Disney’s Frozen II blazed a trail at the box office in North America, as family audiences pushed the animated adventure to a dazzling $127 million debut.
The sequel rose above expectations in 4,440 theaters ahead of Thanksgiving, which should carry into an especially lucrative holiday weekend.
According to Variety, the long-awaited animated sequel set a November record and secured the third-best start for an animated film behind “Incredibles 2” ($182 million) and “Finding Dory” ($135 million).
It’s also the biggest debut ever for Walt Disney Animation (not including Pixar) and the first animated movie to hit triple digits in its inaugural weekend outside of the summer movie season.
The animated adventure generated $223 million for a massive worldwide start of $350 million, the strongest global animated debut in history.
The first “Frozen” was released before Thanksgiving in 2013 and made $93 million during its first five days in theaters.
The original film became a bonafide sensation and still stands as the highest-grossing animated movie in film history with $1.3 billion in global ticket sales.
