'The Expendables 3' Has Leaked Online And Has Already Been Downloaded Over 189,000 Times

Kirsten AcunaJul 25, 2014, 21:30 IST

Phil Bray/Lionsgate

"The Expendables 3" has leaked online three weeks ahead of the film's theatrical release August 15.

Variety reports the latest sequel starring virtually every big action star from Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone to Wesley Snipes and Jason Statham has been illegally downloaded over 189,000 times in 24 hours.

According to TorrentFreak, people have been downloading a high quality version of the film through file distribution system BitTorrent.

While its unknown where the leak started, TorrentFreak reports one of earliest copies that is making the rounds is one from a user known as Drarbg.

The user is reportedly a group of people who uploads a lot of video files online and often. Since 6 a.m. this morning, the user has uploaded 28 videos on file-sharing site Pirate Bay including recent episodes of "The Colbert Report," "Big Brother," and Fox's new show "Gang Related." This obviously isn't good news for the film's distributor Lionsgate. The film has been tracking a $25 million opening weekend, according to BoxOffice.com. "The Expendables 2" debuted to slightly more - $28.6 million - summer 2012. It's worth noting that the first sequel didn't perform as strongly as the original stateside. Here's a side-by-side comparison of the first and second film's performances.

Movie	Opening Weekend	Domestic Box Office	Worldwide Box Office
The Expendables	$34.8 million	$103.1 million	$274.5 million
The Expendables 2	$28.6 million	$85 million	$305.4 million

It's also worth noting it is pretty rare for a film of this magnitude to get leaked online in full and in high quality this far in advance. You may see shaky cam recordings in a theater circulating online; however, a high quality version of the film means it most likely came from a DVD screener. If the film does make less than expected opening weekend, this could work in Lionsgate's favor with the leak to partially blame for a weaker opening in a series that isn't performing as well here as it does overseas.

The cast and crew for the film are currently promoting the movie at San Diego Comic-Con where Lionsgate debuted a bunch of new colorful character posters.

We have reached out to Lionsgate for comment.

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'The Expendables 3' Has Leaked Online And Has Already Been Downloaded Over 189,000 Times