A new movie is sitting atop the box office in the United States in the form of the horror movie Come Play. However, the film’s success over the weekend isn’t something to crow about as the box office, in general, is still performing weakly.

Variety reports that the $3.15 million returns made by Come Play was enough for it to top the weekend box office, as the rest of the films currently out did not even top $2 million. The film’s closet competitor, Honest Thief, only took in $1.35 million, despite topping the box office last weekend.

The overall anemic box office dulls the shine of Come Play’s success, as the film actually performed better than expected. As pointed out by the publication, Come Play was only expected to earn within the range of $2 million to $2.5 million. 

The film was also able to do this despite most films not being able to do well on Halloween weekends. It also did not have big-name stars like Liam Neeson and Robert De Niro to prop it up, like previous box office winners Honest Thief and The War With Grandpa.

Deadline quotes an industry insider as saying that a marketing campaign that focused on advertisements on national television helped Come Play earn as much as it did. The insider cites the same reason as to why Tenet underperformed, pointing out that Warner Bros. had opted for digital marketing more than on television.

Aside from Come Play and Honest Thief, the other films that make up the top 10 include The War With Grandpa, Tenet, The Empty Man, Hocus Pocus, and The Nightmare Before Christmas.

The War With Grandpa earned $1.08 million over the weekend, bringing its cumulative total to $11.3 million. Christopher Nolan’s Tenet, once hyped as the savior of cinemas during this pandemic, earned $885,000. It has now earned $53.8 million over 10 weeks.

Before being dethroned by Come Play, Honest Thief actually spent two weekends on top of the United States box office, earning $3.7 million on its first weekend and $2.4 million on the next one.

At the time, Open Road CEO Tom Ortenberg had remarked that good word-of-mouth would ensure longevity for Honest Thief on the box office. Open Road is the production company behind Honest Thief.

Whether the American box office can go back to pre-pandemic numbers depends on the global coronavirus pandemic state. As of the Nov. 1 update from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there are now 9,105,230 confirmed COVID-19 cases in the country. The number of people that have died from COVID-19 is now at 229,932.