Photo courtesy of Marvel Studios. © 2025 20th Century Studios / © and ™ 2025 MARVEL
Key Takeaways
Total 3-Day Weekend Gross:
$184,851,674 | +28.5% Last Week / -35.2% Weekend 30, 2024
Marvel Studios’ The Fantastic Four: First Steps opened strong with an estimated $118M, in line with previous well-received MCU movies like Spider-Man: Homecoming and Thor: Ragnarok. There was a stronger decline from the combined Friday to Saturday (-42%) than either Superman (-33%) or Thunderbolts* (-22%), which means we will be watching Frame 2 closely. Although this new Marvel movie greatly boosted the box office from last week, it was a big year-over-year decline from this frame in 2024 when the R-rated Deadpool & Wolverine had a huge $211.4M debut from the studio. That feels natural since that Ryan Reynolds/Hugh Jackman movie was combining two very strong IPs with lots of previous success behind them, as opposed to FF which has had a spotty history.
- Top Title: The Fantastic Four: First Steps (Disney) | $118M / 4,125 Screens / $28,606 PSA | Week 1
- Top Opener: The Fantastic Four: First Steps (Disney) | $118M / 4,125 Screens / $28,606 PSA | Week 1
- Best PSA: The Fantastic Four: First Steps (Disney) | $118M / 4,125 Screens / $28,606 PSA | Week 1
Highlights From the Weekend
1. The Fantastic Four: First Steps
Disney/Marvel Studios | NEW
$118M 3-Day Domestic Opening Weekend | $218M Global Total
Marvel Studios broke the Fantastic Four curse this weekend by finally—after three decades of trying- delivering a simultaneous critical, audience, and box office hit for their First Family with The Fantastic Four: First Steps. The 37th MCU movie took in an estimated $118M on 4,125 screens for a $28,606 Per Screen Average. That number is almost exactly what Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 opened with two years ago ($118.4M) and also close to 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming ($117M), another critical/audience fav coming after several previous non-MCU versions. It’s nowhere near the top for a studio that has had six $200M+ openers (including last summer’s Deadpool & Wolverine), but that number is well above any prior FF movie’s debut.
- The Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025) – $118M opening
- Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007) – $58M opening/$131.9M total
- Fantastic Four (2005) – $56M opening/$154.69M total
- Fantastic Four (2015) – $25.68M opening/$56.1M total
Here’s how the 3-Day looked, including a very front-loaded $24.4M Thursday previews gross that led to a -42% decline on Saturday…
- Friday – $57M
- Saturday – $33.2M
- Sunday – $27.8M
This first frame fell right in the middle of our prediction panel’s forecast, and is also performing both domestically and globally in the same range as Superman did two weekends ago ($118M vs $125M domestic/$218M vs $217M WW). IMAX took in 13.6% of the domestic gross with $16M on just 418 screens and $26.6M globally. That’s a smaller share compared to Superman, which debuted with $19.1M domestic and $30.4M on IMAX with the same number of screens. Premium formats drove 46% of the total box office…
2D – 87%
- Traditional 2D – 54%
- PLF 2D – 19%
- IMAX 2D – 12%
- Motion 2D – 1%
- ScreenX – 1%
3D – 13%
- Traditional 3D – 7%
- PLF 3D – 2%
- IMAX 3D – 2%
- Motion 3D – 2%
Critically the movie did very well at 88% on Rotten Tomatoes, even compared to Superman‘s 83%. In terms of the MCU that number is tied with Thunderbolts‘ score and #14 overall for the franchise. Even though critical did not move the needle for Thunderbolts this year, these back-to-back scores indicate a broad improvement in quality that could help return confidence to the brand. Audience score was 93% (also better than Superman’s 92%), while CinemaScore was “A-” and PostTrak got a 4.5 out of 5 stars with an 86% total positive. It’s worth noting that the 35-44 bracket gave the movie the biggest kudos at 80%.
Audiences were split heavily male at 68% to 32% female, while the strongest age grouping was 18-34…
- Under 12 – 6%
- 13-17 – 9%
- 18-24 – 27%
- 25-34 – 28%
- 35-44 – 15%
- 45-54 – 10%
- 55+ – 6%
Here’s how demographics looked…
- Caucasian – 37%
- Hispanic – 30%
- AA – 18%
- Asian – 10%
- NatAm/Other – 5%
Internationally Fantastic Four: First Steps opened in all key markets at either #1 or #1 non-local, posting the highest superhero opening of 2025 in Mexico (the top market), UK, France, Italy, Spain, and Latin America. Overall it earned $100M in 52 material territories for a $218M global total.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps – Opening Weekend
Top Ten Overseas Markets
Mexico | $12.0M
UK | $10.8M
France | $5.7M
Brazil | $5.1M
Australia | $4.8M
China | $4.5M
Italy | $4.3M
Spain | $3.1M
Germany | $3.0M
Korea | $2.9M
Other Notable Performances
WB and DC Studios’ Superman dropped another -57% to #2 with $24.9M (a little below our low-end prediction) for a $289.5M domestic total just shy of Man of Steel‘s $291M. Once it passes that 2013 Zack Snyder pic tomorrow it will be in fifth place among modern DCEU movies and #9 for DC Comics films overall. Overseas is evening out a bit more with $19.8M this frame ($213.2M total) for a global total of $502.7M. WB’s racing movie F1 also passed the $500M mark at $509.7M global.
Universal’s Jurassic World Rebirth also crossed some milestones at $301.5M domestic and $718.35M WW. The movie came in third in the weekend derby at $13M, right where we predicted. Still solidly in fourth place globally for the year.
Next Weekend
A different kind of team will swoop in to try and steal The Fantastic Four’s thunder next week as DreamWorks delivers The Bad Guys 2, the sequel to their 2022 animated hit that made nearly $100M domestic and $250M WW. Meanwhile Paramount is giving us their modern day reboot to the spoof franchise The Naked Gun, with Liam Neeson stepping into Leslie Nielsen’s clumsy shoes. Also in limited is Taron Egerton in Lionsgate’s father/daughter crime drama She Rides Shotgun.
Sunday Studio Estimates | Weekend 30 – 2025
Total 3-Day Domestic Gross: $184,851,674 | (-35.2% vs 2024)