In spite of heavy advertising that prominently featured the Marvel logo, Blade: Trinity finished a distant second at the weekend box office, earning an estimated $16.1 million far behind Ocean's Twelve's $40.9 million.  The third installment in the Blade series opened with only a slightly better total than the first Blade, and couldn't compare with Blade II, which scored an opening weekend total of $32.2 million (though in the face of much less competition).  Blade: Trinity debuted on Wednesday, which may have taken some of the luster off its weekend performance, but its five-day cumulative of $24.5 million is still somewhat disappointing given Blade II's strong performance.

Ocean's Twelve's opening, though slightly better than the debut of Ocean's Eleven, was also somewhat below expectations given Warner Bros. massive publicity campaign for the film, but the relatively weak performances of Blade: Trinity and Ocean's Twelve also demonstrate the continuing strength of the competition, particularly National Treasure and Polar Express, each of which earned approximately $10 million despite the fact that the former has been out for four weeks and the latter for five.  Polar Express, though widely considered a disaster at first, is clearly benefiting from its seasonal theme.  The film's $110 million cumulative is still far from its $165 million cost, but it should be able to lurch into profitability when the DVD is released (presumably in plenty of time for the 2005 holiday season).