The spell of The Avengers has been broken.

Big news: The Avengers is not the top movie at the box office this weekend. That's right — someone else finally claimed the No. 1 spot. And OK, it was Men in Black III, which isn't very good, and The Avengers still broke $500 million domestically, but still. Did anyone else think The Avengers was going to continue its box office dominance forever?

2012: The year that Hollywood took a chance on Taylor Kitsch and failed miserably. John Carter cost an estimated $250 in production alone and returned about $72 million domestically since its March 9 release. Battleship opened this past weekend to the lowest domestic opening numbers ever for a film with a budget with $200 million or above: $25.3 million. The film cost an estimated $209 million to make.

Still in the number one spot this week, The Avengers earned another $55.1 million, well outperforming Battleship, which took in a measly $25.3 million. That might not sound too bad, but given Battleship's budget, it's pretty embarrassing. In fact, this is the worst domestic opening ever for a film with a budget of at least $200 million.

As if they aren't inherently bad enough, my recent Mondays have been exceptionally unpleasant. Three Mondays ago, I spent my night interviewing shady and unengaged drag queen contestants of the most recent season of RuPaul's Drag Race. Two Mondays ago, I was shoehorned into a sceney party thrown by a sceney magazine featuring loud, unblended music and a limited spread of mean-making alcohol. But my least pleasant Monday night of recent memory was this past one, when I spent over two hours in a theater getting my eardrums violated by Peter Berg's film adaptation of a board game.

Peter Berg was recently in Israel to promote his upcoming/recently released big-screen adaption of the Milton Bradley board game Battleship. As it turns out, the half-Jewish auteur has some pretty strong opinions about the whole Israel and Iran being on the precipice of starting World War III thing.

Here is the second trailer for Peter Berg's Battleship, and boy oh boy does this one stink to high heaven already. But watch closely, friends, because there is an extra special treat in this trailer. Do you see her? That's right, it's Rihanna! On a ship! In a bona fide movie!

Here's a trailer for Battleship, a movie based on the classic board game, but really in name only. This thing, directed by Peter Berg of all people, actually seems based on something more recent.

It's true. Read no further if you don't want a big, gay hunk mystery spoiled. Also today: Some completely gross Battleship casting, a timely Gossip Girl cameo, and an alien-related war brews in Los Angeles.

• July 1, 2011. This will be the date when the world sees Peter Berg's Battleship film, inspired by the Hasbro plastic peg board game. [Variety]