'Rogue One' now highest grossing film released in 2016

I made two promises to my readers in Space, both fictional and real, tops weekend box office to begin 2017 as 'Rogue One' edges out 'Hidden Figures'.  The first, whether "Hidden Figures" ended up winning the weekend's box office I covered in 'Hidden Figures' tops the box office for MLK Day plus diversity among Golden Globes winners.  The second was whether "Rogue One" would become the highest grossing film released in 2016, a prediction I made a month ago in the comments to Reactions to 'Rogue One' from critics and stars and repeated in 'Rogue One' has third-highest opening weekend of year, second highest for December.  That came true over the weekend, as Wochit Entertainment reports in 'Rogue One' Passes 'Finding Dory' At 2016 U.S. Box Office.

"Rogue One: A Star Wars Story" continued its massive run at the box office in its fifth week in theaters. According to data at Box Office Mojo, the movie earned more than 3.2 million dollars on Friday at the domestic box office. That pushed the standalone film's domestic total over 488 million dollars. Rogue One is now the Number one-grossing movie of all titles that came out in the U.S. in 2016, beating out Finding Dory, which made 486 million dollars at the box office domestically. Both movies opened to critical acclaim this year.

Box Office Mojo now lists the film as grossing $502 million at the domestic box office.  All that's left of my predictions is the final box office number, which I initially set at $600 million and later followed Forbes' lead and revised down to $540 million.  Stay tuned.