“Deadpool & Wolverine” remains a force at the box office with $824 million worldwide after two weekends in release.
The sequel, starring Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman, has surpassed the combined grosses of 2016’s “Deadpool” ($783 million) and 2018’s “Deadpool 2” ($786 million). “Deadpool & Wolverine” is now the second-highest-grossing film of 2024 behind “Inside Out 2” ($1.555 billion) and the third-highest-grossing R-rated film of all time behind “Joker” ($1.07 billion) and “Oppenheimer” ($975 million). It is expected to cross the $1 billion mark within days.
After this weekend, Disney became the first studio in 2024 to surpass $3 billion in global ticket sales. Magic Kingdom managed to achieve the feat with just four domestic releases, including “Deadpool & Wolverine,” “Inside Out 2,” “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” ($397 million) and “The First Omen” ($53 million). Disney will try to keep up the momentum with “Alien: Romulus” (Aug. 16), “Moana 2” (Nov. 27) and “Mufasa: The Lion King” (Dec. 20).
At the international box office, “Deadpool & Wolverine” grossed $110.5 million from 52 countries in its second outing. Outside the United States and Canada, China ($45.2 million), the United Kingdom ($42.4 million), Mexico ($32.8 million), and Australia ($24.6 million) were its top-grossing markets. The film continues to make money through premium formats such as Imax, which contributed $17.5 million to global ticket sales over the weekend. To date, Imax has grossed $64.5 million for “Deadpool & Wolverine.”
Elsewhere at the global box office, two new films — M. Night Shyamalan’s “Entrapment” and Sony’s “Harold and the Purple Pencil” — failed to resonate with audiences.
“Trap” grossed $4.4 million from 38 countries, bringing its global opening weekend total to $20 million. The twisted thriller, in which Josh Hartnett plays a serial killer who takes his teenage daughter to a concert only to discover that the event is a police ploy to catch him, is another lackluster horror film in a year that hasn’t been good for the genre. Horror films are typically among the genre’s most reliable box office draws, but recent offerings like Blumhouse’s haunting “The First Omen” ($54 million worldwide), the vampire-inspired “Abigail” ($42 million worldwide) and Lionsgate’s sinister “Imaginary” ($39 million worldwide) haven’t struck a chord with moviegoers.
Meanwhile, “Harold and the Purple Pencil” failed to make $3 million in 32 foreign markets amid the huge success of two other kid-friendly films, “Inside Out 2” and “Despicable Me 4,” which were box office heavyweights for several weeks. “Harold and the Purple Pencil,” based on the children’s book of the same name, also flopped at the domestic box office with a miserable $6 million opening. The film, which stars Zachary Levi as a man who uses a magic pencil to bring his drawings to life, cost $40 million to produce, so Sony needs the film to survive the rest of the summer to save its theatrical run.
