UPDATE: Disney/Marvel Studios‘ Captain America: Brave New World came in where we spotted it — $12M in previews.
StudioCanal/Sony’s Paddington in Peru, clocked $600K yesterday. Keep in mind it’s a family movie. Thursday night previews started at 2 p.m. at 3,133 locations. The movie notched a great PostTrak scores of 4 stars for general, and 4 1/2 stars for kids under 12 and a Rotten Tomatoes critics score of 94%. The hope is that the 4-day is around $15M. The first Paddington had a 3-day of $18.9M, while Paddington 2 posted $11M. Quorum believes that the 3-day for the threequel is $12M-$15M (update). The pic has already cleared $104M abroad with $19M from Sony off shore territories.
EXCLUSIVE: Neither Los Angeles rain nor Northeast snow are keeping audiences away from cinemas tonight as Disney/Marvel Studios’ Captain America: Brave New World, a continuation of both Disney+ series Falcon and the Winter Soldier and 2008’s The Incredible Hulk, is eyeing a $12M Thursday after previews which began at 2PM earlier today.
Where does that stack up to other MCU titles? Well, it’s higher than 2014’s Captain America: Winter Soldier which collected $10.2M in previews on its way to a $95M opening.
It’s also under the $17.5M previews of the last MCU title over Presidents Day weekend, 2023’s Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania which made its way to a $106.1M 3-day and $120.3M 4-day. Brave New World isn’t expected to traverse to Quantumania levels with tracking pegging a $80M 3-day and $94M 4-day. Brave New World was always a grounded action film, nothing in the multiverse sense of the word, selling itself entire on Red Hulk (how appropriate for Valentine’s Day).
Bad news: Rotten Tomatoes critics got antsy while watching the Anthony Mackie movie giving it a 52% critics score. Better news: Audiences on Thursday night gave it a tolerable 79% on RT. Early PostTrak from fans was a mixed bag at 3 stars with kids under 12 loving the movie at 4 1/2 stars (62% boys). Audience make-up was 71% males, 29% female. Diversity demos were 32% Caucasian, 28% Hispanic and Latino, 19% Black, and 15% Asian. Best scores came from women over 25 (71% grade), who were the second biggest audience last night at 21% behind men over 25 at 56% who gave the Mackie movie a 64% grade.
Social media analytics corp RelishMix reports that the social media universe for the Julius Onah directed movie stands at just under 600M, which is an average figure for superhero movies; Brave New World running 21% below genre norms across TikTok, Facebook, X, YouTube and Instagram combined. Ya wanna know what the social media reach was for Deadpool & Wolverine before opening? Try 1.15 billion followers. Even Thor: Love & Thunder was at a high 963M-plus before that pic projected onto the screen to a massive $144.1M three-day opening in July 2022.
Mostly all of the cast on this Captain America are social and activated, except for non-social Harrison Ford. Mackie counted 5.4M fans across all platforms before opening, Liv Tyler stood at 7.2M while Giancarlos Esposito has at 4M.
As far as the chatter online, RelishMix says it’s mixed on Brave New World. There are some fans who are excited to see Mackie picking up the shield from Chris Evans, and who are destined to go because of Red Hulk. But “negative-leaning chatter on Captain America: Brave New World hears trembles from fans who feel Marvel has lost its way. Comments include, ‘I remember a time when I used to get hyped for a Marvel film. I saw this poster (and trailer) and felt nothing.’ and ‘I want the film to do well, but I can’t shake the feeling that this movie is just being sent out there to die. Prove me wrong, Disney.’ The jumps in tone are turning some off, sharing, ‘Its nuts how this movie is simultaneously playing up the ‘grizzled espionage’ angle from Winter Soldier, but is also like CLAP FOR RED HULK,’ while others are pessimistically curious in the character of Sabra, given the character’s ties to Israel in the comics with the current geopolitical landscape in the Middle East.”
We’ll have more for you in the AM.
Disney didn’t respond to Deadline’s comment on the projections we were hearing tonight.
On Friday, Brave New World opens in 4,100 theatres, including 400 IMAX auditoriums, 950 Premium Large Format screens, 2,500+ 3D locations, 325 D-Box/4D motion screens, and 100 ScreenX locations.