‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ Swoops In With a Pandemic-Record Opening

In true comic-book style, Spider-Man posted an opening weekend result many thought was impossible amid Covid-19.

Tom Holland as Peter Parker/Spider-Man in the latest instalment of the franchise. Picture: Supplied

Like a comic-book climax at the 11th hour, Spider-Man came to the rescue of Hollywood.

Spider-Man: No Way Home, the latest instalment in the web-slinging hero’s franchise, opened to a record-setting $US253m ($354m) at the box office at the weekend, a result considered all but impossible since Covid-19 cratered the worldwide theatrical industry more than 18 months ago.

The debut weekend would be a smash success in normal times. In a pandemic, the entertainment industry received it as a box-office miracle.

In one weekend, Spider-Man: No Way Home took in more in the US than any movie has in its entirety since Covid-19 spread across the country.

Its $US253m domestic debut is the third-highest of all time, behind only 2019’s Avengers: Endgame (US$357m) and 2018’s Avengers: Infinity War ($US258m).

The opening of Spider-Man shatters the belief in some corners of Hollywood that Covid-19 had irrevocably placed a ceiling on theatrical grosses, giving theatre owners a shot of optimism even as the spread of the Omicron variant could slow moviegoing and provide studios with further reason to give priority to at-home streaming services.

The nation’s theatre chains have struggled to bring moviegoers consistently back to pre-pandemic levels, especially after months of one high-profile flop after another. Spider-Man now brings a surge of revenue ahead of the all-important holiday season, but its blockbuster success comes as many other new releases are floundering, further bifurcating the theatrical market into the haves and have-nots.

Overseas audiences added an estimated $US334m to the weekend tally for Spider-Man, with the UK, Mexico and South Korea leading the way. The global gross of $US587m is the third-highest of all time.

Spider-Man, starring Tom Holland as the latest actor to don the suit, was released by Sony Pictures Entertainment, which earlier this year saw success with another superhero movie, Venom: Let There Be Carnage. That movie has a current gross of $212 million, which before Spider-Man was No. 2 for the year behind Walt Disney Co’s comic-book adaptation Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. The year will likely end with superhero movies accounting for five of the top 10 highest-grossing releases.

Spider-Man is likely to become the latest chess piece in a continuing debate across Hollywood about the role of the exclusive big-screen release. The spread of Covid-19 accelerated studio plans to focus on streaming services — Sony is the only major studio without one. And the gradual return to pre-pandemic activities has caught the industry between two worlds.

Over the next year, more studios are expected to reserve exclusive theatrical releases for only their biggest films — an approach that could lead to Spider-Man-size grosses but will also straddle theaters with fallow periods between the tentpole films.

Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) looks on at Spider-Man in the new movie.

Spider-Man premiered at an especially fraught moment for the nation’s movie theaters. Multiplexes in Denmark have closed because of the Omicron spread, though large US exhibitors have yet to make any major changes. Any imminent slowdown in moviegoing would hit theaters ahead of the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day, which is traditionally one of the busiest ticket-buying times of the year.

Ticket sales in New York didn’t drop despite the variant’s spread in the city, according to Sony data. Richard Gelfond, chief executive of entertainment technology company IMAX Corp, said it didn’t appear as though the spread of the Covid-19 variant ate into box-office sales.

“The numbers speak for themselves — no one thought the numbers would be this big,” he said. IMAX’s premium auditoriums collected $36.2 million globally off Spider-Man.

The movie, he added, appears on its way toward collecting more than $1 billion worldwide, a figure that some thought wouldn’t be reached in the post-coronavirus age.

No Way Home rode a wave of pent-up demand among fans, as well as months of rumours and speculation that swirled around its plot details on the internet. The release of presale tickets strained websites selling them.

Though it is released by Sony Pictures, the movie is co-produced with Disney’s Marvel Studios, and its storylines slot into the larger “cinematic universe” that Marvel launched with Iron Man in 2008.

It also looks like Spider-Man will be relied upon to draw audiences out in the weeks to come, especially since audiences gave it a rare A+ grade, according to market research firm CinemaScore.

The weekend’s other new release, the Bradley Cooper noir Nightmare Alley, fizzled with an estimated $3 million. Other recent flops, including West Side Story, are fading fast in sales, though coming releases such as a new Matrix instalment and a sequel to the popular children’s movie Sing are premiering ahead of Christmas.

One common thread is emerging when it comes to box-office success that could help those two films: drawing in younger audiences. More than 60pc of the opening-weekend audience for Spider-Man were under the age of 34, whereas older moviegoers have shown in recent months a reluctance to return to the theatre due to Covid-19’s spread.

The Wall Street Journal