Box Office

‘Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse’ Scores the Second-Biggest Debut of the Year at the BO!!

When Paramount lost Marvel to Disney, any even distribution of franchises among the major studios was disrupted. However, Sony’s reported $7M acquisition of Marvel’s Spider-Man franchise back in 1998 has continued to immensely pay off, no more evident than this weekend, as Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse posted an exceptional and $120.5M opening — one which tracking didn’t see coming, but exhibition did in advance ticket sales– making it the best start for a summer tentpole YTD (beating Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3‘s $118.4M) and the third-best opening for a Spider-Man movie (after No Way Home‘s $260.1M and Spider-Man 3‘s $151.1M). Global start here for Spider-Verse is $208.6M, well above the $150M we forecast, with China delivering $17.3M.

Among all animated pic domestic openings, Spider-Verse is sixth behind Incredibles 2 ($182.6M), Super Mario Bros ($146.3M), Finding Dory ($135M), Frozen 2 ($130.2M) and Toy Story 4 ($120.9M). The Marvel sequel reps the best start ever for Sony Animation.

Talk about growth in dollars and growth in audience for a subset of a major superhero franchise. But Across the Spider-Verse‘s domestic opening here is 241% ahead of the first movie, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse‘s $35.3M. Reports EntTelligence on admissions this morning for Spider-Verse: “The film is estimated to pull in well over 9M patrons this weekend.  (Aside from Super Mario, this is the most attended three-day period for a film since last summer)”. It’s also a remarkable opening for an animated movie which is at an ungodly length of 2 hours and 20 minutes.

After Super Mario Bros delivered a huge Easter, look out for next year’s holiday, because that’s when part three of this Sony Animation franchise, Beyond The Spider-Verse, hits on March 29.

Sony knew this movie was always a linchpin for them, and have been shouting from the rooftops about it since CinemaCon April 2022. That’s when they showed off the first 15 minutes of the movie to exhibition — and that’s after they moved the release date from Oct. 7 last year to this weekend because of the Covid post-production logjam.

Producers Phil Lord and Chris Miller, as well as filmmakers Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, and Justin K. Thompson, attempted a whole new animation style that would one-up the previous installment, which earned an Oscar for Best Animated Film. There’s no words to describe it, but it’s not rotoscoping. However, it has something to do with character lighting (reflecting different Spideys onscreen feelings) and redrawing over images, again to harken back to the look of the original Spider-Man comics.

Highlights of Sony’s campaign (arguably what will be their biggest movie of 2023) includes assembling a “Spider Society Ambassador Program.” What’s that? A program that recruited 200 celebrities, influencers, and fans across the globe into tubthumping the sequel to an audience of 994M. This included such people as Bad Bunny, Guillermo del Toro, Steph Curry, Rihanna, Beyonce, Tiffany Haddish, Priyanka and Nick Jonas. Highlights of how the studio rolled that out below:

 

Three promo partners created animated spots or custom created animated content. That included Burger King, Nike and Hyundai. Partners also spent over $20 million in outdoor media across the globe.

Nike/Jordan Brand took the Jordan Brand and merged its iconic style with Miles Morales. In the film, Miles wears both classic AJ1 shoes and a newly designed AJ1 HI OG “Next Chapter” shoe, which the Jordan Brand released limited editions for purchase. Those sold out within the hour of launch. They also purchased key billboards, including a 3D board in Times Square, and created an outdoor and digital campaign featuring Metro Boomin and his siblings.

The animated pic had an auto partner, which is unheard of with Hyundai Motors. Sony Pictures’ strategic car partner implemented a multi-dimensional marketing campaign across 25 markets. Filmmakers and Hyundai design teams teamed to create and integrate future mobility systems in the film’s 2099 Nueva York, and depict a flying version of Hyundai Motor’s Prophecy concept EV for the film. Sony Pictures and Hyundai Motor also collaborated on a brand new, animated TV commercial that featured Spider-Man, IONIQ 6, and IONIQ 5, with new music from the soundtrack. Hyundai did stunted executions in many markets. In the Shibuya area of Tokyo they dominated the area by purchasing 13 separate billboards. In London and Seoul they created an experiential build.

Burger King created a Spider-Verse meal featuring a red bun with black seeds, custom packaging, and a Kids Meal program. They have also transformed six locations around the world into the world of Spider-Verse, including fully re-theming select locations. The red bun launched on May 15 and within the week in the US, all major cities sold out of the bun.

Fortnight and Free Fire were the sequel’s digital gaming partners, reaching more than 400 million players per month. Their programs included custom skins of the pic, character inclusion, and clips from the film.

Sony teamed with Amazon to create a Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse Alexa Theme Pack, in which Miles Morales is dropped into the “Alexa-verse.” Once enabled on an Alexa device, the Spider-Verse theme pack featured customized prompts with Spider-Man related responses, visuals, and audio bites from the movie, a 3D Miles Morales avatar, an AR video call Spider-Man mask, and a scan-for-tickets QR function.

Broadcast cross-promos included turning ESPN SportsCenter into “Spider-Center,” as NFL 49er George Kittle and ESPN’s Stan Verrett and Ashley Brew competed over who was the #1 Spider-Man fan.

On Cartoon Network, Spider-Mania took over, as kids amped up to see the pic were donning their Spider-gear, showing off Spider-abilities, etc.

There was an enormous outdoor advertising campaign around the globe, including, but not limited to, dynamic 3D anamorphic large-format digital screens showing Miles and Gwen breaking the plain and traversing through the Spider-Verse:

The sequel’s second trailer at the time of its drop clocked the most for a summer film with 148.6 million views in a 24-hour period, beating Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (116.9 million) and The Flash (81.6 million). It was also the highest-viewed second trailer for all recent Marvel films in a 24-hour period.

Updated diagnostics on Spider-Verse: an A CinemaScore (surprise, surprise), which still isn’t bad next to Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse‘s A+. An 82% definite recommendation from Comscore/Screen Engine PostTrak audiences is bigger than Spider-Man: Far Away From Home, Minions: Rise of Gru, and Sonic the Hedgehog, among others. Top cities were LA, NYC, Dallas, San Francisco and Chicago. Top theaters (for 2 day grosses) were AMC Burbank ($253K), AMC Empire NYC ($246K), AMC Century City ($225K), AMC Lincoln Square NYC ($221K), AMC Orange CA ($200K), and the Irvine Spectrum ($190K).

Saturday came in at $37.4M for Spider-Verse, -28% from Friday/previews’ $51.85M (revised), with Sunday factored at $31.25M. The movie played solid throughout all dayparts, per EntTelligence, with 31% of the traffic between 1 p.m.-5 p.m., 29% between 5 p.m.-8 p.m., and 23% after 8 p.m. Combined PLFs and Imax drove 33% of the weekend. Imax delivered $20M WW for Spider-Verse which reps the third-highest worldwide start for a Sony movie in Imax ever, and the second-highest animated pic opening of all-time for Imax behind Super Mario Bros’ $21M. Some 401 Imax U.S./Canada screens delivered $13.5M, or 11.2% of the weekend opening.

“’With Spider-Verse, the film’s incredible creative team and Sony have created one of the most visually dazzling franchises in cinema, and we are excited to see audiences overwhelmingly choose IMAX to experience it,” said Rich Gelfond, CEO of Imax, in a statement. “Both from Hollywood and thriving international film industries like Japan, animation has emerged as a powerful engine of growth for our global box office, and we are focused on capitalizing on this opportunity as filmmakers continue to raise the bar for the genre.”

The top five Sony Imax openings are all from Spider-Man movies, with Spider-Verse joining Spider-Man: No Way Home, Far From Home, Homecoming and The Amazing Spider-Man.

Chart below—Fathom title popped into the top 10 after a one-night-only play, pushing Open Road/Briarcliff Entertainment’s Kandahar to No. 11 with $765K.

1) Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (Sony) 4,313 theaters, Fri $51.8M, Sat $37.4M Sun $31.25M 3-day $120.5M/Wk 1

2.) The Little Mermaid (Dis) 4,320 theaters, Fri $11.8M (-69%) Sat $16.2M Sun $12.6M 3 day $40.6M (-57%) Total $186.2M/Wk 2

3.) The Boogeyman (20th/Dis) 3,205 theaters, Fri $4.8M, Sat $4.4M Sun $3.1m 3-day $12.3M/Wk 1

4.) Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (Dis) 3,580 (-360) theaters, Fri $2.9M (-48%), Sat $4.4M Sun $2.9M 3-day $10.2M (-51%) Total $322.7M/ Wk 5

5.) Fast X (Uni) 3,467 (-621) theaters Fri $2.6M (-59%) Sat $3.8M Sun $2.7M 3-day $9.2M (-60%) Total $128.4M/ Wk 3

6.) Super Mario Bros (Uni) 2,344 (-804) theaters, Fri $940K Sat $1.38M Sun $1M 3-day $3.35M (-48%), Total $566.2M/Wk 9

7.) About My Father (LG) 2,464 theaters, Fri $576K, Sat $883K Sun $641K 3-day $2.1M (-51%), Total $8.8M/Wk 2

8.) The Machine (Sony/Leg) 2,409 theaters, Fri $535K (-76%), Sat $700K Sun $515K 3 day $1.75M (-65%) Total $8.7M/ Wk 2

9.) SUGA-Agust D Tour ‘D-Day’ in Japan: Live VI (Fathom) Sat $1.24M/Wk 1

10.) You Hurt My Feelings (A24) 912 theaters Fri $195,7K (-59%) Sat $318K Sun $255K 3-day $769K (-45%), Total $3/Wk 2

 

Leave a Reply