‘Across the Spider-Verse’ Dominates While ‘The Little Mermaid’ Fades
This past weekend, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse proved once and for all that Spidey remains the most popular comic book superhero.
The latest Spider-Man film absolutely destroyed box office estimates on its way to a historic weekend.
Everything else got left in Miles Morales’ wake, including Princess Ariel. Here’s what just happened.
Everyone in the Spider-Verse Watched This Movie
Earlier this week, MickeyBlog reported on the tracking for Across the Spider-Verse. It suggested an opening weekend of $80 million for the film.
While movie box office tracking sometimes gets it right, as happened with The Little Mermaid the previous weekend, it’s just as often wrong.
In this case, tracking wasn’t even close, as Across the Spider-Verse opened to a scintillating $120 million, beating its estimate by a full 50 percent.
Theater chains weren’t surprised, as their presales hinted at a much stronger showing.
That’s unsurprising since the first animated Miles Morales movie, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, earned glowing reviews and an A+ CinemaScore.
Then, Spider-Man: No Way Home defied pandemic behavior to earn $1.9 billion, which seems that much more improbable the more we look back on it.
Now, Across the Spider-Verse carries the torch for Sony’s Spider-Man Universe and has absolutely aced the test thus far.
This film grossed $208.6 million worldwide in just three days. That bests most tracking estimates by $50-60 million.
In short, everyone should have seen this one coming…but many didn’t.
Spider-Verse II appears well-positioned to linger in theaters as well. It earned a prestigious A CinemaScore and is currently 95 percent fresh on Rotten Tomatoes.
This feels like a good time to mention that Sony acquired the theatrical rights to Spider-Man during Marvel’s fire sale in 1998.
Sony paid $7 million. So, yeah. That was a bargain.
The Little Mermaid Fades a Bit
The unique part of Across the Spider-Verse’s release is that Sony waited until the week after the lucrative Memorial Day Weekend box office period.
Sony ceded that holiday to The Little Mermaid, which earned a whopping $118.8 million over the four-day weekend.
Ariel’s live-action debut eerily mirrors the performance of another Disney live-action remake from 2019, Aladdin.
That film managed $116.8 million over Memorial Day Weekend.
While things have changed during the pandemic, it provides a solid road map for The Little Mermaid.
For example, Aladdin fell to $42.8 million during its post-holiday second weekend. The Little Mermaid just behaved eerily similarly.
Ariel’s movie earned an estimated $40 million this past weekend. Given Disney’s history with weekend estimates, it’ll probably finish a bit higher.
So, The Little Mermaid is matching Aladdin step for step…domestically.
More Disney Box Office News
Overseas, the story doesn’t look anywhere near as good for Disney.
The Little Mermaid fell only 34 percent overseas to $42 million this week, but that’s a small number in the greater scheme.
Overall, the live-action remake has managed only $141 million internationally.
That brings the film’s global box office take to $327 million. Aladdin had reached $445.9 million by this same point.
We can dismiss some of the gap due to the flagging nature of the international box office right now, which has destroyed Fast X, as an example.
Even so, The Little Mermaid is likely going to be a financial draw at best by the time it exits theaters.
The good news for Disney is that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 has reached $780 million and appears headed to a final take of $900 million.
Since Disney also gets a cut of Across the Spider-Verse, it’s already had a solid summer…and it’s just now June 4th!
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