans' radars that had limited releases this past weekend were Tragedy Girls and The Killing of a Sacred Deer, with the former bringing in an estimated $10,677 (from two theaters) and the latter enjoying a $114, 585 haul from four theaters.

We'll be sure to keep Daily Dead readers updated as more box office numbers come in, including next weekend when Jigsaw is released in theaters. Did you go to the movies this past weekend? What did you see? Let us know in the comments below!

  • Derek Anderson
    About the Author - Derek Anderson

    Raised on a steady diet of R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps books and Are You Afraid of the Dark?, Derek has been fascinated with fear since he first saw ForeverWare being used on an episode of Eerie, Indiana.

    When he’s not writing about horror as the Senior News Reporter for Daily Dead, Derek can be found daydreaming about the Santa Carla Boardwalk from The Lost Boys or reading Stephen King and Brian Keene novels.