It has recently been reported that Marvel Studio’s ‘Avengers: Endgame’ will be opening in China on the same weekend as the rest of the world, in fact two days earlier than everywhere else on the 24th of April.
When ‘Infinity War’ was released, it was released in China two weeks later, but the day-and-date release worldwide means that the film is looking like it will break the global opening weekend record, which was set just one year ago by ‘Infinity War’, which took $640M worldwide.
If we add the $199M debut that ‘Infinity War’ took in China, then we’re looking at $839M in its opening global debut. Sure, we need to factor in whether or not the runtime may hinder its potential, or that there is a slight down-turn in people wanting to see Marvel’s latest epic, however all the signs are pointing to the complete opposite.
‘Endgame’ will be the end of an era for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, saying goodbye to some characters which have been with them for nearly a whole decade. If the film receives mixed reviews, it shouldn’t harm its opening weekend, but rather the longevity of the films run. This would be good for all the other blockbusters in the crowded Summer schedule, as ‘Endgame’ is looking to destroy competition that is within a three-week radius of the film.
In the United States, the current running prediction is something north of $275M, which would be easily enough to become the biggest opening weekend of all time in the United States, but pundits are cautious predicting higher score for the film.
A month ago, Bloomberg reported that the film was heading for $282M over its first three days in the United States, but there is a general consensus that this could be a once-in-a-lifetime-moment when ‘Endgame’ becomes the first film to break the $300M mark in its opening weekend.
This is a stretch to say the least, but when the Official Trailer was released in March it became the highest viewed trailer of all time, with 286,000,000 views in just twenty-four hours. The anticipation is huge for the film of the Summer, and besides die-hard MCU fans the general audience will still view the cinematic spectacle.
If we’re looking at a $300M OW in the United States, then there is no reason why there wouldn’t be a higher OW elsewhere internationally.
China will be the one which will decide how high this $250M-budgeted film will fly in its opening weekend. ‘Infinity War’ debuted to $199.3M in the Middle Kingdom last May and if the film can break the $200M mark in its opening weekend, then we’re looking at more and more records being broken.
If we take into account the US predicted opening weekend of $300M, that would be a rise of 11.6% from ‘Infinity War’s opening weekend. If we scale that up for the whole global debut (using the $839M figure), then we’re looking at a…. $978M worldwide debut.
Let’s just take a breather. That would mean the ‘Avengers: Endgame’ could nearly gross $1BN worldwide in its opening weekend, a feat which has only been achieved by thirty-five films in their entire theatrical runs.
This is a huge ask, with a figure of $900M a better prediction, but even that is staggering. That is higher than the final gross of films such as ‘Batman v Superman’, ‘The Hunger Games: Catching Fire’, ‘Wonder Woman’, ‘Inception’, ‘Spectre’ and ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’. I’m just going to sign off with that then.
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