Weekend Estimates: Black Panther Powers to $218 Million Long Weekend
February 18, 2018
Black Panther is riding a waving of positive feedback all the way to record territory this weekend, with Disney projecting a $192 million three-day, and $218 million four-day weekend, as of Sunday morning. That gives the film three outright records right off the bat: biggest weekend in February, biggest three-day Presidents Day weekend, and biggest four-day Presidents Day weekend. In each case, the film is topping the jaw-dropping-at-the-time opening of Deadpool in 2016.
In some ways, the records Black Panther hasn’t quite broken are more interesting. It’s enjoying the second-biggest opening for a non-sequel film after The Avengers, and the fifth-best opening of all time (not adjusted for inflation). Those numbers show the extent to which the film has broken out into must-see territory across the board. Disney reports that 55% of the audience is male, and 45% female; and 61% of the audience over 25. Both figures are largely in line with the opening weekend demographics for Thor: Ragnarok (which was 56% male and 63% over 25).
We’ve known for some time that movies like this can be released at pretty much any time of year, and opening now will give Panther a virtually un-challenged run until March, when A Wrinkle in Time, Tomb Raider, Pacific Rim: Uprising, and Ready Player One are released on consecutive weekends, starting March 9. We’ll have some analysis on Black Panther’s potential legs shortly.
Internationally, the film is doing great business too, with Disney reporting $169 million for the weekend after opening in 69% of the international market. The $361 million global weekend is the 11th-biggest of all time, according to our records, although Disney has it pegged at number 15 in their list. Leading markets so far include Korea, with $25.3 million (in spite of distractions from the Winter Olympics), the United Kingdom with $24.8m, Mexico $9.6m, Brazil $9.4m, Australia $9.2m, and France’s $7.7m. The film set the record for biggest opening of all time in East Africa and West Africa; and will have the second-biggest weekend of all time in South Africa.
Two other new wide releases are being completely overshadowed by all this. Early Man is headed for a disappointing $3.15 million, which is easily the worst opening for Aardman Animations. Back in 2000, Chicken Run earned them a very respectable $17.5 million debut, on the way to over $100 million at the domestic box office. Sadly, things have been pretty much steadily downhill for them since then. Samson is performing similarly poorly, with $1.972 million expected by Pure Flix from 1,249 theaters.
The brightest spark among the also-rans this weekend (aside from The Greatest Showman’s predictably great hold in its ninth weekend) is Peter Rabbit, which is capturing the family audience this weekend with $17.25 million in its second outing, down just 31% from its opening, and enough to move it ahead of Fifty Shades Freed on the chart. Freed is down 56% this weekend from its opening, and has $76 million so far, which makes a $100 million final total a still-tantalizing goal.
- Weekend estimates
- Black Panther Comparisons
- Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise history
- Biggest three-day weekends of all time
- Biggest weekends for non-sequel releases
- Biggest weekends in February
- Biggest 3-day Presidents Day weekends
- Biggest 4-day Presidents Day weekends
- Fifty Shades Freed franchise history
- Early Man Comparisons
- Samson Comparisons
- Peter Rabbit Comparisons
- Fifty Shades Freed comparisons
- Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle Comparisons
- The 15:17 to Paris Comparisons
- The Greatest Showman Comparisons
- Maze Runner: The Death Cure Comparisons
- Winchester Comparisons
Filed under: Weekend Estimates, Black Panther, The Greatest Showman, Fifty Shades Freed, Early Man, Peter Rabbit, Samson, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Fifty Shades of Grey