The film has generated $284.5 million as I’m writing this, which in my eyes is a spectacular number whatever your film is. Although, there could be exceptions if you’re Waterworld but even so, that’s already almost a $100 million in leftovers in that case. Chamber of Secrets is at $255.7 million, down from the original’s $317.6 million domestic haul.

Sorcerer’s Stone had a lot more buzz from the start, as the sequel mostly got the Attack of the Clones treatment in the franchise-sequel world. The original Harry Potter was a huge deal at the time because it hadn’t been on the screen previously. But since there was a sequel coming out, the fact that Mr. Potter was in theaters again was not as special as it once was.

The (original) Lord of the Rings did a good job of getting fans over a substantial period of time and ranked up at $313.4 million in domestic ticket sales, and that was also playing in 400 fewer theaters at the time. The fact that there’s now a sequel may not appear as special of an event as the original once appeared to those not so "into" to the franchise. I saw the original in theaters twice, with the second time on my will (but also at an excellent, worth-it theater). But if it weren’t for a friend of mine who talked me into going a second time to the sequel (at a pretty average multiplex), I probably wouldn’t have gone again because it simply was not all that special. I knew what happened in the story, and it seemed like a movie that had a first-time amazement factor, which turned out to be rather true.

I always hear fans hoping the sequel will gross enough to climb the all-time chart. Beating the original film is going to be a pretty lenient task, but truly, in my opinion The Two Towers really isn’t the kind of material that should unseating Forrest Gump ($329.5 million) or Jurassic Park ($356.8 million). If you ask real filmgoers, Gump is probably one of their favorite films of all time if not one of the most memorable films at least. And that is not due to visual effects or because it is dazzling fun or pure "kickass," but because it was pure quality.

I really ask everyone truthfully if they can forget their first experience of witnessing Jurassic Park on the big-screen. At the time, it was a breakthrough in the visual effects department in the believability that dinosaurs were actually walking the earth. We knew they really weren’t, but it looked so damn real, which made watching the film all that more dazzling, exciting, and thrilling. Jurassic Park is really a breakthrough in the believability of special effects and I’m betting that when most real moviegoers dwell on their most memorable experiences of sitting in a theater, seeing that story come to life is probably on the chart.

I bring that up because in my world, The Two Towers is nothing special come visuals. It doesn’t do anything we haven’t seen before. Jurassic Park was a landmark movie for coming up with a tactic where the fake felt real, and that was the nightmare. The Matrix Reloaded is looking like a solid possibility as a film that could break new ground with the visual effects department. And whether or not that will deserve $400+ million if it ever achieves so will be determined once it’s released, but as far as Two Towers goes I don’t think beating Jurassic Park (nor Gump) would be a good achievement.