Spider-Man: No Way Home Is Ruling The Box Office And How

Its box office sales trail only 2019's Avengers: Endgame

Sony and Marvel's new Spider-Man: No Way Home scored the third-biggest domestic opening of all time, taking in an estimated $253 million in its massive North American weekend opening. Box office watchers are spinning hopeful predictions, with analysts eyeing it as the pandemic era's first potential billion-dollar-grossing film. Its box office sales trail only 2019's Avengers: Endgame ($357 million) and the previous year's Avengers: Infinity War($258 million), according to the BoxOfficeMojo website. Spider-Man easily surpassed early estimates of $130-150 million.

The new superhero blockbuster is well on its way to earning $600 million overseas, industry watcher Exhibitor Relations reported Sunday. And this comes as theaters continue to battle their way back from months-long Covid-induced closures.

"This is an incredible opening," David A. Gross, who runs Franchise Entertainment Research, told AFP. While most big series struggle to keep their momentum, he added, Spider-Man is exploding."

Analysts, however, are warning that the industry's recovery still has a long way to go, especially amid fears of a new surge in coronavirus cases fueled by the Omicron variant. The latest Spider-Man installment is British star Tom Holland's third solo outing in the wildly popular role, played in earlier films by Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield.