A meteor is hurtling toward Hollywood, and you can only save one movie star (come on, none of them can actually stop the meteor, so get practical). What stud do you take with you to repopulate the movie star species? I'm going to go with Liam Neeson. He stands a literal head over most other movie stars, and it seems that he is able to open movies with the same quiet reserve that distinquish his best performances. Taken 2, the sequel to 2008's breakout hit, obliterated the competition this weekend with one of the strongest October openings on record, and it just feels like Liam being Liam. In other news, Hotel Transylvania remained strong, while PItch Perfect followed up on the promise of a strong limited release to finish third this past weekend. Frankenweenie did not live up to the awesomeness of its title, and finished in fifth behind holdover Looper.

On a sidebar, filmmakers established and aspiring alike take note: four of the top five directors this week are represented by WME.
 

Taken 2: $50M

Olivier Megaton
WME - Robert Newman

Liam Neeson
CAA - Chris Andrews

Maggie Grace
UTA - Chris Hart

Hotel Transylvania: $26.3M

Genndy Tartakovsky
WME - Jeff Gorin

Adam Sandler
WME - Adam Venit
Brillstein Entertainment Partners - Sandy Wernick

Andy Samberg
UTA - Jay Gassner
Mosaic - Julie Darmody

PItch Perfect: $14.7M

Jason Moore
WME - Michael Esola

Anna Kendrick
CAA - Mick Sullivan

Brittany Snow
ICM Partners - Meredith Wechter
The Schiff Company - Mimi DiTrani

Looper: $12.2M

Rian Johnson
CAA - Micah Green
Featured Artists Agency - Brian Dreyfuss

Joseph Gordon-Levitt
WME - Warren Zavala

Bruce WIllis
CAA - David O'Connor

Frankenweenie: 11.5M

Tim Burton
WME - Mike Simpson

Charlie Tahan
Abrams Artists - Ellen Gilbert

Winona Ryder
Gersh - Leslie Siebert