Even before Captain America: Civil War was released, the buzz around Marvel’s thirteenth superhero movie was huge. Bringing together existing characters like Captain America himself (Chris Evans), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), and Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), with new additions to the Marvel Cinematic Universe such as Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman) and Spider-Man (Tom Holland), resulted in a large-scaled Team Cap versus Team Iron Man brawl that translated well onto the big screen and garnered rave reviews across the board.
Initial takings were, as predicted, big; as the film smashed opening day and weekend box office records, it was clear Civil War was going to be one of the biggest movies of 2016. And a few short weeks since its release, the third Cap outing directed by Joe and Anthony Russo has continued to race towards the $1 billion mark.
The first of Marvel’s Phase Three movies has now made $940 million worldwide, which has not only made surpassing the goal of a billion dollars a near certainty, it’s also very close to becoming the biggest film of the year (thus far at least, especially with Rogue One: A Star Wars Story heading to cinemas in December). The stats, according to Box Office Mojo, show almost $300 million has been made domestically in the U.S., with an impressive $640 million amassed collectively from international markets like China and the U.K. Should the film remain popular with audiences, it only needs another $30 million to beat Disney’s other success of the year, Zootopia, which is currently on $970 million after its release earlier this year.
In truth, Civil War shouldn’t have any problem crossing the $1 billion mark within a matter of days, so expect it to be the biggest grossing movie of the year by this time next week. It’s certainly no surprise that Marvel’s latest is doing so well; after all, both The Avengers and its sequel Avengers: Age of Ultron topped the milesstone, with $1.5 billion and $1.4 billion, respectively. The success of Civil War appears largely down to 1) the increasing popularity of the Marvel brand, with the idea of ‘superhero fatigue’ proving little more than a myth, and 2) the fact it incorporates so many well-known characters and indeed actors in one single film.
With a number of solo movies on their way, such as Doctor Strange at the tail end of this year and the highly anticipated Black Panther in 2018, there’s every chance these self-contained stories will begin to perform better as we see more of them - it’s certainly a feat the Captain America solo movies have achieved over the years. The next two Avengers films (currently known as Infinity War Parts I and II, but are in the process of name changes) will surely be huge, in terms of both scale and the money it’ll make at the box office.
Where Civil War will finally fall in the box office ranking of MCU films is still unclear, but it’s certainly on its way to becoming one of Marvel’s biggest success stories.
Captain America: Civil War is in theaters now. Doctor Strange opens November 4, 2016; Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 – May 5, 2017; Spider-Man: Homecoming – July 7, 2017; Thor: Ragnarok – November 3, 2017; Black Panther – February 16, 2018; Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 – May 4, 2018;Ant-Man and the Wasp – July 6, 2018; Captain Marvel – March 8, 2019; Avengers: Infinity War Part 2– May 3, 2019; and as-yet untitled Marvel movies on July 12, 2019, and on May 1, July 10, and November 6 in 2020.
Source: Box Office Mojo
