I recall some but did it fly off shelves?

1. How can a sequel be the first modern blockbuster? That's an oxymoron. And a 50 year fan base of how many people? You had comic readers, people who either saw old serials and the TV show, and cartoons. You act like it was a guaranteed hit, when it clearly wasn't.

2. Suits want their big budget movies to open big because they know they only have a finite amount of time due to overcrowded film release schedules, especially in the summer.

3. Jaws and Star Wars, creeping up to 40 years old, modern blockbusters. A movie not even 25 years old, oldfart blockbuster. Right. Because starting a trend of big opening weekends is over.

4. Adjusted for inflation for things that have already made their money is meaningless. It's not like Gone With the Wind is still making money from its box office. There's not a Gone With the Wind mutual fund, is there? Isn't money made usually used to make other movies? And it's fuzzy math, especially depending when a film was released. Today there are rarely blockbusters, by the old definition, because we know movies will be available for home viewing in about 5 months after being released. Plus there are now forms of other entertainment that take away from tickets sold. Movies are rarely events anymore for most people, just something to do.

5. Marketing changed significantly almost 25 years ago with so many tie-ins for movies for unproven properties. Remember, Star Wars toys weren't even released in the summer of '77. And of course from then on out the merchandizing for the sequels would come out before, since they knew they had a franchise/moneymaker. There was no Batman movie franchise, just some comic book readers, people who watched the old show or serials, and cartoons. You may think that's what sold the movie, but the theatrical poster just read NICHOLSON...KEATON...BATMAN. You don't think that helped with the opening weekend just a little bit with adult audiences to turn out?

6. We have very little information on how the film was distributed worldwide. And just because a movie does gangbusters overseas doesn't always mean the studio will earn a ton of money back because a smaller percentage of grosses is received compared to domestic, and also what deals the studios make with foreign exhibitors. Of course foreign matters, and it matters more than ever if movies don't perform well enough for a studios liking overseas.

If you want to go with T2 or JP because of CGI, fine, but Arnold was at the height of his popularity with T2 and JP had old fart dinosaurs, and no competition in '93.

"That's" should be replaced with "I'm"

It definitely did. There were comic books, multiple video games, a promotion with Dr Pepper, shirts, book bags, toys. Most of the companies that released merchandise for JP signed up again to release more when Lost World came out. For that matter, they are still making toys based on Jurassic Park over 20 years later.

It also marked the beginning of Tim Burton's fascination with Robert Smith lookalikes.

Tim Burton's worth: 1988-1994(7-9) RIP.

Past Blockbusters
1. Gone with the wind 1939
2. Jaws 1975
3. Star Wars Movies 1977 - 83
4. Raiders of the Lost Ark 1981
5. E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial 1982

Then, we had to wait for...

Batman 1989 - Did kick off the next batch of Blockbusters
Home Alone came 1990 - Totals did surpass Batman

Jurassic Park 1993 - This in someways could be the "Modern Age Blockbuster", it is the movie that brought in all things are possible with CGI. T2 did the same thing, but it earned about half of what Jurassic Park did.

***Titanic 1997
-True Blockbuster that had it all: Love story, action, CGI, Death, Music, long movie, repeat viewing...
-Throw back to the old days of Hollywood (not a SW, Indiana Jones, Superhero, SciFi...type movie)

Then came film series: Star Wars 1-3, Xmen, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Spiderman and others...
***Batman Begins, Dark Knight (True Blockbuster), Rises

The last 2 Blockbuster (both made a ton off 3D):
1. Avatar 2009
2. Avengers 2012

Not sure if we will have another Blockbuster like Avatar/Avengers.
-Most #1 Weekend movies only stay #1 for a week or 2
***Titanic 1997 stayed #1 for 15 weeks
***Avatar 2009 stayed #1 for 7 weeks
***Hunger Games 2012 stayed #1 for 4 weeks
***Avengers 2012 stayed #1 for 3 weeks


Movies will still make HUGE Dollars, but part of that will happen because of the rise of Ticket prices.

Are you saying there were no blockbuster movies between GWTW and Jaws?

No, but those were the big ones and the ones people remember as blockbuster.

Others:
-The Sound of Music
-Ten Commandments
-and others

1983's Return of the Jedi came after E.T. and made more money than Batman did/would. Both domestically and worldwide, so it should be 6. on the list above.

Sorry, Last Crusade was released one month prior to Batman. I know, I know, sequels don't count.