Despite only releasing internationally last Wednesday, Spider-Man: No Way Home is already one of Sony’s 20 highest-grossing movies ever, and it wouldn’t be a stretch to say the studio is heavily reliant on the Marvel Comics icon as its marquee piece of IP.
Seven of Sony’s fourteen largest box office hits ever hail from the Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire franchises, and that’ll rise to eight out of fifteen by the end of the week as No Way Home continues to dominate the public consciousness. Tom Hardy’s Venom is also on the list, so you can see just how important those Marvel dollars are.
In a statement celebrating No Way Home earning $260 million domestically and over $600 million globally in its first five days on the big screen, Sony chief Tom Rothman penned a letter thanking his colleagues and audiences around the world for combining to deliver what’s almost guaranteed to be the pandemic’s top-earning film.
“In the face of obviously challenging circumstances, this victory is even more impressive and a great testament to the continued cultural impact that theatrical films deliver. Their power does, and will, endure. Spidey and Sony have struck a mighty blow to demonstrate just that.”
The day-and-date model will hopefully become a thing of the past to aid the industry’s recovery, especially when theatrical exclusives like Spider-Man: No Way Home, Venom: Let There Be Carnage, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Free Guy and more have shown that people are more than willing to return to the multiplex in massive numbers if they’re given a good enough reason.
