It’s always nice when a smaller, lesser known film that has the same release date as a comedy, horror, and a Live 3D concert ends up pulling in the most money for the weekend. Things like this need to happen more.

That’s exactly what happened this weekend as The Help beat out its competitors 30 Minutes or Less, Final Desintation 5, and Glee The 3D Concert Movie for the prized 2nd place spot in the domestic box office.

Of course, given the stunning word of mouth, Rise of the Planet of the Apes pulled through to be #1 again for the second week with an estimated $27.5 million here in the states. That rounds the film out at about $180 million worldwide since it first hit theaters last week.

Meanwhile, Buena Vista’s The Help ended up sliding in at #2 with $25 million. That beat out the other films opening this weekend, including Final Destination 5 which came in at #3 with $18.5 million, 30 Minutes or Less, which came in at number 5 with $13 million and Glee 3D which completely flopped at #11 with $5.7 million.

Next weekend, another barn burner as Conan the Barbarian and Fright Night open to 3,000 screens, while Robert Ridriguez makes his return to the family action flick with Spy Kids: All the Time in the World. Should be fun!

Though some people look down on sequels past number 3, there are a few pretty good films out there in the high sequel count that have had a decent fan response in the past. With that in mind, the upcoming 5th film in the Final Desintation franchise already has 83% over at RottenTomatoes, so it can’t be that bad, right?

The series was “rebooted” with #4 to a new audience, bigger budget, and slightly more 3D element (from the already nonexistant 3D in 1-3). That film took off and had some pretty big numbers in the box office, so why not continue with a fifth film? Exactly.

In honor of the film hitting theaters this Friday (in 3D and 2D), the fun folks over at Screened.com managed to compile every death from Final Destination 1-4, which managed to leave us off with a nice round 30 kills overall.

Just watching this montage made us realize how beautifully violent and deranged some of these deaths turned out to be, and how hilariously campy some of the Rube Goldberg-esque traps were setting us up.

Check out the montage after the jump and race out to see how much more ridiculous the deaths can get this Friday when Final Destination 5 hits theaters everywhere.

Every massive summer blockbuster season has to have a few surprises. Last year, a little animated film starring Steve Carrell and Jason Segal called Despicable Me surprised everyone and grossed $251 million to date. That may be what we have on our hands with Rise of the Planet of the Apes.

Apes managed to surprise everyone this weekend and pull in $54 million in the first three days here in the states with $77 million worldwide, and with 81% rating at RottenTomatoes you can expect the trend to continue through the workweek and possibly next weekend.

Coming in at #2, the true winner of last weekend’s bout, The Smurfs managed to pull another kid-friendly rabbit out with an estimated $21 million for the weekend, and a total $76 million.

Also hitting theaters this weekend, the body-switching comedy The Change-Up pulled in an estimated $13.5 for the weekend, which may not be such good news for Universal, who spent over $50 million for the production.

Fortunately, people have many places where they can express themselves online these days. One of the most popular is, of course, YouTube. That’s one of the main places budding filmmakers, and pretty much anyone else, can make a video, post it online and potentially get a lot of attention.

One person who’s been gaining attention for his videos is Miles Fisher. As a struggling actor he made several humorous videos and got quite a bit of attention. Now that his acting career has started to take off with roles in Final Destination 5 and J. Edgar, he hadn’t stopped making videos.

In fact, the actor reportedly went to Warner Bros with an idea for a short that could help spread awareness of its upcoming Final Destination film and the studio liked it so much they gave him the money to make it. The result is a short called New Romance which seems to be part horror homage and part Saved by the Bell. Either way, the body count it pretty high — which we can appreciate.

Check it out after the jump.

Welcome to another edition of On the Radar where we delve into all corners of the entertainment, tech and geek Internets for news, views and whatnot that may have escaped our regular coverage during the week. Let is know if we missed something interesting.

Let’s get started!

• Now that Transformers 3 has made some of the most money in theaters this year, a few people are claiming that Michael Bay ripped himself off with re-rendered scenes from The Island.

• Who needs new formulas when we’ve got something as classic and plentiful as the Final Destination franchise. Here’s an example with the newest trailer for #5.

• Ladies, swimsuit season is right around the corner, and with these Monster Bikinis, you’ll definitely be the talk of the geeky town.

• Forbes recently uncovered that Sarah Jessica Parker is the highest paid actress in Hollywood. The weird part is that she’s only payed in sugar cubes and carrots…

• Sad to see a few favorites on this list, but here are the top 10 biggest flops of 2011 so far. (We still have to get through Captain America)

• Jon Hamm is a man of many emotions, and you can see them all in the Jon Hamm Emotions Challenge!

It seems that above all others, horror is the one franchise in which it’s culturally acceptable to release as many sequels as possible. Even superhero films, which are one of the highest grossing movie genres to date, has only gone to 3 or 4 films before ending or rebooting a franchise. Not horror. Films like Saw, Friday the 13th, Toxic Avenger, and countless others keep getting cranked out.

One of those franchises still cranking is New Line’s Final Destination. Starting in 2000, the franchise is now hitting it’s fifth (and probably not final) film in this August. Here’s the breakdown.

In “Final Destination 5,” Death is just as omnipresent as ever, and is unleashed after one man’s premonition saves a group of coworkers from a terrifying suspension bridge collapse. But this group of unsuspecting souls was never supposed to survive, and, in a terrifying race against time, the ill-fated group frantically tries to discover a way to escape Death’s sinister agenda.

Lots more “accidental yet creative” deaths, some more cringe-worthy tension, and the return of Tony Todd! Check it all out in the newest trailer for Final Destination 5 — or as we like to call it FIVEnal Destination.