‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ Is About to Do Something No Movie Has Ever Done at the Domestic Box Office

Summer box office runs almost always follow the same pattern, a big opening weekend followed by a steady, predictable decline as audiences move on to the next big release. Sony and Marvel’s ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ has spent the past month quietly ignoring that pattern entirely.

The film has already rewritten the record books more than once since its July 31 debut, from posting the biggest domestic opening weekend ever to becoming the second-fastest movie in history to cross $1 billion worldwide. Every weekend since has added another milestone to that growing list, and the film shows no real signs of slowing its pace even a full month into release.

That trend continued once again this past weekend. Sony and Marvel’s ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ held the top spot at the box office for a fifth consecutive weekend, earning $22.2 million domestically, a drop of just 44 percent from the previous week’s total, according to Variety. That figure pushed the film’s domestic haul to a staggering $891 million.

That number matters because of exactly what it’s chasing. ‘Brand New Day’ is now roughly $45 million away from surpassing ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens,’ which has held the unadjusted all-time domestic box office record with $936 million since 2015, according to TheWrap. Clearing that mark would make Tom Holland’s latest Spider-Man outing the highest-grossing movie in North American history.

There’s an even bigger milestone sitting just beyond that one. Once ‘Brand New Day’ passes the Force Awakens benchmark, the film will be on pace to become the first movie ever to cross $1 billion at the domestic box office alone, a feat no film in Hollywood history has managed to reach.

The film’s international performance has been just as historic. ‘Brand New Day’ has already surpassed $2.33 billion worldwide, putting it on the verge of overtaking ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’ for third place on the all-time global chart, and positioning it as Sony’s highest-grossing release of all time.

Weekend competition hasn’t slowed the film down much either. Ketchup Entertainment’s ‘Coyote vs. Acme’ scored a solid second-place debut with roughly $15.4 million, while Christopher Nolan’s ‘The Odyssey’ continued its own remarkably steady run in third place, still pulling strong numbers well into its own extended theatrical stay.

Given the pace of the decline each week, industry watchers expect ‘Brand New Day’ to overtake the domestic record within the next week or so, potentially around the Labor Day weekend. From there, the question shifts entirely to how much further past $1 billion the film can climb before its theatrical run eventually winds down.

For a franchise that’s been running for over two decades, watching one entry threaten to become the single biggest domestic release in movie history is no small thing. Whether that record ends up standing for years, or gets challenged again soon, ‘Brand New Day’ has already cemented itself as one of the defining box office stories of the year.

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