‘Superman’ Soars Higher: Official Box Office Numbers Beat Early Reports

Superman is flying high at the box office right now, with Warner Bros and DC Studios’ new movie pulling in a strong $125 million in its opening weekend.

That’s actually where many people in the industry expected it to land as of yesterday morning, according to sources from Deadline. The film, directed by James Gunn, showed solid numbers on Sunday too, bringing in $31.3 million, which was just a 17% drop from Saturday. That’s considered a really good hold, especially for a superhero movie.

Warner Bros adjusted its earlier numbers, saying that Friday made $56.1 million and Saturday took in $37.6 million. With those strong weekend numbers, Superman is expected to have a decent second weekend as well.

Industry estimates say it should drop about 50% next weekend, making around $62.5 million. To give a comparison, Matt Reeves’ The Batman also dropped 50% in its second weekend.

Meanwhile, James Gunn’s previous Marvel movies, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and Vol. 3, had drops of 56% and 48% in their second weekends. People still remember how well Guardians Vol. 3 held its audience in its second week.

Right now, Superman doesn’t have much competition. Paramount’s new animated Smurfs movie, Sony’s reboot of I Know What You Did Last Summer, and A24’s new film Eddington, a mix of political, western, comedy, and action from Ari Aster, are all playing too, but none of them are expected to hurt Superman’s performance.

That might change when Marvel Studios and Disney release The Fantastic Four: First Steps on July 25. That movie could finally slow Superman down.

Globally, Superman has already earned $220 million. That’s about $20 million more than experts originally predicted. The film’s global performance is a bit of a surprise, since Superman usually doesn’t perform as strongly overseas as other superheroes.

For example, Man of Steel made only 57% of its total from foreign markets, and Bryan Singer’s Superman Returns did even less, getting just 49% of its earnings from outside the U.S.

What’s catching people’s attention the most is the drop from Saturday to Sunday. The movie fell only 17%, which is rare for comic book movies these days.