Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is still on course for a $110 million opening weekend after blasting to an awesome $48.2 million on Friday.
Early tracking suggested the threequel would debut with a three-day haul of $130 million, so there are those trying to spin this as an example of "superhero fatigue." The fact is, in this post-pandemic era, tracking has become notoriously unreliable and it takes more to get people to head to the theater than it did in 2019.
That's why only a small handful of movies had topped $1 billion in the last two years, despite the fact that was quickly becoming the norm for most blockbusters and just about every single Marvel Studios movie.
Worth noting is that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 debuted with $47 million on its first Friday and later rocketed to $146.2 million by Sunday.
Some pundits are comparing Vol. 3 to Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania, a release that scored a $106 million opening before being deemed a disappointment by earning less than $500 million worldwide. The difference here, however, is that word-of-mouth for the latest Guardians movie is vastly more positive thanks to an A CinemaScore, a 95% Audience Score on Rotten Tomatoes, and the highest rating of any MCU movie ever on Letterboxd.
Overseas, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 earned $71.5 million in its first three days and ended Friday with a global total of $119.7 million. Needless to say, this should be an interesting weekend to track the movie's progress.
"As heart-wrenching as it is hilarious," we said in our review earlier this week, "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is James Gunn’s masterstroke and a showcase for both his filmmaking talent and a cast that makes everything about this movie simply awesome. An absolute triumph."
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is now playing in theaters.