When it comes to Marvel Studios movies, a respectable box office haul is almost a guarantee. Even their lesser efforts put most other blockbusters to shame in terms of earnings and today, 9 years after first kicking off the MCU with 2008’s Iron Man, the franchise has hit another impressive milestone. Thanks to James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, which debuted overseas this weekend, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has now brought in $11 billion worldwide.
Collecting a cool $101.2 million over the past few days, the highly anticipated sequel is only just getting going, as it hasn’t even hit the US yet – that happens on Friday. Still, it’s off to a smashing start and has now put the MCU in a very special position. Not only is a total of $11 billion damn impressive, but several films in the franchise have earned over a billion on their own, including The Avengers, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Iron Man 3 and Captain America: Civil War. And, we’ll probably be able to add Vol. 2 to that club as well once its theatrical run is complete.
It was only a year ago that the MCU hit $10 billion at the worldwide box office, and with what the studio has coming down the pipeline, it doesn’t look like the franchise will be slowing down any time soon. Still ahead this year are Jon Watts’ Spider-Man: Homecoming and Taika Waititi’s Thor: Ragnarok, with movies like Avengers: Infinity War, Black Panther and Ant-Man and the Wasp all following soon after in 2018.
It’s safe to say that the future is incredibly bright then for the Marvel Cinematic Universe and with the way things are currently going, it appears that the studio will be holding onto their license to print money for a while. Sure, the current roster of heroes might be nearing their end (or some of them, at least), but with more and more exciting new characters joining the MCU with each and every film that releases, it seems like the best is still to come.
