After a rare mid-summer weekend at the box office without a new wide release, moviegoers are gobbling up the chance to see Tom Holland and Zendaya return to the big screen for Sony Pictures‘ Spider-Man: Brand New Day.
Marvel Studios‘ latest offering caught a staggering $72 million from Thursday previews on 4,300 North American screens. This sets the record for a previews sum, topping the $60 million that Avengers: Endgame took in 2019 before it scored the top marks for its opening weekend with $357.1 million domestically and an unbelievable $1.2 billion globally.
Needless to say, Thursday’s tally gives the web-slinger by far the year’s biggest previews total. Universal’s The Odyssey had previously led the way in 2026 previews with $17.6 million, followed by Toy Story 5 at $17.5 million and Michael with $12.6 million. Both Toy Story 5 and Michael have surpassed the billion-dollar mark globally, while The Odyssey is well on its way to hitting that milestone, having crossed $700 million earlier this week.
The last Spidey movie to hit the big screen was Spider-Man: No Way Home, which collected $50 million in Thursday previews when it opened in December 2021. Its opening weekend notched $260.1 million domestically and $587.2 million worldwide. At the time, No Way Home’s commercial success — culminating with its $1.9 billion global total for No. 8 all-time — appeared to be anomalous, given the surprise appearance of previous Peter Parkers in Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield, along with the lack of major theatrical competition coming out of COVID.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day
Jay Maidment/Sony Pictures
This blistering start for Spider-Man: Brand New Day suggests an opening weekend far beyond the $195 million domestic and $465 million global that the studio had been projecting. Even a domestic opening at $195 million would have put the film among the top 10 all-time debuts, and now the only question is how high it might climb on the chart. It carries a $225 million production budget.
Sadie Sink, Jacob Batalon, Jon Bernthal and Mark Ruffalo also star in Destin Daniel Cretton‘s feature. It centers on the eponymous hero living a lonely existence without his loved ones before an invisible enemy tracks him down.
Moviegoers have been impressed, as Brand New Day holds a 90 percent approval rating from reviewers on Rotten Tomatoes, along with a 98 percent audience score. In his review for The Hollywood Reporter, chief film critic David Rooney heralded “a never-better Tom Holland.”
Also opening in wide release this weekend is filmmaker Gregg Araki‘s I Want Your Sex, starring Olivia Wilde and Cooper Hoffman. Magnolia Pictures releases the comedic thriller in 700 North American theaters after acquiring the movie in a reported seven-figure deal following its Sundance premiere.
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