The U.S./Canada summer box office per Comscore still has a shot at hitting $4 billion, the second time post pandemic to cross that benchmark, and here’s how it’s expected to go down.
Disney is expected to ring in the last $100M+ opener of the first weekend of May through Labor Day season with Marvel Studios’ Fantastic Four: First Steps which tracking has comfortably between $100M-$110M on July 25. I kept hearing “Oh, Disney is nervous,” but the stats look good: With $13M presales as of Monday, Fantastic Four is pacing ahead of the presales for Thunderbolts ($74.3M) and Captain America: Brave New World ($88.8M 3-day) and -20% behind Superman ($125M). Already, higher expectations have been set with this latest rendition with MCU Boss Kevin Feige’s fingerprints as well as WandaVision helmer Matt Shakman versus the 2015 Josh Trank-directed crash-and-burn reboot which opened to $25.6M and only legged out to $56.1M domestic, $167.9M worldwide. Still, there’s caution as the highest opening for a Fantastic Four movie was 2007’s Silver Surfer at $58M, only $2M higher than the 2005 original. Meaning, there could be a ceiling to the IP at the box office. Again, just like reviews convinced audiences to go to Superman for the Nth time, so will they persuade non-frequent moviegoers here on Fantastic Four.
All men in first choice and unaided awareness are strong (the category where those polled organically bring up the movie’s title without being prodded). In unaided men Fantastic Four has matched Superman, but first choice is slightly behind Superman. The Fantastic Four trilogy of movies counts over $803M at the global box office.
August 1 brings Universal’s DreamWorks Animation sequel The Bad Guys 2 with $20M give or take, and Paramount’s hopeful revival of the big screen comedy with The Naked Gun around $15M. Overall unaided and first choice is higher than DWA’s Dog Man ($36M opening) and The Wild Robot ($35.7M) at this point in time.
Comedies are few in post streaming and post Covid times and Naked Gun‘s forecast is akin to that of Sony’s original R-rated Jennifer Lawrence comedy No Hard Feelings ($15M opening). Typically the genre has been mixed with other genres, in this case action. Total awareness (those polled who immediately recognize brand), unaided and first choice is high with those over 25 for the Liam Neeson-Pamela Anderson movie. Paramount is beginning to screen the film, though no Rotten Tomatoes critics’ scores yet. The pic is clearly sold on Neeson’s crusty action guy playing against type as a buffoonish cop; something akin to the original Leslie Nielsen playing his straight man type with the original movies plus Airplane!
Arriving on tracking this morning were forecasts for New Line’s highly anticipated Zach Cregger horror movie Weapons and Disney’s Gen Z-targeted sequel Freakier Friday with Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis reprising their roles, each projected at $25M+ apiece. Both have potential for upside, and both are just gearing up their campaigns now. Weapons, which was moved from MLK 2026 into this year, has built intrigue with its creepy kids running out of their bedrooms in the middle of the night, among other gross bloody images, as well as faux news websites about the going-on in the pic’s town. Curtis we hear just visited Disneyland in a stunt. Lots of love out there for Freakier Friday among millennials who’ve spent a ton of cash this summer on their childhood nostalgia Lilo & Stitch (first MPA $1 billion grossing movie of the year) and How to Train Your Dragon ($566M global and counting).
R-rated Weapons is best in unaided with women under 25, while in first choice the pic is tied between women under 25 and men over 25. First choice numbers are similar to NEON’s Longlegs from last summer ($22.4M opening).
Best comp for Freakier Friday currently is Paramount’s feature musical take of Mean Girls from last year which opened to $28.6M. Women from 17 to senior citizen ages are all in for sequel.
Beams Comscore Senior Media Analyst Paul Dergarabedian about the heat wave, “The summer of ‘25 has had almost everything working in its favor. From a Marvel movie to kick off the summer followed by a record-breaking Memorial weekend and from start to finish a relentless onslaught of potential hit films week after week, that the summer season is well positioned to hit the $4 billion mark, (the pre-pandemic standard) is no box office pipe dream. With a frequency and cadence of appealing films opening week after week with one of the best overall studio lineups ever to land in the all-important 18 weeks of the summer movie season, it should come as no surprise that by the time Labor Day Monday rolls around that the industry will have banked $4 billion plus.”
The post Summer Box Office Opening Forecasts For ‘Fantastic Four’, ‘Weapons’, ‘Freakier Friday’ & More appeared first on Deadline.
