Thanksgiving Update: 'Breaking Dawn,' 'Muppets' on Top
As expected, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1 held on to the top spot at the box office for the first two days of Thanksgiving weekend. The Muppets was easily the strongest out of the three new family-oriented releases, while Arthur Christmas and Hugo earned less than holdover Happy Feet Two.

Based on studio estimates, Breaking Dawn added $12.5 million on Wednesday and $7.8 million on Thursday for a total of $20.3 million so far this weekend. For its opening week, the fourth Twilight movie grossed $179.3 million, which is off 4.7 percent from New Moon. Continuing along this trajectory, the movie looks poised to finish around $280 million.

The Muppets debuted to $6.6 million on Wednesday and dipped a bit to $5.9 million on Thursday. Its $12.5 million two-day total is down from Enchanted's $14.6 million at the same time in 2007. That movie wound up with over $49 million for the five-day frame, which puts The Muppets in line for over $40 million.

Happy Feet Two faded even further from its predecessor on Wednesday and Thursday with $5 million. That's just 37 percent of the first Happy Feet's $13.6 million over the same two days in 2006. The situation looks slightly better across the entire opening week, as Happy Feet Two earned around half as much as Happy Feet ($30.4 million versus $62.2 million).

Arthur Christmas opened with $2.4 million on Wednesday before dropping to $1.85 million on Thursday. With a two-day total of $4.25 million, the Aardman Animation movie should wind up between $14 and $15 million for the five-day frame.

Hugo was slightly behind Arthur with just over $4 million for the two-day period, though it was playing in a fraction of the theaters (1,277 versus 3,376). Remarkably, Hugo improved 40 percent from Wednesday to Thursday, while most other movies were down or about even. Based on the handful of instances where this has happened in the past few years, Hugo will likely finish the weekend with between $12 and $14 million.

Related Story:

Forecast: 'Twilight' Set to Beat Three Family Movies Over Thanksgiving



Related Chart:

• Grosses for Thursday, November 24, 2011

• Grosses for Wednesday, November 23, 2011