In “Deadpool & Wolverine,” the heroes are exiled to The Void, a wasteland where forgotten characters of 20th Century Fox’s Marvel films wander. The studio’s iconic logo lies decrepit and half-buried, a tombstone for a history of superhero films that came to an end with “The New Mutants,” released to poor reviews in 2020, a year after Disney’s 2019 acquisition of Fox.
The resurrection of that spandex-wearing menagerie of IP has led “Deadpool & Wolverine” to a $438 million global opening weekend, the largest the box office has seen since “Avatar: The Way of Water” at the end of 2022. Its $211 million domestic haul stands as the highest ever for an R-rated film, and after passing $500 million in less than a week, it’s in line to join “Joker” as only the second film with that rating to gross $1 billion globally.
The focus in Ryan Reynold’s third go-around as Deadpool on the history of Fox Marvel is more than a cheeky storyline. In a real sense, the renamed 20th Century Studios is a critical component of Disney’s successful summer, as the studio has leaned on franchises it acquired five years ago to pull itself out of its 2023 theatrical slump.
The arrival of the X-Men into the Marvel Cinematic Universe is arguably the most high-profile element of the 2019 Disney-Fox merger to penetrate pop culture consciousness. It’s the first time that theaters have really benefitted from the Fox acquisition. Exhibitors have been wary of consolidation in Hollywood as studio mergers lead to fewer films for them to show in theaters, which made Paramount Global’s move to be acquired by Skydance Media rather than Sony a relief.
“When studios merge, one plus one rarely equals two,” Boxoffice editor Daniel Loria said. “It finally did this weekend with ‘Deadpool 3,’ but 20th Century Studios will always have less films for theaters than 20th Century Fox. I do wonder what films that label will bring to theaters in the future and if they can keep up the higher level of box office grosses that they have this summer.”
Before being treated to a blood-soaked ride down Marvel memory lane, millions of “Deadpool & Wolverine” moviegoers will experience a three-minute trailer for “Alien: Romulus,” which comes out in mid-August. It will be the first Disney-distributed installment of the 45-year-old horror franchise. With that film, Disney has a chance to earn the highest opening weekend in each month of this summer season, after it scored a stunning success with Pixar’s “Inside Out 2,” which has earned a record $1.5 billion.
Disney tries to quell the doubters after spending $71 billion on Fox
Before 2024, it was unclear exactly how 20th Century Studios was contributing to Disney’s theatrical plans outside of the “Avatar” films. In 2019, Disney completed its $71.3 billion acquisition of most of 21st Century Fox, which contained the iconic studio that distributed the first six “Star Wars” films and has a library consisting of classics like “Titanic” and “Sound of Music.” A year later, Disney renamed it 20th Century Studios.
Fox’s indie wing, Searchlight, provided arthouses with much-needed fare, and since the acquisition it has had success with Oscar-winning films like “Poor Things.” But aside from “Avatar 2” (which earned $2.3 billion worldwide), the highest grossing 20th Century release under Disney was “Free Guy,” the first collaboration between Reynolds and “Deadpool 3” director Shawn Levy. (It made $323 million worldwide during the early stages of pandemic theatrical reopenings in summer 2021.)
Otherwise, no 20th Century release had grossed more than $110 million worldwide. Films like “The Creator,” “West Side Story” and “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” were among those that fell by the wayside.
Disney came into this summer licking its wounds from an uncharacteristically long box office slump. “The Marvels” and “Wish” entered theaters in November with tentpole budgets but failed to reach even $300 million worldwide. And delays forced by last year’s writers’ and actors’ strikes led the company to abandon the first quarter of 2024.
Disney did not release a movie this year until April’s “The First Omen,” a 20th Century horror film initially set for release on Hulu. And its first major tentpole wasn’t a Marvel or animated release, but another 20th Century project, “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.”
Asad Ayaz, chief brand officer at Disney, told TheWrap that he knew it was the studio’s job to convey to audiences that director Wes Ball and his team had created a fourth installment of the “Apes” reboot saga that was both a continuation of the series and a suitable jumping-on point for audiences who hadn’t seen the Fox-released installments in the 2010s.
Ayaz credited20th Century president Steve Asbell and his marketing team, which consisted of Disney veterans along with execs who joined from Fox and had experience working with “Apes” and other IP from that studio, for pulling it off.
“We both leaned into the lore of ‘Apes’ and took a page from ‘Avatar’ and really emphasized the beauty and spectacle of this film,” he said. “We heavily promoted Imax and [Premium Large Format screens], trying to convey that no matter how many ‘Planet of the Apes’ films you saw, this is a film that would be an incredible experience on the biggest screen possible.”
“Kingdom” ended up being a modest but meaningful success for Disney and theaters, becoming the only film in April or May to open above $35 million as it grossed nearly $396 million. From there, Disney’s sole non-20th Century wide release, the animated “Inside Out 2,” catapulted the box office out of its weeks-long slump, joining forces with Universal’s “Despicable Me 4” and “Twisters” to build plenty of industry momentum for “Deadpool & Wolverine.”
Not that the Marvel film needed it. From the moment Ryan Reynolds announced that Hugh Jackman was playing Wolverine again, massive hype surrounded the title.
That made marketing “Deadpool & Wolverine” comparatively easier for Ayaz and his team compared to other 20th Century titles. But that didn’t mean the MCU’s first R-rated film didn’t require a unique approach.
“Deadpool is a unique character, and we needed to embrace that,” Ayaz said. “Our team was led by Ryan Stankevich who has done all the marketing for Marvel Studios, and they created a campaign that really focused on the rating as something that brought a fresh approach to the MCU.”
The result is a box office phenomenon unlike any in recent memory: A four-quadrant, $200 million-plus blockbuster that doesn’t devour its theatrical competition.
While finding the mass audience that every Hollywood studio craves, Deadpool’s gory, reference-heavy, crowd-pleasing schtick is still not for everyone, especially kids. Families with younger children who might have gone to see this film had it been PG-13 like “No Way Home” instead flocked to the animated titles still on offer, while “Twisters” and “Longlegs” served as alternatives for audiences looking for thrills that were less bloody, in the case of “Twisters,” or more challenging, in the case of “Longlegs.”
Indeed, “Deadpool & Wolverine” earned the biggest opening weekend since “Spider-Man: No Way Home” in December 2021, but “Twisters” was still able to earn a respectable second weekend total of $36 million, keeping the drop from its $82 million opening weekend below 60%. Other holdover titles like “Inside Out 2,” “Despicable Me 4” and even Neon’s indie horror hit “Longlegs” showed solid numbers relative to where they are in their theatrical runs.
The next 20th Century film to hit theaters will be “Alien: Romulus,” which hopes to top the $240 million theatrical run of the last installment of the long-running series, 2017’s “Alien: Covenant.” “Deadpool & Wolverine” will give it a boost thanks to the three-minute “Romulus” trailer, and Disney went all-out with a panel at San Diego Comic-Con where an actor disguised as a fan was “killed off” by one of the infamous chestbursters.
While still weeks away, exhibition sources told TheWrap they anticipate “Alien: Romulus” to meet or exceed the $36 million opening of “Covenant,” perhaps reaching the $40 million range. Of its August competition, the only film believed by exhibitors to possibly top it is Sony’s Blake Lively/Justin Baldoni-led Colleen Hoover adaptation “It Ends With Us.”
Either way, Disney’s return to the theatrical consistency it’s been known for is due in good part to the industry-changing merger it made a half-decade ago.
