Haters Be Haters, Captain Marvel’s Box Office Total Is Impressive

Say what you want, Marvel has another hit on its hands. After a Thursday early release that saw the movie take in $20.7 Million, the movie has quickly cemented itself as one of Marvel’s best soft openings. In fact, at $20.7 Million, the movie has quietly beat out Spider-Man Homecoming and Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2. It’s doing so well that it trials only a few, Infinity War and Black Panther being the most notable.

Combine this with the rest of the weekends worldwide haul that exceeds $455 Million and Captain Marvel’s box office total is crushing it. I think it’s safe to say that the movie has put to rest any thought that it wouldn’t do well. 

Leading up to its release, fans all over the world lashed out and threatened to boycott it. The backlash was triggered after a series of comments were made by Captain Marvel herself, Brie Larson. Sadly, due to speaking up for what she believed in, she became the focal point of an online campaign that sought to tarnish both her and the movie before it even hit theatres. The campaign quickly saw Captain Marvel become Marvel’s most hotly debated and controversial movie to date. It got so bad that as a consequence Rotten Tomatoes even changed how they operate. Even this, however, couldn’t stop it from succeeding. Captain Marvel’s box office total has gone on to exceed expectations and the movie will probably do just fine in the end. 

Will it become one of Marvel’s highest grossing movies? No, probably not. But that’s ok. 

Target audience

Captain Marvel was designed with all fans in mind.  Many have spoken up that its only purpose was to show how society places precedence on masculinity (especially true in comic book films). As a father of two boys and an uncle of one niece, I can proudly say that it was more than that. Captain Marvel was meant for an entire segment of the population that had been ignored by Marvel. Think about this. Before its release, women had only accounted for 10% of screen time during the last ten years of the MCU. 

• Nebula
• Gamora
• Maria Hill
• Janet Van Dyne
• Ghost
• Pepper Potts
• MJ
• Shuri
• Scarlet Witch

All those characters. Just 10%. 

And that even includes Black Widow appearing in seven movies and Wasp co-starting in her own movie.

Captain Marvel is the first of many needed steps for the MCU. Kevin Feige has already said that Marvel plans to bring diversity into their movies. With Captain Marvel as their first female-led movie and the Eternals looking to cast an openly gay actor, he’s delivering on his words. 

I hope he continues.

At the end of the day, people can and will say what they want about Captain Marvel and the man-hating/bashing it apparently has. The world needs diversity. The world needs strong women. And the world needs female superheroes. Captain Marvel delivers on all these fronts. 

Cheers,

Joel