Dan Folger, left, and Eddie Redmayne in “Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald.” (Warner Bros.)

Deadline.com is reporting a $7 million Thursday night pre-opening opening for “Fanastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald.”

That’s about 20% below the nearly $9 million that first “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them” debuted to a couple of years back. The film is opening worldwide at the same time and figures to do $250-275 this weekend, planet wide. In the U.S. and North America it won’t match the $74-75 the first film pulled in, if Thursday night is any indication.

Box Office Mojo is expecting a $65-69 million opening weekend for this latest spin in J.K. Rowling’s Wizarding World.

Reviews aren’t helping this one. Critics have been indifferent to the murky muddle that Rowling scripted and David Yates filmed in the dark. I think it’s the worst film of the Potter and Post Potter Picture Parade.

“Instant Family” is another pre-Thanksgiving “holiday hit” in the making. And for a Mark Wahlberg and his “Daddy’s Home” team comedy, PG-13 thanks to adult themes and loads of profanity and a bit of violence, it didn’t make out badly with critics. I think Rose Byrne makes it. 

It should manage $18 million this weekend, says Box Office Mojo.

That will allow the comedy to edge the best reviewed film of the weekend, Steve McQueen’s TV show-inspired heist thriller “Widows.” It opens on a lot of screens and should clear $17 million.

Will “Grindelwald” suck away most of the second weekend business from “The Grinch?” Universal could get another $35-40 million out of the Mean One. Maybe less.

“Bohemian Rhapsody” should pull in another $18-20, and will close the gap on “A Star is Born” about as much as it ever will. $185-188 for “Star” by Sunday night, $130+ for “Bohemian.”

“Green Book” opens in limited release, “Boy Erased” and “A Private War” open wider but still on too few screens to crack the top ten, unless “Nobody’s Fool” collapses altogether.