Akshay Kumar is back with comedy after a series of socially relevant films and fans are waiting for it. His comeback to comedy happened in Priyadarshan’s ‘Bhooth Bangla’ and now the third episode of ‘Welcome’ is scheduled to release this Friday. According to the advance bookings, one can expect the opening of ‘Welcome To the Jungle’ to be better than ‘Bhooth Bangla’.Advance bookings for the movie have started slowly but are getting closer to the release. According to Sacnilk, as of 2 pm on Thursday, less than a day before the film’s release, ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ has sold around 53,000 tickets in advance for its opening day, generating approximately Rs 1.26 crore in gross collections. The film also saw encouraging sales for paid previews and opening weekend shows. On BookMyShow, ticket sales were reported to be moving at a rate of nearly 4,000 tickets per hour on Thursday afternoon, indicating the growing interest among moviegoers.With this, one can expect more numbers in advanced bookings till Thursday night, but mostly, the film will depend on spot bookings that come after word of mouth once the reviews start coming in on Friday morning. An opening day number of more than Rs 10 crore will do well for the film, and that is what even the trade is predicting. Paid previews could contribute Rs 3 to 3.5 crore to the opening day figure. But the film will finally see growth through positive reviews which should show in the Saturday and Sunday numbers.Akshay Kumar’s previous release, ‘Bhooth Bangla’, opened to Rs 16 crore, including Rs 3.75 crore from paid previews. Going by current trends, ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ appears well positioned to at least match that number and may surpass it comfortably.The film also enjoys the advantage of a relatively uncluttered release window. We have Imtiaz Ali’s ‘Cocktail 2’ and ‘Main Vaapas Aaunga’ currently in theaters and both may see a drop in numbers if ‘Welcome To The Jungle’ gets good reviews and gives them competition. One can see how the numbers of ‘Main Vaapas Aaunga’ saw growth through positive word of mouth while ‘Cocktail 2’ crossed Rs 100 crore worldwide on Thursday. Will these two movies continue even after the release of ‘Welcome To The Jungle’? Time will tell. But for now, the shows of these movies will definitely be reduced as the new release on Friday will get more windows.Directed as a madcap comedy adventure, ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ boasts of a large ensemble cast that includes Akshay Kumar, Suniel Shetty, Raveena Tandon, Arshad WarsiParesh Rawal, Jackie Shroff, Tusshar Kapoor, Jacqueline FernandezLara Dutta and: Disha Pataniamong many others.