This weekend sees the Marvel Studios box office behemoth Deadpool & Wolverine crossing the magic $1 billion worldwide threshold, making it the second-biggest movie of 2024 and the second-biggest R-rated movie of all time. Here is a look at where the film will rank with the rest of Marvel Studios $1 billion blockbusters.
Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman star in “Deadpool & Wolverine.”
Deadpool and Wolverine should sit at about $1.03 billion after its third weekend, enough to put it in shooting distance of Joker’s 2019 $1.078 billion cume, which it will inevitably pass in the coming days. I’ll have more about that this weekend too, so be sure to check back for that story.
Marvel Studios has been around for 17 summer movie seasons now, with 34 live-action films released under the MCU banner, including Deadpool & Wolverine (the first film of the Deadpool or X-Men franchises to officially take place within the MCU).
Of those 34 movies, 11 will have topped $1 billion after this weekend is over. That’s an impressive percentage, especially when you consider Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness scored $955.8 million in 2022, while both Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2 and Vol. 3, as well as Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, all topped $845 million.
Notice, too, how many of those films — as well as Deadpool & Wolverine and Spider-Man: No Way Home — released in the Covid era. Marvel took their lumps like everyone else with the box office shutdowns and evolving audience tastes/expectations, but the constant media and fan chatter as if Marvel was really suffering any significant downturn was always silly hyperbole.
Deadpool & Wolverine is here to help drive that point home, flying up the MCU charts like a Fastball Special and setting the stage for the upcoming highly anticipated releases including Captain America: Brave New World, Fantastic Four: First Steps, and the two likely universe-resetting sequels Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars.
Deadpool and Wolverine return in Avengers: Secret Wars, where they’ll face enemies including a Doctor Doom portrayed by none other than Robert Downey Jr. himself.
Four of the MCU’s $1 billion toppers were of course the studio’s immensely popular superhero team-up Avengers movies, plus team-ups like the Avengers-adjacent Captain America: Civil War and Spider-Men/Spider-Villains team-up Spider-Man: No Way Home. And let’s not forget that Iron Man 3 played like an Avengers epilogue.
The only only solo super-outings to join Marvel’s billion dollar club are Black Panther, Captain Marvel, and Spider-Man: Far From Home.
Deadpool & Wolverine arrives to prove the team-ups rule, becoming the seventh team-up film on the list this weekend in the #11 position.
- Avengers: Endgame – $2.8 billion (#2 on the all-time box office list)
- Avengers: Infinity War – $2 billion (#6 on the all-time box office list)
- Spider-Man: No Way Home – $1.9 billion (#7 on the all-time box office list)
- The Avengers – $1.5 billion (#11 on the all-time box office list)
- The Avengers: Age of Ultron – $1.4 billion (#16 on the all-time box office list)
- Black Panther – $1.37 billion (#7 on the all-time box office list)
- Iron Man 3 – $1.2 billion (#26 on the all-time box office list)
- Captain America: Civil War – $1.55 billion (#28 on the all-time box office list)
- Spider-Man: Far From Home – $1.132 billion (#31 on the all-time box office list)
- Captain Marvel – $1.131 billion (#32 on the all-time box office list)
- Deadpool & Wolverine – $1+ billion (estimated by close of business Sunday, between #47-50 on the all-time box office list)
Deadpool & Wolverine should be able to pass Captain Marvel and Spider-Man: Far From Home and secure the 9th position on the list within the next couple of weeks.
Longterm, however, I don’t think Deadpool & Wolverine is destined to move any higher on this particular chart, since Captain America: Civil War’s $1.55 billion will probably remain out of reach even if the Deadpool sequel overperforms at twice the expected level.
I think at this point it looks likely Deadpool & Wolverine will end its run somewhere in the realm of about $1.2-1.25 billion, with the high-end “overperformance” being perhaps $1.3 billion. We’ll see how much the film forces a reevaluation in the next couple of weeks.
But wherever it winds up, it’s already a mind-blowing outcome that’s rewritten the record books and proven Marvel Studios is not only back on top of the live-action box office, but can even play there with R-rated releases.
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