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We’ve had a couple of tentpole missteps here this summer, read Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny this weekend with $60M, The Flash and Elemental; putting the running summer box office at $1.88 billion for May 1-July 2.
That’s close to -2% off from the $1.91 billion reached over the same frame last year. All these figures come from Comscore.
While the pacing isn’t terrible, the overall industry always likes to exceed year-over-year, especially after that disastrous pandemic which forced theaters to close in 2020-through early March 2021. Summer 2020 for the May 1-July 2 period only grossed $47.3M.
Next to the pre-pandemic summer 2019 which was on Viagra and steroids led by Disney/Marvel Studios’ Avengers: Endgame (delivering $416.7M for that May 1-July 2 play period), summer 2023 is 17% behind that mid-summer which accumulated $2.27 billion.
Still, there’s a lot of hope in July with Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning – Part One set to open to a franchise record of $100M over 5-days, and the Barbie and Oppenheimer weekend fueling what could be a near $200M weekend over July 21-23 for all films.
Comscore Senior Media Analyst Paul Dergarabedian points out, “The fortunes of the summer can be perceived as rich or fallow depending on which week is being examined and with many weeks and numerous potential high-profile blockbusters on the way in July and August, it’s way too early to characterize the overall summer box office performance as a hit or a miss.”
Even though we’re slightly behind 2022, we could be ahead ultimately as Dergarabedian says, “August could be the unexpected savior and take the summer out with a bang instead of a whimper as happened last year.” Remember, Sony’s Bullet Train was the last huzzah last summer before studio movies went dry to the post-pandemic logjam in post-production. This August we have marquee fare in Paramount’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem (Aug 2), Warner Bros’ The Meg 2 (Aug 4), Universal’s The Last Voyage of the Demeter (Aug 11), Sony’s Gran Turismo (Aug 11), Universal’s raunchy R-rated talking animals comedy Strays (Aug. 18), Warner Bros/DC’s Blue Beetle (Aug. 18) and Sony’s The Equalizer 3 (Sept. 1).
Disney, despite stumbling with Indiana Jones and Elemental, is leading all studios at the summer box office so far with an estimated $811M per Deadline calculations and from a diverse slate that includes 20th Century Studios fare and tentpoles. That’s more than the $620M combined that Universal and Sony have pulled in for the beach season. Disney is providing a diverse slate of theatrical releases to cinemas post-pandemic, and they’re largely being very good about long windows (none of this 17-days to Disney+ stuff); all this despite the beating they took for going theatrical day-and-date on their streaming service back in summer 2021 under the CEO Bob Chapek era.
Summer currently reps 42% of the $4.5M running domestic box office cume this year for Jan. 1-July 2. Overall 2023 is 18% ahead of 2022, and 21% behind 2019.
Currently Disney owns five of the top ten movies in summer, you can see the list below.
(Date for May 1-July 2)
1.) Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 3 (Dis) – $354.8M
2.) Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (Sony) – $339.8M
3.) The Little Mermaid (Dis) – $281M
4.) Fast X (Uni) – $145.4M
5.) Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (Par) – $136.1M
6.) Flash (WB) – $99.2M
7.) Elemental (Dis) – $88.7M
8.) Super Mario Bros (Ill/Uni) – $82.6M (of a total cume that is $573.4M)
9.) Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (Dis) – $60M
10.) Boogeyman (Dis/20th) – $40.9M