It was predicted to be a big hit, with strong pre-sales and a lot of interest. But no one quite foresaw how successful Black Panther would be. While the final figures have yet to be published for the four-day Presidents' Day weekend in the States, the film has opened to an estimated $235 million.
Among the milestones the movie has passed, it's only the fifth film to break $200 million in its first three days of release, it scored a rare A+ CinemaScore with audiences and has set a new record for this particular holiday weekend, breezing past Deadpool. Internationally, where the movie opened in some markets days before the States, the take is already around $169 million, bringing the current global figure to an $404 million. And given the audience reaction, we can expect it to keep on earning for a long time to come.
Few movies chose to open against the latest Marvel behemoth, which means most of the chart is simply small adjustments down – with one exception, and we'll get to that. Peter Rabbit stayed second with $23 million (an impressively small 7% drop), while Fifty Shades Freed was deposed by the new king of the charts, dropping to third on $19.4 million. Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle remained fourth with $10 million, while The 15:17 To Paris slipped a couple of places, rounding out the top five and earning $9.1 million.
The Greatest Showman was down to sixth place, adding $6.2 million, but you have to venture down to seventh to find one of the week's brave other openers, as Nick Park's Early Man landed with $4.2 million.
Maze Runner: The Death Cure was down to eighth, taking in $3.1 million, ahead of horror movie Winchester in ninth, which made $2.6 million. Finally, we find The Post at 10th on $2.4 million.
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