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‘Joker’ Nears $900 Million As DC Films Vs. Marvel Rivalry Becomes A Fair Fight (Box Office)

This article is more than 4 years old.

Joker earned another $1.88 million yesterday, rising 15% from Wednesday and dropping 22% from last Thursday. That brings its domestic cume up to $285.68 million in 28 days of release. Presuming it has maintained its 32.6%/67.4% domestic/overseas split, the $60 million, R-rated DC Films flick has now earned $590.6 million overseas and $876.3 million worldwide. The film should pass $600 million overseas today or tomorrow, while it passes Man of Steel’s $291 million domestic gross this weekend and makes a play at topping $900 million worldwide by Sunday. When passes Spider-Man: Homecoming ($880 million in 2017) and Spider-Man 3 ($890 million in 2007) over the weekend, it’ll be the eighth-biggest solo comic book movie ever, in unadjusted global grosses.

It’ll soon be behind The Dark Knight ($1.004 billion in 2008), The Dark Knight Rises ($1.081 billion in 2012), Captain Marvel ($1.128 billion in 2019), Spider-Man: Far from Home ($1.131 billion in 2019), Aquaman ($1.148 billion in 2018), Iron Man 3 ($1.215 billion in 2013) and Black Panther ($1.346 billion in 2018). Yes, I’m counting Captain America: Civil War ($1.153 billion in 2016) as an ensemble film, since it’s arguably either Avengers 2.5 or a glorified Captain America 3/Iron Man 4 combo sequel. Looking at those eight titles, you’ll notice that four of them are DC Comics adaptations and four of them are MCU movies. Two of the four DC flicks are Chris Nolan Batman sequels, but they also made their money, like Joker, without 3-D and little help from China. 

The Dark Knight Rises did earn $52 million in China in 2012, but that’s tiny compared to the recent Chinese grosses for the recent batch of solo superhero movies ($154 million for Captain Marvel, $206 million for Spider-Man: Far from Home, $298 million for Aquaman). Spider-Man: Far from Home and Aquaman both used a Chinese boom for solo superhero movies to become the first non-Disney/non-Universal movies to pass $1 billion since mid-2014. Once again, China inflated the global totals of already successful movies in the most successful sub-genre of blockbusters. While Joker presumably won’t play in China (folks using Joker masks during anti-government protests aren’t helping its case), its success shows that, when it comes to solo/non-ensemble superhero flicks, the MCU and DC Films “duel” may be a fair fight.

Prior to Black Panther, the biggest grosses for a non-Iron Man/non-Avengers MCU flick were Guardians of the Galaxy vol. 2. ($869 million) and Thor: Ragnarok ($854 million), all in 2017. Prior to that, there was a slight ceiling on solo MCU movies that didn’t feature Tony Stark, as we saw with Guardians of the Galaxy ($773 million in 2014) and Doctor Strange ($676 million in 2016). Spider-Man: Far from Home earned $880 million in 2017, but that film featured a heavily advertised supporting turn from Robert Downey Jr’s Tony Stark. During this period, it should be noted, the big solo superhero movies (Wonder Woman, Iron Man 3, etc.) were earning between $90 million and $125 million in China. Meanwhile, Pirates of the Caribbean 5 and Kong: Skull Island were pulling over/under $170 million grosses.

One of the biggest advantages the Marvel Cinematic Universe had at the start was beginning their run of movies at a time when a $449 million gross for Thor mad it the biggest ever for a solo superhero movie not starring Batman, Spider-Man or Iron Man, and where a $140 million Captain America movie earning $376 million was an unqualified success just because it made more of its money overseas than domestic. By 2013, Thor: The Dark World was a moderate success at $644 million but Man of Steel, intended to kick off whatever DC Comics had up its sleeves, was a disappointment at $668 million. Man of Steel was positioned to play closer to a Harry Potter movie than a standalone MCU movie, but costs, expectations and a lack of legs complicated the final gross.

Had Batman v Superman been positioned as Man of Steel 2, its $330 million domestic/$873 million global gross would have qualified it as a glorified breakout sequel. But it was pitched as WB’s answer to The Avengers, further designating DC Comics movies as WB’s replacement for the Harry Potter films and the Middle Earth flicks as surefire mega-grossers. Man of Steel, Dawn of Justice, Suicide Squad ($745 million, without China) and Wonder Woman ($821 million) made more money than the Iron Man ($585 million), Incredible Hulk ($267 million for Universal), Iron Man 2 ($623 million), Thor ($449 million) and Captain America ($376 million). Marvel’s five pre-­Avengers movies earned $2.3 billion on a combined $780 million budget, while the four pre-Justice League movies earned $3.07 billion on a combined over/under $800 million budget.

The Avengers’ ridiculous success ($1.519 billion) changed the game, as did Warner Bros.’ hopes for DC Films. In its early days, Marvel wasn’t positioned as Paramount’s savior, as its early successes existed alongside the likes of Transformers, G.I. Joe, the DreamWorks toons and Paranormal Activity. If anything, The Avengers, which was the first MCU film released by Disney after the Mouse House bought Marvel in 2009, essentially “saved” Disney by giving them a ready-made boy-friendly mega-franchise already primed to break out. Had Marvel begun at Disney, considering how their live-action department was struggling to replicate the successes of Pirates of the Caribbean and National Treasure, then Iron Man and Thor likely would have been studio “saviors.” That assumes that Disney would have sold them as well as Paramount did in the late 2000s/early 2010s.

DC’s handicap was that it began after The Avengers and was a must-succeed franchise for the studio. But five years after Marvel made their big Phase Three announcement and Warner Bros. announced ten DC Films flicks between 2016 and 2020, the situation seems a little leveled out. Granted, most of those promised MCU movies actually got made (Inhumans went to TV, which seemed likely even at the time), while DC Films fans are still waiting on The Flash, Cyborg, a second Justice League movie and Green Lantern Corps (which will apparently now be an HBO Max show). If you take China out of the equation for a moment, then the solo superhero movies from Marvel and DC Films are about on par with each other in terms of global grosses.

Aquaman’s non-China gross ($857 million) is about on par with Captain Marvel’s non-China gross ($972 million) which is about on par with Spider-Man: Far from Home’s non-China gross ($925 million) which is about on par with wherever Joker is going to end up. For that matter, Fox’s Deadpool movies earned $783 million in 2016 and (not counting Once Upon a Deadpool) $735 million in 2018 without China, although China’s $269 million gross was clearly a clincher for Venom in terms of top-tier box office. If all four of those franchises, Warner Bros.’ DC Films, Fox’s Marvel, Sony’s Spider-Verse and Disney’s MCU, were separate, I’d feel more optimistic for a theatrical future predicated on future superhero hits. But, thanks to Disney buying Fox and making a deal to split Spider-Man, Disney now partially owns 3/4 of those.

To the extent that neither side needs to “win,” how will Birds of Prey, Wonder Woman 1984, The Batman and The Suicide Squad compare to Black Widow, Eternals, Shang-Chi, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (god, I love that title), Spider-Man 3 and Thor: Love and Thunder? Will Venom 2 be a breakout sequel or a “We were only curious last time” underperformer, and what exactly is Deadpool’s future within the Disney empire? As Joker nears $900 million while Marvel’s Captain Marvel and DC Films’ Aquaman can pass $1.1 billion global, the DC vs. Marvel competition has settled into a measured peace. The “good” news is that neither Marvel nor DC destroyed each other. The bad news is that they destroyed almost every other kind of theatrical blockbuster in their wake.

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