Box Office | Avengers: Endgame Breaks the Box Office with a Colossal $1.2 Billion Opening Weekend
Carl Roberts 
Earth’s Mightiest Heroes net a recording breaking $1.2 billion box office haul
I called it! I said it would happen! And I was right! The Worldwide Box Office records were completely destroyed this weekend as the almighty powerhouse movie ‘Avengers: Endgame‘ hit us like an unstoppable object. The final film starring the original six characters earned an absolutely incredible $1.2billion worldwide. This makes it the first movie EVER to hit and overtake the $1billion mark in a single weekend.
In the U.S, the film took an amazing $350million including previews, completely dismissing the previous record holder, fittingly ‘Avengers: Infinity War‘ which took $257.6million last year and smashed the opening day record by taking in $156.7million. Despite its three hour runtime, the film has been sold out worldwide and many audiences have come back for more with repeat viewings. The film cost an estimated $350million to produce but to grab its budget back in less than four days is nothing short of phenomenal, with 45% of the global takings coming from 3D screenings of the film. Critics were blown away by the 22nd film of the Marvel Universe, gaining the film a 96% average on Rotten Tomatoes.
We at The Future Of The Force send our sincere congratulations and thanks to the entire teams behind the 22 films that have led us to this point as well as a posthumous thank you to the late and great Stan Lee and Jack Kirby for creating these iconic characters and leading towards this unprecedented masterpiece of filmmaking.
Fittingly as the fates would have it, ‘Captain Marvel‘ rose up into the second position. Audiences decided to again see the cinematic debut of Brie Larson’s superhero in preparation for the events of Endgame. With takings of $8million, the film now has a total of $413.5million at the U.S Box Office and $1.1billion worldwide.
Scarily dropping by 71% into the third position came the James Wan-produced horror flick ‘The Curse Of La Llorona‘. Last weeks number grabbed another $7.5million bringing its total to $41,2million U.S and $86.9million worldwide on a paltry $9million budget.
The faith-based drama ‘Breakthrough‘ remained fairly strong in the fourth position. Even though it dropped by an estimated 44% on last weeks takings, the film still made $6.3million. bringing its current total to $26.1million domestic and $33.7million worldwide on an estimated $14million outlay.
DC made sure Marvel didn’t grab all the money this weekend as hovering around in fifth place was ‘Shazam!‘. The crowd-pleasing Zachary Levi comic book comedy grabbed another $5.5million, bringing its total to $131.1million domestic and $346.3million worldwide. the film sadly doesn’t appear to have the pulling power of ‘Aquaman‘ and ‘Wonder Woman’ but has made a decent impression with audiences and critics alike to guarantee we will see the red-suited superhero again somewhere down the line.
PG-13 comedy ‘Little‘ saw a little more cash as it came in at the sixth position. Taking a further $3.4million and bringing its totals to $35.8million U.S and $42.4million worldwide against its $20million costings, the film still has some legs left in it yet.
‘Dumbo’ fell into seventh place. Another $3.2million was added to its coffers bringing its total to $107million domestic and $327.6million worldwide against a $170million budget. Audiences have voted with their feet, the film taking much less than Disney expected. Again, this doesn’t bode well for its ‘Aladdin‘ live-action remake due for release next month but after what ‘Endgame‘ has pulled out this weekend, I’m sure Disney won’t be TOO disappointed now!
‘Pet Sematary‘ and ‘US‘ came in at eighth and ninth places respectively. The two R-Rated seat jumpers have both made their money, both are box office successes and are now quietly slipping out of the chart as the big summer blockbusters start to arrive in multiplexes around the world. ‘Pet Sematary‘ took a further $1.2million, giving it a $52.6million total domestic while ‘US’ grabbed $1.1million giving it a running total of $172.8million.
Disney managed to pull top spot and the tenth spot this week as it’s documentary ‘Penguins’ pulled in another $1million, bringing its total to $5.7million domestic. It proves audiences still have a passion for the true-life films Disney have made and released over the past 40 plus years. Long may it continue in my eyes.
Leaving the top ten this week are the stop-motion animated Bigfoot comedy movie ‘Missing Link’ and the R-Rated disaster that is the ‘Hellboy’ reboot, finally and to be quite frank, thankfully being sent back to hell where it belongs where hopefully it will burn for its sins, never to rise again.
Next week, a few brave films decide to throw their might at the Avengers in the hopes (No chance!) of hitting that hoped for number one position. Seth Rogan and Charlize Theron hope to grab some of that box office moolah with the release of their Rom-Com ‘Long Shot’, Animated family film ‘Uglydolls’ and Dennis Quaid returns to the screen in a menacing form in ‘The Intruder’. All three are hoping to dent Iron Man’s armour, Captain America’s shield and steal Thor’s hammer and gain that coveted top spot.
Can they do it? Can comedy or animation stand in the way of the all-powerful Avengers? Can the unexpected happen and Iron Man and company submit to a surprising Box Office defeat? Or will they stand tall again and rule the worldwide box office for a second week? I know what I think! I predicted ‘Avengers: Endgame’ would be the film they all had to beat this year. And to be totally honest, I think the battle for the years top grossing movie is already over and it’s only the end of April. All the rest can do now is battle for the second position. I can honestly say that by the end of its run, ‘Endgame’ will have toppled ‘Avatar’ as the highest grossing film of all time. it wouldn’t surprise me if the film took over $3billion worldwide and possibly getting close to $4billion. The audiences desire to see the film over and over again testify to that fact. Many of the people I know (including myself and my brother, Phil and his family) have seen the movie twice and are currently planning to see it again in IMAX 3D at least once.
‘Avengers: Endgame’ is a generational event, not unlike ‘The Lord Of The Rings’ saga. Last year, ‘Black Panther’ took the box office by storm and gained itself a bunch of nominations and wins at this year’s Oscar ceremony. ‘Return Of The King’ won 11 Academy Awards at the 2004 ceremony. It WAS a generational event. ‘Endgame’ is in the same vein as ‘Return Of The King’. I can honestly say that ‘Endgame’ deserves to be treated the same way. Both films are epic event movies. Both films appeal to the audience. Both films are crowd pleasers. If the Academy overlook this final ‘Avengers’ movie next year, then there is no justice in their logic. Because, and I feel this 100%, you won’t see a film better than this for the remainder of the year. And yes, sacrilege maybe but that includes Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker.
Check back next week to see how the chart pans out right here on The Future Of The Force.
Until next time
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Source: JoBlo.com
Carl Roberts is the News Editor for The Future of the Force. Aside from being our horror genre aficionado, he is also passionate about Star Wars, Marvel, DC, and the Indiana Jones movies. Follow him on Twitter where he uses the force frequently!
