Marvel Studios had a great run last year. 2017 was the first time the studio released three films a year as opposed to the two films per year schedule it had stuck with since 2011. The move paid off in spades giving the production giant a record $2.6 billion in worldwide box-office ticket sales. That record however, was not meant to last as Marvel has had an even better 2018 and surpassed $3 billion in global box-office revenues. Moreover, the recently released Avengers: Infinity War has been running with a record-breaking spree and become the highest grossing superhero movie of all time.
Of the three movies set for release this year, Black Panther has amassed $1.35 billion while Avengers: Infinity War has grossed more than $1.85 billion. Combined, the movies have made $3.2 billion in worldwide ticket sales which is $600 million more than last year’s record total. And this is when Infinity War is already running in theaters and will most certainly continue its run for several more weeks and Ant-Man and the Wasp is yet to release. Assuming the sequel makes even $700 million, a real possibility seeing as the first Ant-Man made $519 million, Marvel Studios could top $4 billion in 2018, breaking its own record by a wide margin.
As for Infinity War, that movie is now the biggest superhero movie of all time, surpassing Marvel’s own The Avengers that held the record for six years since 2012. With its current haul, it is also only the fourth highest-grossing movie of all time, right behind James Cameron’s Avatar ($2.8 billion) and Titanic ($2.1 billion) and Lucasfilm’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens ($2 billion). Its current run looks like it has a decent chance of besting Star Wars and Titanic to become the second highest-grossing movie of all time before the next wave of summer movies takes over in June beginning with Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. Domestically, it has amassed $609 million and looks less likely to out-gross the wildly successful Black Panther and its near $700 million run although it could settle somewhere near $650-$675 million which would be an impressive haul in itself by all accounts.
Marvel Studios has been on a roll since the last few years with President Kevin Feige carefully orchestrating a massive buildup leading to the movies of this year. One can only expect greater things from its next year’s slate of movies, especially Captain Marvel and the still untitled Avengers 4, especially if the latter’s recently released plot synopsis is anything to go by. Of course that’s not without its challenges and the biggest challenge Marvel has with its next Avengers movie is to sell it as the culmination of the MCU thus far given that they already used that gimmick in marketing Avengers: Infinity War. Knowing the prolific studio’s marketing chops however, that might not be much of a problem.
Avengers: Infinity War is currently running across theaters now.
