Spider-Man Defies Omicron: No Way Home Crosses Billion Dollars Globally

Year-end blockbuster Spider-Man: No Way Home has become the first film in the history of Sony Pictures to cross the $500 million mark at the domestic box office. According to THR, the tentpole,achieved the milestone on Tuesday after earning another $24.8 million on Monday to bring its 11-day domestic total to $495.1 million from 4,336 theaters in the U.S. and Canada.

No Way Home is the hero of the year-end box office. The pic has shattered numerous records since its debut nearly two weeks ago. On Sunday, it became the first film of the pandemic era to hurtle past the $1 billion threshold at the worldwide box office. And it did so in near-record time, or 12 days.

The corridor between Christmas and New Year’s is historically a big week for moviegoing. This box office, however, is still lagging overall compared to pre-pandemic times as COVID-19 cases surge again due to the omicron variant. Were movies just better before coronavirus? Or is the fear porn being pushed on CNN everyday just keeping the normies from going to the movies?

Holding steady at No. 2 on Monday was Universal and Illumination’s Sing 2, which earned a paltry, but solid $7.8 million from 3,892 locations for a six-day domestic tally of $47.1 million. Sing 2, buoyed by an A+ CinemaScore, is good news for family films. As the first $1 billion grossing global title of the pandemic, Sony/Marvel’s Spider-Man: No Way Home is already bound for a $242M net profit after all worldwide home ancillaries, marketing costs and participations.

However, should movie theaters remain open amidst the much ballyhooed Omicron surge, particularly given all the overkill Covid-safety measures they’ve implemented, and the Tom Holland-Zendaya-Benedict Cumberbatch movie remains on a steady box office track, it’s quite possible that the Sony feature will see a profit that’s close to 3x what it’s currently generating with an estimated $610M.

Prediction: there is no stopping this movie. Matrix Resurrections sucks. Nothing can stop this blockbuster.

These financial projections do not come from Sony, but film finance sources who are quite familiar with the balance sheets of what will be the Culver City lot’s highest grossing movie of all-time; No Way Home poised to best the $1.13 billion worldwide box office of 2019’s Spider-Man: Far From Home. This is based on an ultimate worldwide box office of $1.75 billion for No Way Home, broken out with a $1 billion offshore (sans a China release) and $750M domestic. Note, Force Awakens hit a billion overseas outside of China’s $124.1M gross. Spider-Man: Far From Home made over $28M in Japan, and the destiny for No Way Home could likely beat that after it opens on Jan. 7. Currently broken out, the Jon Watts-directed MCU title has made $587.1M international and $470.3M in the U.S. and Canada for a grand WW total of $1.057 billion.

via Deadline