Deadpool & Wolverine breaks box office record with $205 million

©The Walt Disney Company/Courtesy of Everett Collection

“Deadpool & Wolverine,” a comic book-based adventure film that brings together two of Marvel’s most popular characters, is topping the box office.

Disney’s superhero sequel grossed $205 million in its opening weekend, ranking eighth as the biggest debut of all time, ahead of 2018’s “Black Panther” ($202 million) and behind 2015’s “Jurassic World” ($208 million) and 2012’s “The Avengers” ($207 million). Only nine films in Hollywood history have surpassed the $200 million mark in their opening weekend. It also easily surpassed 2016’s “Deadpool” ($132 million) to set the record for the biggest R-rated opening weekend of all time. Its 2018 sequel, “Deadpool 2,” is third as the biggest R-rated debut of all time, with $125 million. Among the many highlights of the latest installment, “Deadpool & Wolverine” had the biggest start of the year, surpassing another Disney film: Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” ($155 million debut).

Internationally, “Deadpool & Wolverine” has grossed $233.3 million, bringing its global total to $438 million. After three days in theaters, the Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman-starring film is the sixth-highest-grossing film of 2024. Disney spent about $200 million to produce the film and another $100 million to promote it.

Heading into the weekend, the third “Deadpool” movie (the first Marvel Cinematic Universe film to feature comic book characters previously licensed to 20th Century Fox) was expected to make between $160 million and $170 million. But those estimates were quickly blown. That’s because diehard fans want to be among the first to see the film to avoid plot twists and surprise appearances and see Jackman’s ruthless mutant Logan come out of retirement, propelling the Shawn Levy-directed film to new heights at the box office. On Friday alone, “Deadpool & Wolverine” took in $96 million, more than most 2024 films have made in their entire opening weekends.

“Deadpool & Wolverine” is a necessary victory for Marvel. After this weekend, the MCU became the first film franchise ever to surpass $30 billion worldwide. While the comic book giant has delivered an unprecedented string of blockbusters across 33 films over 15 years, more recent entries like “Eternals,” “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” and “The Marvels” haven’t done as well at the box office. Part of the problem is that since the launch of the Disney+ streaming service, the studio has overwhelmed viewers with countless spinoffs, sequels and TV series on the big and small screens. In response, Disney CEO Bob Iger said the MCU is trying to scale back its production. Due to last year’s strike and other delays, “Deadpool & Wolverine” is Marvel Studios’ only movie of 2024 — the first time that’s happened since 2012’s “The Avengers.”

“The pandemic hasn’t slowed down the biggest superhero titles,” says David A. Gross of film consulting firm Franchise Entertainment Research, pointing to the big hits of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” ($1.91 billion), “Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness” ($956 million), “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” ($859 million) and “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” ($846 million). Still, Gross adds, “lesser-known, newer films have suffered.” So it’s a good thing the MCU has familiar names on its upcoming call lists. Over the weekend, the studio announced at Comic Con that “Iron Man” star Robert Downey Jr. will return to play villain Victor Von Doom in 2026’s “Avengers: Doomsday.”

This summer also marks a return to form for Disney, which has long been one of Hollywood’s dominant studios but stumbled in 2023 with a string of underperforming blockbusters including “Indiana Jones and the Game of Thrones,” “The Haunted Mansion” and “Wish.” So far in 2024, “Inside Out 2” has surpassed “Frozen 2” to become the highest-grossing animated film of all time with $1.5 billion, while “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” is approaching $400 million worldwide. “Alien: Romulus” could deliver another win for the Magic Kingdom in August.

With nearly every theater devoted to “Deadpool & Wolverine,” last weekend’s No. 2 film “Twisters” dropped to No. 2. The disaster epic, starring Glen Powell, Daisy Edgar-Jones and Anthony Ramos, took in $35.3 million, down 57 percent from its debut. “Twisters” has now grossed $154.9 million in North America and $221 million worldwide.

Elsewhere, films still in the works rounded out the box office charts. In third place was Universal/Illumination’s “Despicable Me 4,” which added $14.2 million in its fourth weekend. The sequel has now grossed $290.9 million domestically and $677 million worldwide. “Inside Out 2” took fourth place with $8.3 million in its seventh weekend, bringing its domestic total to $613.4 million.

The horror film “Longlegs” took fifth place with $6.7 million, bringing its North American total to $58 million. It now holds the top spot as Neon’s highest-grossing film of all time, surpassing the Oscar-winning “Parasite” which grossed $53.36 million in North America.