The Shawn Levy-directed Marvel film, teaming Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman, is also the eighth biggest preview number among all films.
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Box Office: ‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ Reaps Record $38.5M in Previews, Best Ever for an R-Rated Film and More
The Shawn Levy-directed Marvel film, teaming Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman, is also the eighth biggest preview number among any film.
BY
PAMELA MCCLINTOCK
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JULY 26, 2024 8:41AM
Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool/Wade Wilson and Hugh Jackman as Wolverine/Logan in 'Deadpool & Wolverine.' JAY MAIDMENT/MARVEL
Merc with the Mouth is looking better than ever, along with old pal and fellow superhero favorite Wolverine.
Marvel Studios and Disney’s
Deadpool & Wolverine grossed a record-shattering $38.5 million in Thursday previews beginning, by far the best showing ever for
an R-rated film and putting it at No. 8 on the list of top previews among all films, not adjusted for inflation. It joins an elite roster that includes installments in Hollywood’s biggest franchise, including Avengers, Star Wars, Spider-Man and the final Harry Potter film.
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Shawn Levy directed the high-profile
Deadpool threequel, which returns
Ryan Reynolds as Wade Wilson/Deadpool and brings Jackman into the franchise as Logan/Wolverine. (The trio are close friends, a big plus for the film’s global publicity tour that was capped by
a stop at Comic-Con’s Hall H on Thursday, where fanboys were treated to a panel and a screening of the two-hour and eight-minute film.)
The
whirlwind worldwide tour is certainly paying off; the
Deadpool threequel is also pulling in huge numbers overseas, earning $64.8 million in its first two days, 57 percent ahead of the first film and 48 percent of the sequel.
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The record-shattering preview gross in North America is difficult to decipher because of the R-rating in terms of whether it changes the weekend opening forecast of $160 million to $175 million. Studios and most
box office analysts believe it would be hard for an R-rated movie to cross $200 million in its domestic launch, although David Herrin’s The Quorom believes it could.
Deadpool & Wolverine is being buoyed by
strong reviews and even stronger exits, or five out of five on PostTrack and a 97 audience score on Rotten Tomatoes.
The first
Deadpool made history when opening to $133.7 million domestically in February 2016, the biggest start ever for an R-rated title — a record it still holds — proving that a superhero pic could draw big crowds despite the restrictive rating. A little more than two years later,
Deadpool 2 debuted to $125.5 million after earning $18.6 million in previews, the record until now for an R-rated film.
Feige’s Marvel took over the
Deadpool franchise when Marvel parent company Disney swallowed up 20th Century Fox, which had rights to the X-Men universe of characters.
Deadpool & Wolverine is the first R-rated movie ever released by Disney, Marvel or otherwise.
Reynolds — also an expert promoter and producer — and his marketing team at Maximum Effort, along with Disney, have been trying to grow the audience by
going after woman. On Wednesday,
Taylor Swift — who is good friends with Reynolds and wife Blake Lively — used her powerful social media sway to
post an item endorsing the movie that included a link to buy tickets “if you like to see things that are unspeakably awesome. Continuing, she sad, “Shout out to Wade Wilson, a.k.a., my god kids’ sperm donor.”