The CEO of movie theater chain AMC painted an optimistic picture for the box office in the company’s financial results call last week, predicting that the fourth quarter could be the industry’s best in six years.

It’s been an up-and-down year at movie theaters, according to Michael O’Leary, head of the trade group Cinema United.

The first quarter was really slow, then Memorial Day broke records.

“And then at the end of the summer, kind of in the fall area, there was also a little bit of a drop off, where there just wasn't that much available for people to go and see,” O’Leary said.

And the fourth quarter has gotten off to a really slow start.

But the industry thinks things can turn around, per Shawn Robbins at Fandango — thanks mostly to just three big titles: “‘Wicked: For Good,’ ‘Zootopia 2,’ and ‘Avatar: Fire and Ash.’ Those are the big three, the holy trinity of this year.”

All are sequels, and all are coming out between mid-November and Christmas.

“It will be that Thanksgiving week where we really start to see the turnaround,” Robbins said.

Those three movies — along with smaller releases — could push the domestic box office over $9 billion for the year, Robbins said.

Before the pandemic, however, movie theaters were consistently selling over $11 billion worth of tickets every year.