‘Wonder Woman’ Has Strongest Superhero Box Office Hold In 15 Years

Justice League Gal Gadot Wonder Woman Joss Whedon

Wonder Woman continues to blow expectations away as the film looks to have one of the strongest opening weekend multipliers for a superhero movie since 2002’s monster hit Spider-Man.

The Hollywood Reporter recently made the observation that the unstoppable Wonder Woman is doing incredibly well. The film is expected to end its groundbreaking box office run with upwards of $390M domestically. That would put it at least at an 3.8X multiplier compared to its $103M opening weekend, which is incredible considering that the standard multiplier for a superhero movie like this is typically between 2X and 3X. For frame of reference, the original Spider-Man (the first movie to open over $100M) made 3.6X its $114.8M opening and The Dark Knight made 3.4X its $158.4M opening. In fact, there’s actually a chance that Wonder Woman will actually match or surpass the domestic gross of the original Spider-Man and become the highest-grossing origin story movie of all time.

Warner Brothers executive Jeff Goldstein recently issued a statement on the movie’s success:

“It feels like Wonder Woman will play all the way through August. Right now, the movie is still in about 3,000 locations. Usually, the theater count would be a fraction of that at this point.”

Wonder Woman managed to have a strong hold against the debut of Spider-Man: Homecoming last weekend, and because of this it looks like it’s going to pull off a surprise at the box office by topping Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 2 domestically. The movie’s vast overperformance ensures that it will remain the most successful woman-directed picture for years to come, and that studios will be willing to invest more in female superhero movies after the failures of Catwoman and Elektra. More importantly, it should open the door for more female directors to get a shot at working on major tentpole pictures, which would make for an even better legacy than a fantastic box office run.

Wonder Woman is playing in theaters. Its cast includes Gal Gadot as Diana Prince (Wonder Woman), Chris Pine as Steve Trevor, Connie Nielsen as Queen Hippolyta, Robin Wright as General Antiope, Lucy Davis as Etta Candy, David Thewlis as Sir Patrick Morgan, Elena Anaya as Doctor Isabel Maru (Doctor Poison), and Danny Huston as General Erich Ludendorff.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter