Disney (and others) at the Box Office - Current State of Affairs

[BrianLo]

Movies with A- cinema scores average out to a 3.67X multiplier. Big budget tentpoles average to a 2.97X multiplier.

I might have been a bit overeager guessing at 750 and wanted a prior range of 650-750, but I don’t feel shame with a little predictive optimism.

95% of the predictions that I’ve seen here have been well south of 1B though. Very few of the MCU first run hero films, even at the peak, debuted over 1B. Maybe just Black Panther and Captain Marvel?

 

[Animaniac93-98]

Very few of the MCU first run hero films, even at the peak, debuted over 1B. Maybe just Black Panther and Captain Marvel?

That's correct.

I thought Spider-Man: Homecoming* did, but it made a little under $900 million worldwide.

Deadpool and GotG both were over $750 million, but well under $1 billion. Doctor Strange under $700 million

*If we're counting this new F4 as "first run" after 3 previous movies by other studios, I'm counting MCU Spider-Man

 

[TalkingHead]

Finally saw Superman and thought it was very fun and well mounted. Popcorn movie of the summer imo.

 

[BrianLo]

That's correct.

I thought Spider-Man: Homecoming* did, but it made a little under $900 million worldwide.

Deadpool and GotG both were over $750 million, but well under $1 billion. Doctor Strange under $700 million

*If we're counting this new F4 as "first run" after 3 previous movies by other studios, I'm counting MCU Spider-Man

Totally, I was counting Spiderman as well in my off the brain calculus! I’m impressed I knew that off the top of my head.

Anyways, I don’t see this as a bad result given where the MCU is at these days. Unless it has a terrible multiplier, it seems pretty successful to me.

 

[LSLS]

This weekend will really give us a much clearer picture. My honest guess they expect this at LEAST over $750 million. I'll say again, this was one of the two franchises they have pushed as a big hitter they have left. I'm pretty well documented that I didn't really buy it, but a lot did. If it comes in just "Ok", I think real worry sets in.

Personally, I tried and couldn't make it happen this past weekend. I'm pretty sure I'll get a chance this coming weekend (though I never did get to Thunderbolts even though I really wanted to see that as well).

 

[Willmark]

This weekend will really give us a much clearer picture. My honest guess they expect this at LEAST over $750 million. I'll say again, this was one of the two franchises they have pushed as a big hitter they have left. I'm pretty well documented that I didn't really buy it, but a lot did. If it comes in just "Ok", I think real worry sets in.

Personally, I tried and couldn't make it happen this past weekend. I'm pretty sure I'll get a chance this coming weekend (though I never did get to Thunderbolts even though I really wanted to see that as well).

Same here, life got in the way the last week so it’s looking like this weekend for us.

 

[Disney Irish]

This weekend will really give us a much clearer picture. My honest guess they expect this at LEAST over $750 million. I'll say again, this was one of the two franchises they have pushed as a big hitter they have left. I'm pretty well documented that I didn't really buy it, but a lot did. If it comes in just "Ok", I think real worry sets in.

Personally, I tried and couldn't make it happen this past weekend. I'm pretty sure I'll get a chance this coming weekend (though I never did get to Thunderbolts even though I really wanted to see that as well).

I really think we need to stop talking "expectation" in terms of what "we" think Disney or any other studios expects for a film. We actually have no idea what any studio expects, and in almost all cases I suspect we're wildly off. It really comes down to what we actually expect a particular movie to do not what the studio does, so we should frame it that way.

So if you want to talk about expectation just frame it differently, stop using "they expect" and start using "I expect".

 

[Ghost93]

This weekend will really give us a much clearer picture. My honest guess they expect this at LEAST over $750 million. I'll say again, this was one of the two franchises they have pushed as a big hitter they have left. I'm pretty well documented that I didn't really buy it, but a lot did. If it comes in just "Ok", I think real worry sets in.

Personally, I tried and couldn't make it happen this past weekend. I'm pretty sure I'll get a chance this coming weekend (though I never did get to Thunderbolts even though I really wanted to see that as well).

I am certain they are not expecting $750 million. The bar has been lowered since the MCU brand has been severely damaged due to bad movies and because China is no longer a big market for superhero films, and is no longer adding $100-$200 million to the box office per film. Personally, I think anything over $500 million is a win for Fantastic Four, as it would put it above Black Widow, Shang-Chi, Eternals, Ant-man and the Wasp Quantumania, The Marvels, Captain America 4 and Thunderbolts.

I don't think it's fair to compare F4 to a major crossover event film like Spider-man: No Way home, Deadpool and Wolverine or Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. And it really can't be compared to Guardians 3, the third in a well-received trilogy.

 

[BrianLo]

I’d say 750M would be a big wish (I mean they probably always wish for the moon, but for reasons I’ve spelt out, that would have been stupid to project more than that). 550-600M is likely the basic expectation. That puts it in the same band (or above) that most of their other successful MCU character launchers approached.

More than anything, Fantastic Four was always supposed to be the biggest of the three this year, which clearly it won’t struggle to meet.

Captain Marvel retroactively was a strange exception. Had the shoes been reversed, I bet Black Widow would have soared in that release slot. Black Panther was an entirely unanticipated breakout cultural event domestically.

Hulk 265M
Captain America 370M
Black Widow 379M
Thunderbolts 382M
Eternals 401M
Cap 4 413M
Shang Chi 432M
Thor 449M
Ant Man 518M
Iron Man 584M
Doctor Strange 676M
Guardians 770M
Spiderman Homecoming 880M
Cap Marvel 1.29B
Black Panther 1.39B

And yes inflation blah blah, but the franchise also clearly isn’t in a peak right now.

As is WBD seems happy with Superman; however we want to parse it, I doubt Superman or Fantastic Four are going anywhere after these reasonable debuts.

 

[Casper Gutman]

Grumble grumble stupid audiences skipping Thunderbolts grumble grumble

 

[Animaniac93-98]

Black Widow 379M

I think Black Widow was the only MCU movie you could pay to watch at home same day as theatrical?

Probably affected its numbers too.

 

[Disney Irish]

I think Black Widow was the only MCU movie you could pay to watch at home same day as theatrical?

Probably affected its numbers too.

Yes which is why Black Widows should always have an * next to it as those Premium D+ sales probably helped it out a lot and aren't reflected in those numbers and should be.

 

[Wendy Pleakley]

Captain Marvel retroactively was a strange exception. Had the shoes been reversed, I bet Black Widow would have soared in that release slot. Black Panther was an entirely unanticipated breakout cultural event domestically.

Captain Marvel was cleverly released right before Endgame, so everyone thought they had to see it in the theaters to be current with the story.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

Weekend actuals are in and Superman did indeed cross $500 million worldwide. For all the talk of it underperforming outside the USA, it doesn't look like Fantastic Four is going to do significantly better and I expect both movies to have similar global totals. Superman is also closing the gap between it and Jurassic World at the domestic box office.

 

[MoonRakerSCM]

Weekend multiplier not great though after Friday. We’ll see if there’s any legs to it but that’s very front loaded. The weekend multiplier was lower than Love and Thunder

Oof. The reality of F4 is, when I got back and spoke with a couple of friends who would go see it, my statement to them was... "Eh, it's good, but not great, wait to watch it on D+"

It wasn't a "OH YEAH, you GOTTA see it asap!"

 

[BrianLo]

Captain Marvel was cleverly released right before Endgame, so everyone thought they had to see it in the theaters to be current with the story.

Indeed and retroactively I think black widow was more meaningful anyways in End Game. She deserved to have a spotlight leading into her sacrifice. Captain Marvel was just an accessory that could have been cut ultimately. Though the post credit scene was great.

 

[TP2000]

It's sweet you all waited and let me do this for the big debut of The Fantastic Four. Sorry I'm late, I was being sociable...

The Numbers - Weekend Box Office Chart for July 25, 2025

Weekend Domestic Box Office Chart for the weekend of July 25, 2025

thenumbers.com

 

[TP2000]

$118 opening weekend should likely end up somewhere in the $650 million range worldwide, I’d call that both a success ($150m profit) and a bit of a failure (considering many thought it might be a $1b film).

Continuing a Box Office Magic trend from last week, it's slightly weakened numbers probably had to do with the fact that the entire Western third of the country continued to be 4 to 7 degrees below normal through this weekend. In San Diego this past Saturday, it was downright chilly by the time Happy Hour was over at The Marine Room!

This weekend will really give us a much clearer picture. My honest guess they expect this at LEAST over $750 million.

In bad news for theater owners, as I suspected the cooler than normal June/July west of the Rockies is turning into a cooler than normal August east of the Rockies. That's not good news for theaters, but great news for hot dog stands at the beach!

 

[LSLS]

Weekend actuals are in and Superman did indeed cross $500 million worldwide. For all the talk of it underperforming outside the USA, it doesn't look like Fantastic Four is going to do significantly better and I expect both movies to have similar global totals. Superman is also closing the gap between it and Jurassic World at the domestic box office.

Honestly I feel like Superman should do better than F4. Beyond everything else, I will still contend Superman is a much bigger and well-known character than F4.

 

[BrianLo]

A reasonable surrogate for “is the company happy” is when they press release about metrics after the fact.

In fact there is currently a 1:1 correlation going on right now with when they brag about trailer viewership and 1B film.

Films they have bragged about metrics this year are Stitch obviously, Moana 2’s streaming numbers and this weekend of Fantastic 4. Notably they did not talk about Snow White, Cap 4, Thunderbolts nor Elio.

So while I can say neither Superman nor Fantastic Four set the entire world on fire in an unexpected blazing glory, they really both seem to be hitting numbers that are making their parent companies happy.