If you’ve been paying attention to the movie world at all over the last few years, you already know that Marvel has had a solid run as of late. They have two of the top five grossing movies of all time, and three of the top ten, and while it probably won’t reach quite that high, their next endeavor, Ant-Man, looks like it is on track to be yet another big hit.
Ant-Man may be tiny, but he packs quite a wallop, and while the film is on a smaller scale than the likes of Avengers: Age of Ultron and the upcoming Captain America: Civil War (where Ant-Man also appears), the movie is also on track to pack quite a punch. According to The Hollywood Reporter, tracking services predict the movie could earn as much as $65 million over the course of its opening weekend.
While there is humor in most of Marvel’s movies, early reviews and reactions indicate that the Paul Rudd-starring Ant-Man is much more of a comedy than most of its fellows. And these numbers put it in the same league as the first Thor movie and Captain America: The First Avenger, which opened to similar hauls.
In the comics, Ant-Man is one of the original Avengers, and he’s played an integral part in that side of things for decades, appearing in countless notable storylines and arcs and titles. That said, he’s not the biggest name among casual fans, so some have wondered how that will translate to the movie world. But as usual, Marvel’s marketing machine has been working overtime, cranking out TV spots, clips, images, trailers, and more, so probably don’t have too much to worry about.
Last year they took what, on the surface, seemed like a risk with Guardians of the Galaxy. For a movie that revolves around a bunch of weird looking deep space outlaws, led by a relatively unknown, untested actor most recognized for a supporting role on a soon-to-be-cancelled sitcom, where the two biggest stars only appear as voices, the gamble paid off huge. Not only did the movie earn $774 million worldwide, it launched Chris Pratt to leading man status, spawned a new franchise, and gave the MCU a cool new dimension that it lacked before.
Will Ant-Man be that kind of a success? Probably not, but we know that the character is going to appear in multiple other films in the MCU, starting with the superhero-laden Civil War, and if it has a solid opening, this could easily be something that Marvel builds upon moving forward, which could lead to big things in the future.
We’ll see for ourselves how Ant-Man performs at the box office when it opens everywhere in a couple weeks on July 17.
