Sony’s Venom: The Last Dance has come in with a $175M global opening, which is slightly lower than where we saw it yesterday, but still well ahead of pre-weekend projections. While domestic misstepped, landing at $51M, overseas overperformed at $124M from 64 markets and led by a powerful China debut. The franchise has now reached $1.5B worldwide.

Overall overseas, this is the 3rd biggest opening of the year for a Hollywood title in like markets, behind Inside Out 2 and Deadpool & Wolverine.

China, which gobbled up the first film in the trilogy but did not get a release for the second movie, Venom: Let There Be Carnage, led all markets on Last Dance with a truly surprising $46M over five days. Though not apples-to-apples given this one had a five-day start, it is the biggest superhero movie opening since 2019’s Spider-Man: Far From Home and the biggest Hollywood opening of the year.

The top launch markets behind China are Mexico ($7.3M), Korea ($5.8M), UK ($5.7M), India ($4.7M), Germany ($4.1M), Italy ($3.4M), Australia ($3.2M), Spain ($2.7M) and Indonesia ($2.7M).

Still to come are France and Japan next week.

In worldwide IMAX, The Last Dance tangoed to $16M, the 3^rd best global release ever for the format in the month of October. Shot with IMAX Certified Digital Cameras, the trilogy finale took in $11.2M overseas, to make it the biggest offshore opening for IMAX in an October and the 3rd best for Sony behind the two most recent Spider-Man titles. In China, the total was $6M with IMAX repping 14% of the five-day gross.

As we’ve previously noted (see below), China indeed came in higher than expected. The market has been super wonky and overall is down on local titles and Hollywood (exceptional performances for the studios this year have included Alien: Romulus and Godzilla x Kong). This one perhaps fed a desire after the first movie did so well and the second one was not released during a time when the market was still choppy with Covid.

South East Asia, which was also struggling out of the pandemic when Carnage released, stood up this time. Scandinavia and Germany also delivered here. India was also a surprise happy start – though the market has Diwali titles coming in next frame. Still, in all, there are varying and ongoing holidays ahead in myriad markets and not much competition. Important to note, Venom 3 saw a lot of uptick across weekend days in some markets.

We’ll watch this space…

Now, turning to the other titles on this weekend’s dance card: Universal/DreamWorks Animation’s The Wild Robot added three new markets this session, taking the total in release to 79 (Japan goes next February). The weekend was good for another $17.6M (-27% in the holdovers), to lift the overseas cume to $121M and global to $232.3M.

The emotional charmer is now the biggest non-sequel animated movie of the year, and only the third non-sequel of 2024 to cross $100M international. The running offshore total is well above The Bad Guys and Migration, and in line with Trolls in the same markets at the same point (excluding China).

This frame, the Chris Sanders-helmed film surpassed overseas totals (ex China) of The Bad Guys and Trolls Band Together. In all to date, 35 markets have exceeded the lifetime of The Bad Guys; 26 have topped the lifetime of Trolls; and 24 have overtaken Migration.

In holdovers, The Wild Robot is capitalizing on staggered UK school holidays which delivered strong midweeks. France saw uplift in school holidays heading into weekend three, with Wed-Fri more than 3x the same days the previous week, and the weekend 33% up overall. Mexico dropped just 18% in the fifth weekend, at No.2 in the market. Spain also had a terrific hold (-23%) at No.2.

The Top 5 markets to date are: Mexico ($16M), Australia ($10.3M), UK ($8.4M), France ($8.2M) and China ($7.2M).

Meanwhile, last week’s studio champ, Paramount’s Smile 2, packed in another $12.6M from 67 overseas markets (-42%), for an offshore cume of $43M and a global total of $83.7M.

France held well, down just 29% despite a lot of local competition. The lead market is the UK with $5.2M, followed by France at $4.5M, Germany at $3.6M and the pair of Italy and Australia at $2.4M apiece.

MISC UPDATED CUMES/NOTABLE
Joker: Folie à Deux (WB): $3.8M intl weekend (78 markets); $143.3M intl cume/$201.1M global
Despicable Me 4 (UNI): $980K intl weekend (84 markets); $604.3M intl cume/$965.3M global
*Anora (UNI): $110K intl weekend (2 markets)
*Denotes new

PREVIOUS, SATURDAY: Demonstrating continued strength at the international box office, Sony’s Venom: The Last Dance has chomped on $50.8M from 64 overseas markets through Friday. As noted yesterday (see below), and despite domestic’s underperformance, the full global weekend bow is looking to come in at $180M. That would bring the franchise total to $1.5B.

The China gross through Friday was $22M, with Saturday (not reflected in the overseas cume above) pushing that to an estimated $36.8M across four days; and now expected to reach a $45M through Sunday. This is despite a 6.8 critical score from Douban, versus the 7.2 earned by 2018’s trilogy starter. The audience score on Moayan has also dropped another smidge, now at 8.8, but this doesn’t seem to be denting business.

Even Chinese state media is endorsing the movie, calling its opening impressive and robust. Further, it was noted that Sony hired Chinese actor Jia Bing to voice Venom in the local release, and created promotional materials inspired by Chinese culture, such as a poster for the film that is reminiscent of traditional Chinese art and based on the legend of Hou Yi, a divine archer from Chinese mythology who shot down nine of the 10 suns.

However, it’s not all about China here. Rounding out the Top 10 markets through Friday are Mexico ($2.8M), Korea ($2.3M), UK ($2M), Germany ($1.8M), India ($1.7M), Italy ($1.3M), Australia ($1.3M), Indonesia ($1.1M) and Saudi Arabia ($1.1M).

As ever, more to come on Sunday…

FRIDAY UPDATE: Across its first two full days of overseas play, Sony’s Venom: The Last Dance has slurped up a total $27.3M from 47 international box office markets. As we noted on Wednesday (see below) the early offshore performance is sending projections for the global bow higher than initially estimated. Worldwide, the Marvel symbiote is now looking at a $180M opening. Thursday’s domestic previews, as Anthony has reported, were $8.5M.

If it hits that $180M mark globally, this $120M Tom Hardy-starrer, which includes TSG as a co-financier for a third, will come in 5% above the worldwide debut of the previous title in the trilogy, Venom: Let There Be Carnage, on a like-for-like basis at today’s rates.

Part of what we’re seeing here is a better-than-expected start in China ($14.7M through Thursday), while some South East Asia markets saw launches that were higher than Let There Be Carnage. That includes results in Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.

Recall that Carnage did not release in China, while SE Asia opened at a time when recovery from the Covid impact was choppy, but the movie still got folks back out to cinemas.

Through today (and not included in the 2-day total above), China has reached $22M across three days so far. That clears a path for a $35M+ 5-day launch. China’s Maoyan score slipped from a 9 on Wednesday to an 8.9 currently, with the site now seeing an $81.8M full run – predictions tend to fluctuate over the first few days of play.

Korea has grossed $2.3M with Friday numbers included ($857K of that came from today and is not reflected in the through-Thursday gross above).

In Europe, Germany’s Thursday opening of $800K was bigger than Carnage by 43%, and Belgium’s $168K is the top start in the franchise.

Elsewhere, the Kelly Marcel-directed/co-scripted film notably added the UK and Spain today. It is now out in 90% of its international footprint with France and Japan joining later.

We will continue to update throughout the weekend.

WEDNESDAY: Sony’s Venom: The Last Dance chomped into its first suite of international box office markets today, with the Marvel symbiote nabbing a strong $9.3M start in China.

This is the biggest opening day for a superhero film since Spider-Man: Far From Home in the market, and portends a five-day launch in the upper $30M neighborhood there. The start is also above recent Hollywood releases, though not apples-to-apples since other movies opened across a traditional weekend.

These days, anything above a $20M debut in China is icing for the studios. The early social score from Maoyan is a 9 and we are waiting on critical responses. These scores can certainly impact the outcome over the next few days.

The second Venom movie, Let There Be Carnage, did not release in the market while the first one did gangbusters at a $107.7M bow (historical rates). It finaled at $269.2M (again, historical conversion), and had a 9.1 social score. Maoyan is currently predicting an $82.5M total run for the Tom Hardy threequel.

As we noted yesterday, Venom: The Last Dance has been looking at a potential $150M global opening with $85M of that from overseas; the latter number now looks to shoot higher (bringing the worldwide opening to around $165M) if China delivers a high $30Ms 5-day.

Directed by Kelly Marcel and co-written by Marcel and Hardy, The Last Dance will be out in 90% of its offshore footprint through Friday, with France and Japan joining later in the rollout.

We will have updates throughout the weekend…