Of all the films coming out this month, Detective Pikachu seemed like the only one that even had a chance at taking on Avengers: Endgame’s impressive run at the box office. Now that the numbers are in though, it looks like that while the first live-action Pokémon movie did some damage to Marvel Studios’ juggernaut, it wasn’t a critical hit.
According to Deadline, Detective Pikachu had an incredible $58 million opening weekend, but it wasn’t enough to topple Endgame‘s $63 million gross, making this the third weekend in a row Marvel held the No.1 position at the box office.
While some websites are claiming this is a huge drop-off from its second weekend, the actual numbers don’t lie. Though it did drop, this is still the fourth highest grossing third weekend of all-time domestically, following Star Wars: Force Awakens, Avatar and Black Panther.
But Marvel’s good news doesn’t stop there. Just today, Disney announced that Endgame is now China’s largest grossing foreign film ever, bringing its worldwide total to a staggering $2.4 billion. The fourth Avengers is now only a few hundred million dollars away from topping Avatar as the highest grossing film of all-time worldwide.
As studios flock to create their own cinematic universes, most fans seem to be satisfied with Marvel’s conclusion their to one-of-a-kind 22-film run, with many returning to theaters to see it a second, third and even fourth time. This comes at the heels of Captain Marvel‘s impressive box office intake earlier this year, and before Spider-Man: Far From Home is expected to put a dent into everyone’s wallets this July.
Meanwhile, the success of Detective Pikachu has pretty much guaranteed it a number of sequels and spinoffs, many already in development. Regardless if you liked Avengers: Endgame more than the movie about a talking electric mouse, I think we can all agree that it’s amazing to see how these properties, once considered niche franchises, are now not only dominating the global box office but our culture in general.
