12.5 million viewer premiere

[Bones]

You were trying to draw a parallel between Wars and Trek then to Wars and Trek now by arguing WOK had a good opening weekend. It did. However, as pointed out by both Dennis and Guy, opening weekends don't tell the whole story.
Even with its strong opening, WOK didn't even finish in the top five for total take of its year. And, if we assume "of its time" to mean a five year swing (So 79-83), it doesn't even crack the top 20 for total take.

None the less, if the point is to directly compare Trek to Wars, then compare WoK's $78M to Jedi's $252M. That's more than three times as much. I'm pretty sure that suggests Jedi "burred" WoK at the BO.

What I did was this: In one paragraph, I said Star Trek can deliver, and (only) provided a single data point.

In another paragraph, I said there is a gap between Star Wars and Star Trek, including the fact that TFA buried the Kelvin episodes in terms of box office. I asserted that part of the gap was due to studio execution, and another part of the gap was due to market appeal. I never asserted Star Trek was superior to Star Wars at the box office.

If you want some data comparing Star Wars vs Star Trek, here is some interesting information:

Box office: based on these guys, Star Trek is the #6 movie franchise of all time, based on US domestic total box office. Star Wars is #1. If I compare total inflation-adjusted domestic box office, Star Trek (2.4B) has made 38.7% of Star Wars (6.2B). If I compare TFA (936M) to ST:ID (228M), Star Trek did 24%. So like I said, buried. However, based on its ranking at #6, Star Trek can deliver.

Market Appeal: These guys have an interesting take on the fanbase. I wouldn't exactly call it 100% authoritative, but one of their results is they estimate that the ratio of Star Wars fans to Star Trek fans is 3:1. So based on market appeal, Star Wars beats out Star Trek again.

If you want to debate something, debate my assertion that part of the gap of Star Wars vs Star Trek is due to market appeal, and part of the gap is due to studio execution.

 

[Captain of the USS Averof]

Regarding the Wars vs Trek franchise comparisons (as well as their viewership numbers), I posted this on another thread, but it is applicable here as well:

Just go to the official YouTube page for each franchise and check it out for yourselves.

Paramount Pictures YouTube channel => Star Trek Beyond trailer #1: 18 million views after 16 months, Beyond trailer #2: 6 million views after 11 months.
Paramount Pictures International YouTube channel => Star Trek Beyond trailer #2: 1.5 million views after 11 months, Beyond trailer #3: 1 million views after 9 months.

Star Wars YouTube channel => The Last Jedi teaser trailer: 30 million views after 8 days.

Just a small but indicative sample test.

 

[Morpheus 02]

While I would LIKE the numbers to be high...with all the many choices available, I don't see it happening very high. ANd also, the owners of Trek have historically had pretty weak/bad publicity (such as the lack of 50th anniversary celebration)...so I don't have much confidence that it will be strong. I mean...if they invested in advertising on The Walking Dead, it might go beyond the 4-7 million I predict.