The culmination of 10 years and over 20 movies of the Marvel Cinematic Universe has come to this moment. Walt Disney’s “Avengers: Endgame”, the most anticipated movie event of the year is set to drop this week.
Having already smashed records for advanced ticket sales, “Endgame” will have the red carpet laid out for it to reach or even surpass $300 million in its inaugural opening weekend. That will be the highest opening in history, the current record holder being “Avengers: Infinity War” at $257.6 million.
Online ticketing sites Fandango and Atom Tickets reported that 4000 showings have been sold out, which correspond to “Endgame” having the widest release of any movie in US film history. To handle the overwhelming demand, some cinemas have begun offering showings round-the-clock. In some areas of the country, moviegoers are still unable to find tickets for opening weekend.
Critics like Boxoffice.com chief analyst Shawn Robbins are skeptical of “Endgame” hitting the $300 million mark, calling it “mathematically challenging”, for a couple of reasons.
First up is the competition that “Endgame” faces from movies currently showing in theaters. “Shazam!,” “Hellboy,” “Dumbo,” “Captain Marvel,” and “Breakthrough” among others, are still slated to play in cinemas nationwide. As much as theaters would like to show just “Endgame”, contractual obligations have forced their hands to set aside screens to play these other films.
Secondly is the run time of “Endgame”. Standing at a whopping three hours, theaters can feasibly only show the film three times in a 12-hour period when you take into account the time it takes for previews and cleanup which can account for another hour.
In response, some theaters have included early-bird showings at 4am and 7am. Robbins believes that this won’t tip the scales too much for opening weekend. Taking into account that “Endgame” will be showing in 4600 theaters, which is more than the 4470 for “Infinity War”, each theater would have to bring in an average of more than $65000 each to come close to hitting the $300 million mark.
Robbins notes that “It’s unprecedented, it’s never happened, but it doesn’t mean that it can’t happen”. Inflation and rising ticket prices have helped to bump up these figures, and one has to take into account the number of IMAX theaters thrown into the mix, where tickets are usually more expensive than standard theaters.
On the global stage, “Endgame” is also slated to break records. The total global opening weekend has been estimated to range from $750 million to $900 million, with many analysts predicting it to be the fastest film to hit the $1 billion mark.
Whatever the result, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has lived up to the hype thus far, and this weekend will definitely be the benchmark to beat for years to come.
