“Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” doesn’t need to make a billion dollars at the box office to be a hit for Disney and Marvel Studios. But considering that it begins the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s build to the next two “Avengers” movies in 2025 it needs to do better than the two “Ant-Man” films that preceded it.
Marvel Studios is still as reliable a moneymaker for Disney as it has ever been, but the consensus among fans seems to be that most of the films and Disney+ series since “Avengers: Endgame” — known together as MCU’s Phase Four — haven’t been as good as the buildup to the big showdown between the Avengers and Thanos.
In 2022, Marvel released three films that were box office hits: “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” ($952.2 million worldwide), “Thor: Love & Thunder” ($760.9 million) and “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” ($830 million). But since the pandemic, Sony’s release of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” ($1.91 billion) is the only MCU film to top $1 billion, something that Marvel was able to do with five out of its six films released in 2018 and 2019, when the words “Infinity Stones” were on the tongues of billions of moviegoers.
That in itself isn’t a problem. Given the natural ebb and flow of narrative arcs and blockbuster hype, it was never likely that Phase Four was going to maintain that consistently high performance from just before the pandemic. What’s more concerning is three out of the studio’s last five films — “Eternals,” “Multiverse of Madness” and “Love & Thunder” — have failed to receive an A or A- on CinemaScore, something that only happened once in Marvel’s entire history prior to that with “Thor” in 2011.
That hasn’t impacted Marvel’s box office performance yet to a significant degree, but each lukewarm audience score risks lowering the ceiling for future MCU films if general audiences no longer feel the need to watch every single installment and lose interest over time. If non-hardcore moviegoers aren’t as invested in MCU’s Multiverse Saga as they were for the Infinity Saga, the global total of “Avengers: The Kang Dynasty” in 2025 may be substantially below that of “Infinity War” and “Endgame,” barring of course a return of Robert Downey Jr. or Tobey Maguire via the multiverse to fuel nostalgia hype.
That’s why “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” needs to do better than its 2015 and 2018 predecessors, two films that were smaller, more self-contained MCU films. That was reflected in their box office totals as “Ant-Man” grossed $180.2 million domestic/$519.3 million worldwide while “Ant-Man and the Wasp” grossed $216.6 million domestic/$622.6 million worldwide.
“Quantumania,” on the other hand, is the start of MCU’s Phase Five and introduces Jonathan Majors as Kang the Conqueror, the big bad villain of the next three years of Marvel films. Because of that status as a linchpin in the overarching narrative, a $750 million-plus global run similar to “Thor: Love and Thunder” is probably the bar of success to show a significant number of people are still interested in the MCU’s longterm saga.
If the tracking is any indication, “Ant-Man 3” is on course to meet that mark. Current projections have the film earning a $120 million four-day opening over Presidents Day weekend. While that’s below the $144 million opening of “Thor: Love & Thunder” last July, it would be a big leap from the $75.8 million opening of “Ant-Man and the Wasp.” With the exception of “Eternals,” which opened to $71.2 million after being projected for a $75 million-plus launch, all of the Phase Four MCU films have met or exceeded opening weekend tracking.
Disney is keeping its projections conservative but still above “Ant-Man and the Wasp,” projecting a $95 million three-day/$105-110 million four-day domestic opening and a three-day global opening of around $255 million, both of which would be the best for an “Ant-Man” film.
Like all superhero films, the hardcore fanbase will drive the opening weekend number, but the CinemaScore determines the legs “Quantumania” will have against March competition like MGM’s “Creed III” and Warner Bros./DC’s “Shazam! Fury of the Gods.” Audience metrics have to be significantly better than critics’ reviews, which as of this writing sit at a very tepid 58% on Rotten Tomatoes. If it stays below 60%, “Quantumania” will join “Eternals” (47%) as the second MCU property to fail to receive a “Fresh” rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Whether “Quantumania” can turn a higher opening weekend into a higher global total than its 2018 predecessor will come down in good part to whether audiences end up disagreeing with critics and continue to turn out in the film’s third week and onwards, or abandon the film early and leave its box office performance frontloaded.
The other big factor determining the film’s fate is be China, as “Quantumania” will be the first new Marvel release to hit that country since “Spider-Man: Far From Home” in 2019. China has turned out in droves for MCU films and was a big reason why “Avengers: Endgame” grossed nearly $2.8 billion worldwide, but theaters there have not screened any of the Phase Four films upon release. Officials there have significantly tamped down the number of Hollywood imports released in favor of local titles.
“Ant-Man and the Wasp” grossed $121 million in China, approximately 19% of its worldwide total, so Ant-Man in particular has leaned on that market to lift up its box office performance. If international numbers are softer than last year’s Marvel offerings, China may determine whether “Quantumania” is deemed a theatrical success. That may well come down to whether moviegoers there have had their enthusiasm for the franchise cooled by missing years’ worth of films in theaters.
