‘Avengers: Infinity War’ Notches Mammoth 2nd-Week Box Office Win

Marvel's superhero flick notches $112.5M haul, but are smaller films being hurt?

May 6, 2018 1:18 pm

Marvel’s accountants must feel their spider senses tingling.

Avengers: Infinity War won the box office crown for a consecutive straight weekend with $112.5 million, good for the second highest second weekend total of all time. On Saturday, the superhero team-up flick crossed the $1 billion mark at the global box office in a record 11 days — and the film doesn’t even open in China until this Friday.

To get a box office hit of this scale, ticket-buyers have to opt for repeat viewings at the other choices at the multiplex.

“This totally reflects repeat viewing,” Paul Dergarabedian, senior box office analyst for ComScore told RealClearLife. “You don’t get these kind of numbers that fast without people going back for more.”

And while that’s good news for Marvel and parent company Disney, there’s a school of thought that Hulk is smashing the marketplace for smaller films in the process. This weekend’s second-place finisher, Lionsgate’s remake of Overboard, finished almost $100 million behind, with $14.75 million. (Although those were better than expected numbers for the comedy.)

Some industry experts and cinephiles worry that the trend will mean studios will spend all their marketing muscle on tentpoles to the exclusion of a more varied slate — especially during the summer popcorn movie season. That’s more or less the same gripe that has existed since Star Wars first rolled into theaters in 1977 like an Imperial Star Destroyer. Only now streaming services are starting to pick up the slack. Which sets up the possibility that the movie theater becomes seen as a destination for event viewing only especially outside of New York City and Los Angeles.

 March saw a drop of  24% compared to 2017 despite the herculean performance of Marvel’s last film, Black Panther. The film, which opened in mid-February, was responsible for nearly 25% of March’s box office. That’s not necessarily super for the industry as a whole.

“The strategy of living off big blockbusters and then everything else is a loss leader is not a good long-term strategy,” said Dergarabedian. “You can’t hold up the entire table on one leg.

“David has to be able to go out there can go out there and at least compete with Goliath.”

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