Well, we knew it was gonna be big. But this big?
The Avengers, Marvel’s supersized superhero flick, didn’t just win the weekend box-office crown. It didn’t just make history. It pounded the record books like the Hulk tossed around poor little Loki.
The Avengers‘ opening weekend is so big, in fact, that we’re not even sure how big yet. Disney estimates that the cinematic colossus will earn $200.3 million in its Friday-through-Sunday run, according to Box Office Mojo. But some prognosticators believe that Disney’s being extraordinarily cautious and that the total take may land somewhere north of $205 million.
But hey, when we’re talking numbers this massive, what’s a couple of mil here and there?
Regardless of where the final tally lands, there’s no question that The Avengers set a bevy of records, including the highest opening weekend ever (beating last year’s Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2) and the fastest film to reach the $200 million mark (three days; previous record-holder The Dark Knight took five).
And here’s a bit of trivia for you: The Avengers has already surpassed the total box-office take of Thor ($181 million) and Captain America: The First Avenger ($176.7 million), Marvel’s two big releases last year. In just three days!
Not that The Avengers had much competition. Studios fled from this mighty band of superheroes, leaving the weekend free of major new releases. The only other newcomer to make the Top 20 was The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, which earned $750,000 in extremely limited release and (with all due respect, of course) wasn’t probably hoping to compete with Marvel’s big boys.
Think Like a Man put up the best fight among the also-rans, scoring another $8 million to finish a very, very distant second. Katniss and her ever-feisty Hunger Games landed in third with $5.7 million, bringing the film’s 2012 cumulative total to a whopping $380.7 million.
Which makes me wonder … will The Avengers overtake the Games by the end of the year? The end of the week? Will one of those two films wind up winning the 2012 box office crown, or will the eventual champ be a contender still in the wings? Remember, we’ve yet to see The Dark Knight Rises (July), The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2 (November) and the first installment of The Hobbit (December) take the field. I’m not convinced that even the mighty Avengers can resist all those comers.
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