In the mail, a question from someone who clearly knows how to poke me right in the eye:

Any thoughts for us on the box office performance of Transformers: Dark of the Moon last weekend? We all know how much you love that series.

Heh. The sarcasm! It burns! And actually, yes, I have a number of thoughts.

First, the over $160 million that Dark of the Moon pulled in domestically in its first five days is objectively excellent by any sane standard, and surprisingly good considering the handicap it had coming after the second Transformers film, which is universally acknowledged -- even by the filmmakers -- as being one of the crappiest films of the last several years. That there would be a third Transformers film was not surprising (crappy or not, Revenge of the Fallen grossed $800 million worldwide, which is a hard figure to ignore), but it had vast potential to be a (relative) failure out of the box, because the audiences burned by Fallen might have chosen to stay home.

In that respect, the filmmakers owning up to the rankness of the second film was a smart marketing strategy, because it gave audiences the idea that the latest edition wouldn't be insultingly bad. Also a smart strategy: actually making Dark of the Moon a better movie than the last one. This is different than making a good film, mind you. But with the Transformers you take what you can get. So well done, Michael Bay and pals, or at least, better done.

Second, with about 60% of its domestic gross coming from 3D showings, Dark of the Moon shows there are still some films people want to see in three dimensions, if the process is handled well (most reviews of the film gave a thumbs up to the 3D aspect of the film, even if they gave a thumbs down to the rest of it). I suspect that the 60% 3D gross figure could eventually become the goal for high-end, effects-heavy "event" films, since the 75% 3D grosses of Avatar have shown to be unsustainable in the long run. I think 60% would be a slightly more realistic goal regarding the potential of the process, at least as it concerns Hollywood bean counters.

Third, with a spectacular international gross of $210 million in its first five days, Dark of the Moon continues 2011's major film story, which is that it's the international, not domestic, market that's the true economic engine for the film industry (it doesn't hurt that 70% of the international grosses were from 3D as well). The film's worldwide $370 million gross in five days also means it has an excellent chance to creep into the $1 billion club, even if the North American market doesn't perform as strongly as it did for the other films in the series. Just ask Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides about that: It cracked the $1 billion worldwide mark this last weekend, with more than three-quarters of that coming from overseas markets. Sorry, North America. Your tastemaking dominance was fun while it lasted.

What will be interesting will be to see how Dark of the Moon fares next weekend. Will the film's relative improvements over the second installment keep it going strongly, or will it see the same 60% drop that the last film in the series suffered? My prediction is that it will hold up at least a little better than the last Transformers film, partly because it's a better film -- again, relatively speaking -- and partly because next week's "big" release is Zookeeper, a family comedy starring Kevin James, which I don't really expect to suck away too many of Dark of the Moon's core market of young men (or, for that matter, any of Moon's 3D screens).

The other interesting thing will be to see where the Transformers series goes from here. Michael Bay and Transformers series star Shia LeBoeuf have both indicated in interviews that they've seen this as the final installment of a trilogy, which is all well and good. On the other hand, it's hard to see either Dreamworks or Paramount, the two studios involved in the production of the films, so casually walking away from a series that makes that much damn money, especially if Dark of the Moon ends up performing as well as I expect it to. Which leads me to make the following, probably completely safe prediction: With or without Bay and LeBoeuf, we haven't heard the last of the Transformers. Yes, I know. I'm scared too.