The Amazing Spider-Man 2 has already made $47 million and it's not even scheduled to open in the United States until next weekend. While fans might complain about this business model, the numbers on almost any box office releases (hit or flop) point towards international markets being a higher grossing component of a domestic production. If you want your movie to get a nice jump start towards the billion dollar club, you give it a healthy running start internationally.The Avengers Age of Ultron knows this truth, and has planned accordingly.
Coming Soon confirmed that Marvel Studios has announced the release date of April 24th, 2015 for The Avengers: Age of Ultron. The United Kingdom and Ireland are the only two countries slated for that release date, but more will be announced in the future. The good news for domestic audiences is that it's only a week's delay between the early international release and the May 1st domestic release. The bad news is in that week a lot of spoilers and memes can form around important plot devices. One stray fan rant and the entire United States will know that Ultron is secretly Tony Stark's father.
On top of international grosses being a bigger piece of each film's pie, there is the fact that films like Age of Ultron tend to film in a lot of international locations. Tax breaks are a good incentive for film productions to set up production in certain locations, and early release rights seem like a good faith trade off to keep studios coming back for business. Keeping that rationale in mind, it's a safe bet that we'll hear South Korea and South Africa joining the list of early release venues rather shortly. (Which makes us wonder, does Agents of SHIELD have corresponding air dates with the international release dates?)
The wait is indeed the hardest part. The one week between releases will seem as lengthy as the two years it took to lead up to the actual film itself. The Avengers: Age of Ultron opens in the UK and Ireland on April 24th, and in the United States on May 1st. To continue to tease the audience a little more, we're sharing the sneak peek footage from Marvel's behind the scenes special Assembling A Universe. Just what is Tony Stark working on in the lab, and is it connected to the (SPOILER ALERT) experiments Hydra is doing on Quicksilver and Scarlett Witch?
