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The summer season officially begins, though it certainly felt as if it began two weeks ago with the massive success of Ryan Coogler’s Sinners. Not to take the focus off of that winner, but Marvel is hoping to get back on track both financially and creatively this weekend. Disney has laid claim to the opening of summer for nine of the last 11 (non-pandemic) years and have made at least $358 million on any one domestic release in that period. That’s not going to happen for its latest, but at least critics appear to like it.
Thunderbolts* is, indeed, the best-reviewed film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe since Spider-Man: No Way Home. The film is holding onto a Certified Fresh 88% with critics, better than Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (82%), Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (82%), and Deadpool & Wolverine (79%). The latter was certainly a massive success for everyone involved, but it has also felt like an outlier of late, which feels odd given that five of the last eight MCU movies grossed over $343 million domestically and over $760 million worldwide. Both of those numbers belong to Thor: Love and Thunder, also one of the lowest-rated MCU entries. Just not quite as low as The Marvels, Captain America: Brave New World, and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.
Perception is king sometimes, though, and those three movies are not remembered in glowing terms in either the creative or financial departments. That may be why Thunderbolts* feels like a small breath of fresh air backed by a number of reviewers. Its $76 million opening weekend will pass The Marvels’ entire domestic gross this week, but it still falls below Brave New World’s $88.8 million. That film claimed the smallest of victories by inching its way over $200 million, a task it took 62 days to complete. In the post-Avengers world of 2012 and beyond, only four MCU films made less money, and two of them (Black Widow and Eternals) could be given the pandemic asterisk.
Critics are on board with Thunderbolts*, but will the fans be? More importantly, will the casual fans be reinvigorated to give it a go? Given how many huge openings these films have had, it’s not surprising that only 10 of them made over three times their first three days. More concerning for Marvel is that seven of their 10 lowest opening weekend multiples have come since 2021. Yes, two of those were Black Widow and Eternals, but they were also higher than Brave New World, The Marvels, Quantumania, and the Doctor Strange sequel. Sure, Guardians 3 and Deadpool &Wolverine are in that top 10 list, but the thuds have hit louder — at least on the creative side, much more than the financial. But here we are with an $180 million production getting off to the 28th-best start out of 36 MCU titles with another $86 million internationally. Sinners certainly did not tell its whole story in a single weekend, but few films are Sinners.
That’s a good lead-in to what is, unquestionably, the biggest story of the box office this year. It may have only the 15th biggest opening in April ever, but it has consistently climbed the chart over the past several weeks, and with a $33 million third weekend (down just 28% from last week and the sixth best for an April release), Sinners is now ninth among April’s all-time 17-day grossers. That’s $10 million ahead of Fast Five and $14 million behind The Fate of the Furious, two films that grossed just $20.4 million and $19.9 million in their third weekends, so they will be left in the dust soon as well. Furious 7 is still well over $100 million ahead of Sinners’ pace with a highly frontloaded haul, but Sinners even bested its third weekend of $29.1 million, suggesting that it is headed for not just $250 million but potentially even $275 million domestic at this rate. Another small drop next weekend and the $300 million conversation could begin. It’s a shame its international haul of $57 million is not nearly the match.
A Minecraft Movie may be saying “hold my chicken jockey” in regards to what is the biggest box office story of 2025. Surely this is winning in sheer calculable numbers, adding another $13.7 million to its take and bringing its total over $398 million. This week it will be welcomed into the $400 million club as it moves toward $1 billion globally. After a month the film sits between The Dark Knight Rises and Captain America: Civil War on the all-time 31-day list, besting both of their fifth weekends. Minecraft’s is closer to the live-action Beauty and the Beast, though that film is over $55 million ahead. That still suggests it has another $50 million in its domestic haul, which, now at $873 million globally, would need the international audience to kick in another $100 mil to join that billion-dollar club.
The question as to whether or not people really wanted a sequel to The Accountant is being answered with a “not really, but maybe kind of a little.” The film fell over 60% in weekend two with $9.4 million. That brings the film to $41.1 million after 10 days, a little over $6 million behind the original, which began with roughly the same opening weekend but had a much stronger second go with $13.6 million. These are closer in sync to Kill Bill Vol. 2, which had a $10.4 million second weekend and $42.9 million 10-day haul. So put The Accountant 2 in the $55-60 million neighborhood, which isn’t terrible, but given its $80 million price tag and less than spectacular international haul of just $25 million to date, maybe The Accountant would have to go from the Warner Bros. column to the Amazon/MGM column to the Netflix column if we’re looking at a third entry.
Until Dawn did not cost nearly as much (just $15 million), but its going to take more than 10 days to gross that much on the domestic side. A 50+% slip to $3.8 million this weekend has the film at $14.3 million. Internationally the film is doing just as well, so $20 million on each side of the ledger could declare victory for Sony on this one. It’s at $34.7 million right now. The same cannot quite be said for The Amateur. The 20th Century Studios release is at $36.9 million domestic and $85 million worldwide, not nearly enough to even double up its $60 million budget.
The rest of the top 10 begins with The King of Kings, down over 65% with $1.6 million and a total of $57.3 million. Alex Garland & Ray Mendoza’s Warfare got its total to $24 million. Indian crime thriller HIT: The 3rd Case made $1.1 million over the weekend in 590 theaters and now has a total of $2.2 million. Nicolas Cage’s new film The Surfer opened in 1085 theaters and grossed $675,000.
Many are taking off the post-Marvel weekend, but there will be a few new options. Lionsgate is certainly trying to hype up Shadow Force with Kerry Washington and Omar Sy. IFC is going to give another wide go with Clown in a Cornfield from the director of Tucker and Dale vs. Evil. Briarcliff has the latest Shakespeare variation with Juliet & Romeo. And keep an eye out for the limited release of Friendship with Tim Robinson and Paul Rudd. A24 will be taking the film wider in the next couple of weeks. Could it be one of the comedy sleepers of the summer?
Erik Childress can be heard each week evaluating box office on Business First AM with Angela Miles and his Movie Madness Podcast. [box office figures via Box Office Mojo]
Thumbnail image by ©Marvel Studios
