The box office remains in a constant state of flux, with projections often turning out to be dead wrong. Sony were estimating somewhere between $45-55 million for Venom: Let There Be Carnage‘s first frame, only for Tom Hardy’s superhero sequel to almost double those estimates.
Conversely, pre-sale tracking had No Time to Die in with a chance of becoming the first movie since Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker to crack $100 million, but it ended up opening on the very bottom end of the estimates thanks to a $56 million haul. The three highest-grossing debutants of the pandemic era are all Marvel Comics adaptations, with the latest speculation hinting that Eternals could be the one to nab a three-figure opening.
According to box office analyst Charlie Jatinder, the 26th installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe is scoring the best ticket pre-sales since The Rise of Skywalker, shifting more stubs in six hours than Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings managed in 24.
That means Eternals could realistically fly as high as $110 million should the demand keep up for the next three weeks, and there’s no reason why it won’t. Audiences are finally returning to cinemas in big numbers, and nothing draws in the crowds quite like the most commercially successful multi-film series in the history of the business.
