Multiverse of Madness has been a dominant figure at the box office ever since its official theatrical release, maintaining hold of the top spot over its three domestic weekends. Despite the troubling 67% drop in ticket sales from the previous weekend, the film continues to push forward, surpassing milestones that seemed impossible during the early stages of the pandemic. The film is quickly becoming one of the year’s highest box office earners, but it still has some work to do domestically.
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Per Deadline, the Doctor Strange sequel put forth a solid outing this past Friday, earning $8.5 million to close out the night. The narrative managed to conjure up a respectable $13.8 million by the end of Saturday but saw a decrease in revenue by the conclusion of Sunday, which brought the film’s overall weekend total to $31.6 million. The film has earned a combined $342 million over its three weekends, which sits second behind the $369 million generated by The Batman domestically.
While behind within the domestic arena, the Marvel film has done enough internationally to surpass the Matt Reeves film on the worldwide stage. Multiverse of Madness has accumulated $461.1 million internationally, bringing its worldwide total to an impressive $803.2 million, passing the $768.5 global million total generated by The Batman. This is the second time the new Doctor Strange project has dethroned the masked vigilante, beating its opening weekend performance to become the most profitable debut weekend release of the year.
If Multiverse of Madness can maintain its current pace, the Marvel film has the potential to become the second film since the inception of the pandemic to cross $1 billion at the worldwide box office. The only film to accomplish this feat has been the ground-breaking film Spider-Man: No Way Home, which has accumulated roughly $1.8 billion since its release in December of last year. The path, however, for Multiverse of Madness isn’t necessarily clear of obstacles, with two new projects making their theatrical arrival this Memorial Day weekend. The Doctor Strange sequel may surrender its three-week hold on the box office to Top Gun: Maverick, which received solid reviews after its premiere at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival.
However, until then, Multiverse of Madness can revel in its accomplishments from yet another top-performing domestic box office weekend, beating the newly releases film Downtown Abbey: A New Era, which earned $16 million to close out the weekend. Universal and DreamWorks’ The Bad Guys finished third with $6.1 million, followed by Sonic the Hedgehog 2, which earned a modest $3.94 million. A24’s newest horror narrative, Men, rounds out the weekend’s top-five performances, bringing in $3.29 million to close out its debut weekend. It’ll be interesting to see where Doctor Strange stands after a jam-packed Memorial Day weekend that will be anything but quiet.
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is currently playing in theaters.
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Source: Deadline
