The Dark Knight (Warner Bros.) will soar past $500 million sometime on Sunday, and will have banked about $505 million by Tuesday morning. With Sex and the City at $152.44 million and Get Smart reaching $128.29 million, Warner Bros. is the No. 1 studio for the summer of 2008 with a monstrous $995.42 million by the end of the long Labor Day weekend. The studio also got help from Journey to the Center of the Earth, which has generated an impressive $93 million or so.

My measure here is to take the grosses for all movies released from May 2 through this Friday (Aug. 29) and add projected Labor Day weekend numbers. Based on that standard, Paramount/DreamWorks is a very strong No. 2 with an estimated $964.59 million, about $30 million behind the Warner crew. The Melrose Avenue gang rode back-to-back $300 million grossing movies — Iron Man ($317.57 million) and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull ($315.33 million) — followed by the DreamWorks animated smash Kung Fu Panda ($212.95 million). Include the $86.53 million that Tropic Thunder will have reached by the end of business on Labor Day, and you have got a very impressive performance during Hollywood's most lucrative season.

Steve Mason is now on Facebook.

SUNDAY 11:00 a.m. (Pacific): Tropic Thunder (DreamWorks/Paramount) has clinched another box office crown, becoming only the sixth R-rated movie since 2000 to win three straight weekends. The Ben Stiller-directed movie satire scored an excellent $11.5 million third weekend, and it should finish the four-day Labor Day weekend with an estimated $14.2 million, for a new cume of $86.5 million. The only other R-rated movies to pull off a hat trick of weekend wins in the past eight years were The Whole Nine Yards (2000), Hannibal (2001), American Pie 2 (2001), Black Hawk Down (2001) and The Passion of the Christ (2002). Even a box office phenomenon like 300 only managed back-to-back three-day victories.

Greetings moguls, cinephiles, web addicts and Hollywood players who love to read my weekly column (oh come on, let me dream!). For those of you who have stumbled upon this strangely titled column for the first time, let me introduce it to you: This is where I usually comment on arthouse feature films released in American theaters, which are being watched by Fantasy Moguls players hoping to prove they are true virtual moguls. Well, like I said, that's what I usually do. It's what I have been doing for the past year now (exactly one year actually!). Happy anniversary to me!

Greetings, Moguls! Welcome to the Tip of the Week. With many October selections costing upwards of $25 in Ultimate Movie Moguls leagues, I thought it'd be prudent to take a look at some mid-range values for the rest of the season. The kings of this category would easily be The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor and Pineapple Express, neither of which would have cost you more than $20. Those flicks, alas, are already off the table — although I'd wager that many of you put one or both on your August-October slate. Before you go and drop another $37 (or $27 in Box Office Moguls) on High School Musical 3, though, take a look at these decent values in the middle of the price list. After all, you can't fill out an entire slate if you only pick the most expensive options. I've got six Ultimate values, and six for Box Office, all priced affordably between $11 and $24.

The end of August is a dumping ground for marginal movies that are, in many cases, barely worthy of release. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer once made friends on "the island of misfit toys," but not even Rudolph would pay to see any of the "misfit movies" that are opening Labor Day weekend.

I am putting my money on a third consecutive weekend win for Tropic Thunder (DreamWorks/Paramount) with another excellent hold. With Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black and Tom Cruise all continuing to generate laughs, the Stiller-directed satire may have just enough juice to win another weekend with a three-day of $11 million-$13 million (my prediction is $12.5 million) and a four-day of $14.5 million-$16.5 million (I am calling for $15.75 million). That would push its U.S. cume to $86 million-$88 million. At this pace, Thunder appears headed for $115 million-$120 million domestic.

Greetings to all citizens, denizens and tourists of the Fantaverse, and welcome once again to Bard's Eye View, your virtual laboratory where we dissect, vivisect and analyze down to the molecular level, the latest wide-release films that germinate their way into theaters. Much like some microscopic organisms, some films are lethargic specimens with absolutely no signs of intelligence or cellular activity. Others show great powers of adaptation, insinuating their way into our lives and making us talk about them without really realizing why. Just don't get too close to the latest Friedberg/Seltzer film, that stuff is lethally radioactive and has a half-life of at least two months. (Wink.)

Steve Mason is now on Facebook.

SUNDAY 8:30 a.m. (Pacific): On Friday night I reported that The House Bunny (Sony) had won the Friday box-office race, but that Tropic Thunder (DreamWorks/Paramount) would win the weekend, and that is exactly the way it played out. The Anna Faris PG-13-rated comedy was down almost 12 percent from its $5.92 million Friday for $5.25 million on its second day of release, and it will likely hit $15.1 million for the 3-day. That is well above industry expectations for the modestly budgeted, Under 25 Females-geared movie.

Steve Mason is now on Facebook.

There are four new wide releases this week, but only of them is likely to top $10 million for the traditional 3-day weekend. The Jason Statham vehicle Death Race (Universal) seems to be getting some traction in industry tracking, although a huge breakout opening is unlikely. Instead, the Paul W.S. Anderson-directed action pic will likely open with $13 million-$16 million. I suspect this movie, also starring Oscar nominee Joan Allen (The Contender) and Golden Gobe winner Ian McShane (Deadwood), will be enough to out-pace holdover Tropic Thunder (DreamWorks/Paramount), which will probably dip 40 percent-45 percent from its opening weekend.

Greetings to Fantaversians young and old, and welcome back to Bard's Eye View, where I, like many guys my age, am 39. Yes, that's right, it was my birthday this past Sunday, which means I am now less than one year away from the big 4-0. (Just one John McCain joke out of any of you whippersnappers, and I swear to Jeebus I will whack you with the nearest blunt object that presents itself! Or I'll just sic Donnie Wahlberg, who, in an amazing bit of coincidence, was born on exactly the same day as me, on you. Or possibly Robert De Niro or Sean Penn, who were also born on Aug. 17. Don't piss us off, is all I'm saying.) (Wink.)

The certain $500 million domestic box office take of The Dark Knight has moved Warner Bros. past Paramount/DreamWorks in the 2008 market share race, and, with Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince set for November, the studio seemed a lock to sail past Sony's 2006 domestic box office record of $1.71 billion. The 2008 release schedule got a major shake-up on Thursday, however, as Warner Bros. shifted Half-Blood Prince to July 17 next summer.

Warner Bros. still seems likely to be Hollywood's No. 1 studio for this year, edging Paramount/DreamWorks, and they seem destined to post at least the second-best all-time annual domestic haul with something over $1.6 billion. And, as the studio continues to juggle its release schedule, it is not inconceivable that Warner Bros. could still top the Sony record, even without HP6.