Here we are. Phase one all over again for a fresh cinematic universe adapted from the pages of comic books. DC’s extended universe — or Snyderverse, or whatever fans choose to label it — completed with 15 features plus a fan-demanded Justice League miniseries. There were some big early successes, but a string of failures put an end to the timeline and opened the way for James Gunn to take the reins and create the opening salvo in the “Gods and Monsters” phase of the rebranded DC Universe. That salvo opened this weekend hoping to be the first success story. The world does not need another Dark Universe.
King of the Crop: James Gunn’s Superman Takes Flight with $122 Million Debut
Thankfully, Dark Universe this is not. At least for now. A debut of $122 million for James Gunn’s Superman is the third-best start of 2025 and would have been the third-best start of the Extended Universe entries behind David Ayer’s Suicide Squad, which opened with $133.6 million, and Zack Snyder’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, which began with $166 million and introduced Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman. That movie also sunk like a stone and ultimately failed to earn even double its opening weekend. But we’re onto a new era now.
Fans will certainly not appreciate any Marvel comparisons, so let’s just start by saying this is the 55th-best opening of all time. Only six films have ever opened to over $110 million and failed to reach $300 million. Three of them were of the Twilight Saga. The other three belong to Warner Bros.: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, and Man of Steel (speaking of comparisons DC fans don’t want to see).
We are at nearly 40 years of Superman on the big screen since Richard Donner and Christopher Reeve truly made us believe a man could fly in 1978. That film, adjusted for inflation, would have opened to about $36.8 million and finished with over $663 million domestic. Superman II adjusts to a $49.8 million start and a $382+ million finish. The addition of Richard Pryor in Superman III would make for a $43 million start and $193+ million finish. The Reeve era would end with Superman IV: The Quest for Peace in 1987 with an adjusted $16 million start and $44+ million finish. Bryan Singer’s Superman Returns in 2006 would equate to $83.7 million and $319 million. And finally, Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel 12 years later would be more like $160+ million and a finish of over $401 million.
The reported budget for Gunn’s Superman was $225 million, the same cost as Snyder’s Man of Steel, which actually started in 2013 with $116.6 million and finished its run with $291 million domestic and $668 million worldwide. It was one of the DC Extended Universe’s successes, as was Batman v Superman. The 2025 Superman has made an additional $95 million on the international side for a current total of $217 million. Man of Steel began its first four days with over $71 million (or $97.9 million) worldwide. So, inflation aside, the numbers are very similar, and that could be deemed a positive start. It should have no problem hanging on to the top spot for another week before Marvel tries to turn its own fortunes around with the new Fantastic Four on July 25. Superman should have its presence on the box office chart through at least Labor Day weekend. We’ll see how it progresses the rest of July, but we may be very close to crowning Lilo & Stitch as the summer’s champion.
Tales of the top 10: Jurassic World Rebirth Adds $40 Million, Lilo & Stitch Inches Towards $1 Billion Worldwide
Another early challenger for the summer crown, Jurassic World: Rebirth in its second weekend took an expected tumble down to $40 million, a 57% drop. That brings its 19-day domestic total to $232.1 million, which is 62nd all time. Fallen Kingdom is 35th with $286.1 million and Dominion is 41st with $266 million. Those films had respective second weekends of $60 million and $59.1 million, though Rebirth can take some solace in the fact that only three films have ever failed to reach $300 million after making over $225 million in 12 days. All three — again, the Twilight films. These numbers have Rebirth trending behind Suicide Squad’s pace, though, which had $233.8 million after 12 days and a $43.5 million second weekend. We’re going to set Rebirth’s final total in the $310-320 million region. Globally the film has already at $529 million.
Apple, Warner Bros., Brad Pitt and Joseph Kosinski’s F1: The Movie added $13 million in its third weekend. We’re up to $136.2 million in 17 days now, behind the pace of The Karate Kid reboot in 2010 ($135.7 million) and Batman Forever ($135.3 million), which made $15.6 million and $15.5 million, respectively, in their third weekends. Karate Kid finished with over $176 million domestic, so F1 is pacing below that and possibly coming in with less than $170 million. Yes, it will be the fourth-highest grossing film for Brad Pitt after World War Z ($202.3 million), Mr. & Mrs. Smith ($186.3 million), and Ocean’s Eleven ($183.4 million). It also has passed Seven’s international haul ($227.1 million) with $257.2 million, behind only WWZ, M&M Smith, and Troy. But will those numbers add up together for F1 to be declared a success? That depends on whether the budget is $200 million or closer to $300 million as originally indicated. It may take some funny accounting and optimistically written box office stories for that to be the case, but with $393+ million total, it is going to make a run at half a billion.
Universal’s live-action remake of How To Train Your Dragon is right on track for our estimate of $250-260 million. Another $7.8 million in its fifth weekend brings it up to $239.8 million. It is still ahead of the pace of Transformers: Age of Extinction, which posted $4.7 million in its fourth weekend and had $236.4 million. It is now over $560 million worldwide. Disney/Pixar’s Elio, on the other hand, is down to $3.9 million in its fourth week. The lowest gross achieved by Pixar after 24 days in its entire history was A Bug’s Life with $83.4 million, and it was only in two theaters for its first five days. The Good Dinosaur is the only other film from Pixar to have not reached $100 million by now. Elio’s total gross stands at $63.6 million domestic and only $117 million worldwide. WALL-E 2 might be the only thing to draw interest in the animated sci-fi genre at this point.
Danny Boyle’s 28 Years Later finished in sixth this week with $2.73 million, bringing its 24-day total to $65.7 million and $138.3 million globally. Depending on its final P&A costs, the film is approaching profitability. How the film’s domestic dropoff will affect numbers for The Bone Temple in January is another story. Lilo & Stitch, meanwhile, in its eighth week in the top 10 added $2.70 million to its global-leading (non-Ne Zha 2) haul, which is now at $994 million; $414.6 million of that is on the domestic side. Hopes of catching A Minecraft Movie locally are near moot, but depending on how Superman plays out, it could lay claim to being the biggest film of the summer season.
How badly does Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning want to reach $200 million? Well, what film doesn’t? It is certainly trying to hang around, and it needs to get ahead of the pace of Captain America: Brave New World to make that happen. Marvel grossed $1.35 million for that film in its eighth weekend, bringing its total just over $199 million. Final Reckoning barely beat that number with $1.4 million, but it is still about $5 million behind Brave New World’s pace, which did lose over 1,300 theaters in weekend nine when five new releases hit theaters. The Final Reckoning lost 413 this weekend and faces three new releases on Friday that will likely knock it out of the top 10 and put it somewhere in the $195-199 million domestic range. Globally the film is over $570 million.
Down to ninth place is M3GAN 2.0 with $1.3 million. That brings its domestic total to $22.3 million. As a reminder, the first film opened in January 2023 to $23.4 million in its first two days. Globally the sequel has made just $34 million. Domestically the original made $30.4 million in its opening weekend and over $180 million worldwide. Pandemic years of 2020-21 aside, here are some of the worst drop-offs for sequels in the 2000s:
Basic Instinct 2 (-94.93%), Unbroken: Path to Redemption (-94.65%), Daddy Day Camp (-87.68%), Orphan: First Kill (-86.49%), Son of the Mask (-85.81%), The Girl in the Spider’s Web (-85.52%), T2: Trainspotting (-85.43%), Joker: Folie a Deux (-82.76%), Sin City: A Dame to Kill For (-81.43%), Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 (-81.19%), The Marvels (-80.21%), Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd (-79.34%), Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights (-78.07%), Alice Through the Looking Glass (-77.03%), M3GAN 2.0 (-76.54%), Hot Tub Time Machine 2 (-75.51%), My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 (-75.28%), The X-Files: I Want to Believe (-74.99%), Book Club: The Next Chapter (-74.36%), Inferno (-74.25%)
On the flipside of that equation, Celine Song’s Materialists has now grossed more than three times her debut, Past Lives. Another $720,000 to close out its run in the top 10 has the film at $35.1 million, and it is now the seventh-highest grossing film in A24 history. Their release of Eva Victor’s Sorry, Baby was expanded to 40 theaters this weekend, and it grossed $230,000. It has made a total of $600,000 in 17 days. Embeth Davidtz’s directorial debut, Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight, opened to $37,000 in four theaters.
On the Vine: I Know What You Did Last Summer, Eddington, and Smurfs
The summer of horror sequels continue with the reboot of I Know What You Did Last Summer. This is a literal 28 years later from the last time we saw one of these in theaters (there have been direct-to-video films and even an Amazon series) and certainly the first to feature Jennifer Love Hewitt and Freddie Prinze Jr. returning and hoping to survive one more time. Newcomers next week also includes Ari Aster’s latest contribution to our social horror landscape, Eddington, with Joaquin Phoenix, Pedro Pascal, and Emma Stone squaring off during the pandemic. Also, for something a little more family friendly, Paramount has taken Smurfs off of Sony’s hands and is putting them back in theaters for the first time since 2017, turning it into a musical with Rihanna as Smurfette.
Full List of Box Office Results: July 11-13, 2025
- Superman – $122.0 million ($122.0 million total)
- Jurassic World: Rebirth – $40.0 million ($232.1 million total)
- F1: The Movie – $13.0 million ($136.2 million total)
- How To Train Your Dragon – $7.8 million ($239.8 million total)
- Elio – $3.9 million ($63.6 million total)
- 28 Years Later – $2.73 million ($65.7 million total)
- Lilo & Stitch – $2.70 million ($414.6 million total)
- Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning – $1.4 million ($194.0 million total)
- M3GAN 2.0 – $1.3 million ($22.3 million total)
- Materialists – $720,000 ($35.1 million total)
Erik Childress can be heard each week evaluating box office on Business First AM with Angela Miles and his Movie Madness Podcast.
Thumbnail image by ©Universal Pictures
