Deadpool & Wolverine has certainly seemed to breathe new life into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The movie is already a smash hit giving Marvel its best opening weekend in years. But that’s not all it did, as the movie has now pushed the MCU past the $30 billion mark in global box office receipts.
Even before Deadpool & Wolverine had finished its remarkable opening weekend the MCU franchise had crossed the impressive milestone. The newest movie is the 34th in the franchise, meaning that MCU movies have grossed an average of nearly $900 million per film, an average that will only go up as the newest movie continues to rake in the box office dough. It’s an impressive average for any film franchise, and one especially great for one that has been running for over a decade and produced so many movies.
While many of the most recent MCU movies have failed to impress at the box office, some of that is only because we’re comparing them to several movies that made a billion dollars. It’s a good problem to have when your movie only made $400 million at the global box office. Deadpool & Wolverine has already exceeded that, having banked nearly a half billion dollars at the global box office in less than a full week of release.
Based on the way that social media reacted to the Marvel panel at SDCC last weekend, there is clearly a lot of excitement still for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Robert Downey Jr.’s return to the franchise may still be years away, but people are excited to see the Fantastic Four cast on screen, and movies like Captain America: Brave New World and Thunderbolts are getting a lot of positive buzz as well.
At this point the question isn’t if the MCU will break the $40 billion mark, it’s just how many movies it will take to get there. 10 of the MCU’s movies have crossed the $1 billion mark in the global box office, and Deadpool & Wolverine looks like it might become number 11. Even if it doesn’t do quite that well, it’s all but certain to become the highest-grossing of the Deadpool movies and become one of the most successful comic book movies ever.
The end will come for the MCU one day, but it is not today. And even if the MCU never reaches the same heights as Avengers: Endgame, what’s clear is that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been a resounding success. Even if individual movies fail, the successes of others have more than covered those losses. As long as that’s the case, the future of the MCU, and the future of its fans, is looking good.
