Weekend Predictions: Will Civil War have an Unruly Opening?

May 5, 2016

Captain America: Civil War

According to Fandango, Captain America: Civil War has had the best prerelease sales of any comic book film and the second best overall, behind Star Wars: The Force Awakens. It should come as no surprise that no other studio was willing to take a chance and go head-to-head with Civil War. However, it won't be the only film earning tens of millions of dollars this weekend. The Jungle Book will finally relinquish top spot, but I would be shocked if it didn't earn at least $20 million over the weekend. None of the rest of the box office will earn a fraction of that. Due to a misalignment in the calendar, the biggest new release from this weekend last year was Hot Pursuit, while The Avengers: Age of Ultron topped the chart with $77.75 million. Civil War should make more than that opening day.

Captain America: Civil War is the most anticipated film of the year and it would be hard for any film to live up to that hype. Fortunately, its reviews are just as loud as the hype. They are not the best of any wide release so far this year. That honor goes to Zootopia, while The Jungle Book is currently in second place. All three of these films are from Disney. It is rare for a studio to dominate a year with so many of the top-reviewed films. It's about as rare as a studio dominating the box office, but Disney is doing that as well. The studio currently has the third and fourth biggest hits of 2016 and by the end of the weekend, they will have three of the top five spots. By next weekend, they could have the number one film of the year, plus two other $300 million hits. Civil War should earn $200 million, or come very, very close, on its way to a $500 million domestic run and a $1 billion worldwide run.

The Jungle Book will be pushed into second place with $22 million, more or less. It remains on pace to get to $300 million and will likely get there next weekend and it might eventually catch up to Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

The Huntsman: Winter's War should be next with just under $5 million over the weekend for a three-week total of just over $40 million. I think this is a lesson teaching everyone not to make a sequel without the star of the original film.

Keanu should round out the top five with just over $4 million. Great reviews will hopefully translate into a better run on the home market.

One final note, it looks like Zootopia will overtake Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice on the yearly chart. At the moment, Zootopia is about $1.3 million to $1.4 million behind BvS, but BvS will likely lose a lot more theaters this Friday as Captain America: Civil War is direct competition.

- Captain America: Civil War comparisons
- Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice vs. Zootopia

Filed under: Weekend Preview, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, The Huntsman: Winter’s War, The Jungle Book, Captain America: Civil War, Zootopia, Keanu, Kristen Stewart