Spider-Man: Brand New Day Just Broke a Major MCU Box Office Record on the First Night
After cementing itself as the dominant movie franchise of the 2010s, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has experienced its fair share of ups and downs during the 2020s. Over the past handful of years, there have been multiple Marvel movies that disappointed at the box office — a development that would have seemed incomprehensible 10 years ago. One constant the MCU can always rely on, however, is Spider-Man. In 2021, Spider-Man: No Way Home became the first true post-pandemic blockbuster with $1.921 billion worldwide, and now Spider-Man: Brand New Day is poised to be one of the biggest hits of the year. Box office projections for the film were always high. The only question was how high would Brand New Day go.
After one night, Spider-Man: Brand New Day has already broken a major MCU box office record, reportedly grossing $70+ million domestically from preview screenings that took place on Thursday, July 30th (via Borys Kit of The Hollywood Reporter). That would be a new all-time record, breaking the previous mark set by Avengers: Endgame ($60 million).
Can Spider-Man: Brand New Day Match Avengers: Endgame‘s Opening Weekend?
Ahead of its premiere, box office projections for Spider-Man: Brand New Day have been a bit all over the place. A few weeks out from release, the domestic estimate was in the range of $180-190 million, but some thought Brand New Day could go as high as $300 million. The sheer volume of ticket pre-sales have made things somewhat difficult to predict; coming into the weekend, reports indicated that Brand New Day had earned $80+ million domestically just from advanced sales. That $80 million, of course, was likely spread out over multiple days. Some people interested in seeing Brand New Day were unable to make a Thursday preview screening. That those early showings generated $70+ million at the box office all but guarantees Brand New Day is going to have one of the biggest openings of all time.
The all-time domestic opening weekend record belongs to Avengers: Endgame, which earned a whopping $357.1 million. Records are made to be broken, but that number seemed unattainable given the unique circumstances surrounding the Endgame release. Endgame was arguably the premier movie event of the 2010s, marking the culmination of a sprawling superhero story audiences had been following for 11 years. Spider-Man is Marvel’s most popular character, but Brand New Day is ostensibly “just” a solo Spider-Man movie — one that doesn’t even have the multiversal hook of No Way Home to generate more buzz. That said, Brand New Day is the first new live-action Spider-Man film in five years and has received strong word of mouth, making it feel like more of an event than your standard MCU solo movie.
Brand New Day significantly outpacing Endgame‘s preview screenings definitely puts it on pace to challenge that opening weekend record. It’s off to an incredibly strong start, and $70+ million from preview screenings illustrates how excited people are to see this movie as soon as possible. It’s not just die-hard MCU fans that are interested; Brand New Day wouldn’t have made this much on Thursday if general audiences weren’t on board as well. It’s clear that Brand New Day has the most widespread appeal of a Marvel movie in years, but beating Endgame‘s previews record does not mean it’s a lock to top the weekend record as well. If anything might stop Brand New Day from reaching that mark, it’s another Tom Holland movie. The Odyssey continues to be a huge draw and has been exceeding expectations throughout its box office run. Brand New Day is clearly going to win the weekend, but it still has to contend with holdover business for The Odyssey.
Notably, The Odyssey is keeping its IMAX screens this weekend, meaning Brand New Day can’t benefit from that lucrative format. It’s playing in other premium large formats, but IMAX is the biggest one. When The Odyssey broke records in its opening, IMAX showings accounted for 24% of the gross, a considerable chunk. When Endgame opened in 2019, it had the multiplex to itself and played in IMAX locations, so it’ll be interesting to see how things pan out here. Even if Brand New Day falls short of topping Endgame‘s weekend record, Marvel Studios and Sony will have a lot to celebrate.
