‘Thor: Love And Thunder’ Hammers Global Box Office For $300 Million Bow

Writer-director Taika Waititi brings his magical flavor of Marvel mania back to the box office this weekend, with Thor: Love and Thunder set to hammer the global box office for a $300+ million.

The Thor sequel — number four in the franchise — could fly as high as $350 million on the higher end of potential, with $320+/- million the more likely range. Despite the continued Covid pandemic and surging variants with higher transmissibility, audiences are enthusiastically filling theaters and should easily drive the final worldwide opening cume north of $300 million.

Reviews are running mostly positive, with a current Rotten Tomato score of 71% after 160+ reviews. That leaves plenty more critical assessments to come, which could significantly swing the final score — and remember, the score is simply “how many reviews out of 100 are positive?” as opposed to representing a qualitative grade like on a kid’s report card from school. But by this point, most films tend to sit pretty close to where they’ll wind up once all of the reviews come in.

No audience scores yet, of course, but word of mouth is going to be a lot more important than reviews. The MCU generally has a faithful audience who will always turn out, plus each character has an added subset of fans who might skip other superhero films but who fill seats when they’re favorite is available.

The previous Marvel release Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness topped $953 million, after opening to an eye-popping $450 million opening the first week of May. That overperformance is partially driven by the depth of audience desire to make up for lost time — however ill-conceived such a premise is when a dangerous virus is still circulating around the world after more than two years and counting — and probably a not-insignificant dash of needing escapism in the face of mounting domestic and international crises, stresses and conflicts, and outright fears of survival.

Likewise, Top Gun: Maverick appears to be on course for a $1.2+ billion finish, riding high on the same tremendous outpouring of audience good will. So if viewers haven’t had their fill yet, and if these trends continue, then don’t be surprised if Thor: Love and Thunder winds up on the higher end of expectations after all.

With kids out of school and plenty of folks taking vacations, breaks, or otherwise simplifying their schedules and working from home or being unemployed, we’re probably going to see attendance numbers remain high until some external factor — in particular, Covid hospitalizations — starts motivating people to stay away from crowds again, or enough viewers simply reach their threshold for theatrical attendance (typically somewhere around 5 films per year, on average).

Marvel movies seem generally immune to pressures related to audiences having to choose where to spend their dollars each year, but Covid has proven one of the few things capable of tripping up the otherwise unwavering blockbuster heights of MCU box office potential.

Black Widow, released in July of 2021, took $379.7 million despite lead Scarlett Johansson’s usual box office drawing power. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings scored slightly better with $432 million in September of the same year, but still clearly suffered from the effects of the pandemic. And Eternals saw a $402 million total two months later in November.

Some will point to those films having shorter theatrical windows and debuting on Disney+ streaming as a contributing factor to their box office struggles. But it was pretty obvious that Covid and the lack of safer theatrical options, plus the shutdown of theaters in so many parts of the country and rest of the world, that had the biggest impact on ticket sales for those three films.

And it says something that the bar for disappointment in the MCU is frankly a box office results most other films would consider a solid blockbuster result.

My current pre-release prediction is a final global box office run in the range of $800+ million, and the higher the opening weekend the higher I’d expect to revise my final tally estimate in the coming weeks.

I’ll be back with more box office updates for Thor: Love and Thunder in the coming days and weeks, so be sure to check back soon. Meanwhile, if you see this or any film in theaters, please wear an N95 mask — there are many immunocompromised people out there susceptible to worse Covid outcomes including death, lots of children who aren’t vaccinated at all (and kids are among those being hospitalized for the new variants), and Long Covid is no joke and includes potential longterm serious health risks. So, take care of yourselves and of each other, and make sure the fun of seeing movies in theaters again doesn’t have to include a life-or-death risk.