This report also appears in Box Office Theory’s Substack newsletter.
Disney and Marvel Studios have stuck their superhero landing again.
Deadpool & Wolverine opened at the top end of bullish expectations with a domestic weekend performance of $211 million per Monday morning’s revised estimates, registering as the best R-rated debut (over Deadpool‘s $132.4 million in 2016) in domestic history and the sixth-highest ever.
The crossover tentpole surpassed Jurassic World‘s $208.8 million weekend start and trails only Avengers: Endgame, Spider-Man: No Way Home, Avengers: Infinity War, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, and Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
This also tops 2019’s The Lion King remake ($191.8 million) as the best July opener in history.
Around the world, D&W‘s stellar haul surpassed Avatar: The Way of Water‘s $439 million opening in like-for-like markets to become the top global box office debut since No Way Home.
Among many highlights, the international performance of D&W is 56 percent ahead of the first Deadpool, 50 percent ahead of Deadpool 2, 37 percent ahead of Joker, and 24 percent ahead of Thor: Love and Thunder. Top markets include China ($24 million), United Kingdom ($22.1 million), Mexico ($18.7 million), Australia ($13 million), and $10 million each from Brazil, Germany, and India.
More than $36.5 million of the worldwide haul came from IMAX venues, and 18 percent overall came from the scope of premium formats.
Audiences are responding very favorably to the first official R-rated film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, yielding a 97 percent audience score from more than 2,500 ratings on Rotten Tomatoes at present.
Meanwhile, Universal’s Twisters continued to display the power of its word of mouth with a 56.6 percent sophomore weekend decline in North America to $35.3 million (estimates as of Sunday). Coming off a breakout $81.3 million start, that’s a strong retention rate in the face of stiff competition from the Marvel tentpole which also took over premium formats (and their higher average ticket prices) from Twisters.
Through ten days of release, Twisters has earned an estimated $154.9 million domestically and $221.3 million through Sunday.
Between the two blockbusters, both are performing at the top end of Box Office Theory’s extended tracking ranges. While our final pinpoint forecasts were slightly more conservative ($184.4 million for D&W and $69 million from Twisters), our five-week averages ($76.9 million for Twisters and $186.2 million for D&W) were over 90 percent accurate between the two combined dating back to our first public report that the two releases were tracking to combine for a major late summer presence.
Our 4- and 5-week accuracy rate on the two films scored 95 percent.
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