Six days in, and Sardar 2 is barely limping to the finish line. The film dropped below 1 crore net in India on Tuesday, collecting just 0.54 crore, according to figures reported by Koimoi. That's the kind of number a film posts when it's already been written off by its own audience.

The PS Mithran-directed sequel opened big on paper, riding the goodwill of the 2022 original, but poor reviews did the damage early. Add to that the clash with Soori's Mandaadi, which Koimoi notes is doing brisk business in the same window, and Sardar 2 never really had room to breathe.

The domestic net now stands at 13.64 crore, which works out to roughly 16.1 crore gross. Overseas has added another 4.5 crore, taking the worldwide total to 20.6 crore. None of that is disastrous on its own. It's the trajectory that hurts, a film sliding from opening-day highs to sub-crore days inside a week.

What it means for Karthi's numbers

According to Koimoi's tracking, this puts Sardar 2 on course to become Karthi's second-lowest grosser since theatres reopened after Covid, trailing only Vaa Vaathiyar, his most recent release before this one. That's two soft outings back to back for an actor whose last real box office win came a while ago now.

There's also a comparison being drawn to Japan, an earlier Karthi film that made 18.17 crore. Per the same report, Sardar 2's domestic lifetime net is unlikely to get past that figure, which is what pushes it into second-lowest territory rather than dead last.

The film brings back Karthi in a dual role alongside Rajisha Vijayan from the first Sardar, with S. J. Suryah, Malavika Mohanan and Ashika Ranganath added to this instalment. Prince Pictures and IVY Entertainment produced it. On paper, that's a solid returning cast for a franchise sequel. It just hasn't translated to word of mouth this time.

Online, the reaction has been unkind, with comparisons to Indian 2's underwhelming run doing the rounds and plenty of people asking, bluntly, why a film with this cast and this setup didn't land. Some viewers are already weighing an OTT watch over a theatre ticket, which tells you where sentiment sits six days out.

Mandaadi, meanwhile, keeps eating into whatever screens and footfall Sardar 2 might have picked up on a normal week. With daily numbers already under a crore, the question now isn't whether Sardar 2 recovers. It's how quickly it exits screens, and whether Karthi's next announcement can shake off two underwhelming openings in a row.