Jared Leto's Morbius has opened up in theaters to a flood of negative reviews, becoming the third new installment in Sony's Spider-Man Universe after Tom Hardy's Venom films. Following two full years of delays to its theatrical release, the film only has a C+ rating on CInemaScore and is currently sitting at a 17% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes.
Amongst various, simplistic movie-making issues that critics and fans have with Morbius, Spider-Man fans are also worried about the future of the character, especially after Spider-Man: No Way Home completed the web-head's first MCU trilogy. It's a mini-miracle that Disney and Sony have been able to play this nice with the characters, but the continual growth of the SSU puts the future into question.
Marvel Studios has a history of producing well-received Marvel films over the past 14 years; the same can't be said for Sony with its Spidey-centric outings. Morbius isn't being received well critically, but critical and monetary success isn't always directly related.
Morbius' Opening Weekend Totals Revealed
According to Variety, Morbius earned $39.1 at the opening domestic box office. This outperforms Sony's $33M projection for the living vampire film but doesn't live up to recent comic book movie success. Sony's latest added an additional $44.9M at the international box office, equaling its worldwide total to $84M.
The two previous SSU movies, Venom and Venom: Let There Be Carnage made $80.2M and $90M, respectively. 2021's Marvel Studios opening weekends go as follows:
- Black Widow: $80.3M
- Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings: $75.3M
- Eternals: $71.2M
- Spider-Man: No Way Home: $260.1M
Morbius grossed less during the opening weekend than any Marvel Studios film. 2008's The Incredible Hulk ($55.4M) is the MCU's lowest opening weekend performer to date
Sony's latest added an additional $44.9M at the international box office, equaling its worldwide total to $84M.
Is Morbius a Box Office Success?
Early projections for Morbius were as high as $60M at the opening weekend domestic box office. As negative word of mouth and reactions trickled out before its release, Sony released a projection of $33M for the film's opening weekend. This meek projection set the studio up for its latest Spider-Man spin-off creation to outperform its studio projection.
Unsurprisingly, it beat that projection by about $6M and is on track to be a $100M movie globally by next week. For context, the blood-sucking flick only cost roughly $75M to make, less than average for contemporary comic book movies.
In a wise move by Sony, Morbius wasn't a huge monetary swing at the box office. The studio heads played it safe with the budget and tried to bank off of non-existent connections to Spider-Man.
Looking ahead, April is a crowded month at the box office. Just next week, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and Ambulance hit the silver screen and will eat into Morbius' potential earnings. Besides, competition at the theater and general word of mouth is setting Morbius up for a big second-weekend drop-off and an overall lack of legs at the 2022 box office.
Is Morbius a success? Not really, but Sony Pictures didn't have much to lose with this one outside of fan trust.
Morbius is now playing in theaters worldwide.
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