Boasting a near-perfect audience score, Universal and DreamWorks Animations live-action How to Train Your Dragon flew to an impressive $11.1 million in previews.

That includes $8.6 million from regular Thursday previews and another $2.5 million in early access screenings hosted Wednesday. Combined, its one of the best showings of the year to date.

The family film is easily headed for a first-place finish at the June 13-15 box office with a projected debut of $75 million, although that number could climb higher based on preview grosses and first reactions. As of Friday morning, the pic boasted a 99 percent audience score on Rotten Tomatoes. Its critics score is 77 percent. How to Train You Dragon will steal the box office crown from Disneys smash hit live-action Lilo Stitch, which flew past the $800 million mark at the global box office earlier this week after topping the chart for three consecutive weekends and setting numerous records.

This is the first time that Universal and DWA are borrowing a page from the Disney playbook and turning one of its animated films into a live-action title.

Filmmaker and How to Train Your Dragon franchise regular Dean DeBlois returned to direct the remake of the first 2010 film, which spawned two more movies and other media properties. To date, the marquee franchise about a young Viking boy named Hiccup who goes behind his fathers back and befriends a feared Night Fury dragon named Toothless has generated more than $1.6 billion in global box office ticket sales.

How to Train Your Dragon has a huge advantage in taking over the Imax screens that have belonged to Tom Cruise-starrer Mission: Impossible The Final Reckoning for three weekends (Both pics used Imax cameras to shoot certain sequences). Dragon is also taking over numerous other large-format screen this weekend.

Overseas, it opens this weekend in its first 53 markets.