Spider-Man: Brand New Day is about to enter extraordinarily rare territory at the domestic box office, and its blistering pace has now put one of the biggest movies in Hollywood history directly in its sights.
The Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios blockbuster is expected to cross $700 million at the domestic box office on Wednesday, according to Deadline, becoming only the seventh movie in history to reach the milestone.
As of Tuesday, the Destin Daniel Cretton-directed film had accumulated an estimated $671.2 million domestically. Deadline reported that the movie earned nearly $17 million on Monday and expected another substantial haul from Tuesday’s discounted ticket business.
Crossing $700 million would make Brand New Day just the fourth Marvel Cinematic Universe movie to reach that level domestically, joining Avengers: Endgame, Spider-Man: No Way Home, and Black Panther.
But the bigger story may be the pace at which Brand New Day is getting there.
Spider-Man Is Running Far Ahead of Avatar
The original Avatar remains one of the greatest box office success stories Hollywood has ever seen.
James Cameron’s 2009 blockbuster ultimately became the highest-grossing movie in history worldwide and produced one of the most remarkable domestic runs ever recorded.
But Avatar didn’t explode out of the gate like Brand New Day.
It endured.
A screenshot from Avatar: The Way of Water – YouTube, Avatar
According to historical box office data, Avatar had earned $250.4 million domestically after its 12th day in theaters. On Day 13, it earned another $18.5 million, bringing its domestic total to approximately $268.9 million.
By comparison, Spider-Man: Brand New Day had already accumulated approximately $671.2 million through Tuesday.
That means at essentially the same stage of their theatrical runs, Brand New Day is ahead of Avatar by more than $400 million domestically.
Spider-Man Is Also Crushing Avatar’s Worldwide Pace
The comparison becomes even more remarkable when the international box office is included.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day crossed $1 billion at the worldwide box office in just six days. The original Avatar needed 17 days to accomplish the same feat.
After its third weekend in theaters, James Cameron’s blockbuster stood at approximately $1.02 billion worldwide, consisting of $352.1 million domestically and roughly $670 million from international markets.
A screenshot from Avatar: The Way of Water – YouTube, Avatar
That means Brand New Day reached the billion-dollar milestone approximately 11 days faster than the movie that would eventually become the highest-grossing film in history.
And Spider-Man has already reached another staggering milestone.
Brand New Day has now crossed $1 billion from international markets alone after just 12 days of release.
Put another way, Spider-Man has generated roughly as much money outside North America in 12 days as Avatar had generated across the entire planet after 17 days.
The difference was apparent almost immediately.
Avatar generated approximately $241.6 million worldwide through its first five days in release. Brand New Day, by comparison, delivered a roughly $927 million worldwide opening.
That’s nearly four times Avatar’s early worldwide haul.
There’s One Huge Catch
That doesn’t mean Brand New Day is guaranteed to finish ahead of Avatar.
The defining characteristic of Avatar‘s theatrical performance wasn’t its opening. It was its extraordinary staying power.
Avatar opened to $77 million domestically in December 2009 before continuing to generate enormous grosses week after week. It benefited from the Christmas and New Year’s holiday corridor, premium 3D ticket prices, extraordinary word of mouth, and relatively limited competition as audiences continued returning to Pandora.
A screenshot from Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora (2023), Massive Entertainment
That allowed Cameron’s movie to turn what initially looked like a strong blockbuster opening into a historic theatrical phenomenon.
In other words, Brand New Day has built an enormous lead, but Avatar was a marathon runner. The question now is how much of Spider-Man’s lead survives once the movie gets deeper into its theatrical run.
$700 Million Puts Spider-Man Among the Giants
Regardless of where Brand New Day ultimately finishes, crossing $700 million domestically is an achievement reserved for an extraordinarily small collection of movies.
Deadline notes that only six films had previously crossed that threshold at the domestic box office.
Brand New Day will become number seven.
Chadwick Boseman as Black Panther in Captain America: Civil War – Disney+
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It will also move beyond Black Panther, which finished with approximately $700.4 million domestically, leaving only Spider-Man: No Way Home and Avengers: Endgame ahead of it among MCU movies.
No Way Home finished its original domestic run with more than $800 million, while Endgame reached approximately $858 million.
Those numbers suddenly don’t look nearly as untouchable as they once did.
Especially considering how much money Brand New Day has already generated with its third weekend still ahead.
Another Massive Weekend Is Coming
Deadline currently projects Brand New Day to remain comfortably atop the domestic box office during its third weekend with somewhere between $57 million and $72 million.
That would represent a decline of approximately 50% to 60%. For comparison, Avengers: Endgame dropped 57% during its third weekend.
At the upper end of Deadline’s projection, Brand New Day would also challenge Avatar‘s $68.5 million third weekend.
The all-time third-weekend record still belongs to Star Wars: The Force Awakens, which earned approximately $90.2 million. If Brand New Day lands near the top of Deadline’s range, however, it will continue putting enormous pressure on the movies sitting above it on the all-time domestic charts.
Could Spider-Man Actually Catch Avatar?
At this point, the question no longer sounds ridiculous. Brand New Day has already demonstrated that its historic opening wasn’t simply a one-weekend phenomenon.
The movie opened to a record-setting $360 million domestically and has continued accumulating enormous weekday and weekend grosses since then. Now it is approaching $700 million before its third weekend has even begun.
The original Avatar needed extraordinary legs to transform its comparatively modest opening into its historic final total. Spider-Man has taken almost the opposite route, building an enormous war chest almost immediately.
That gives Brand New Day something Avatar never had at this stage of release: a massive cushion. Spider-Man doesn’t need Avatar-level legs to make this race interesting.
It simply needs to avoid collapsing.
And if Brand New Day continues performing anywhere near its current trajectory, the conversation could quickly shift from whether it can challenge the biggest domestic movies ever released to exactly how high this thing can go.
Do you think Spider-Man: Brand New Day can beat Avatar at the box office? Sound off and let us know!
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