Will ‘Superman' Fly High Or Stay Grounded This Summer Movie Season?

Forbes

5 hours ago

With just three weeks until writer-director James Gunn's Superman soars into theaters on July 11th as the first superhero would-be blockbuster of 2025 summer movie season and the official live-action kickoff of the DCU. Superman hit tracking this week, and early estimates were sort of all over the place. But will Superman fly high or stay grounded this summer movie season?
David Corenswet stars in "Superman." Source: Warner
The early tracking for Superman ranges from $90-125 million, or $125-145 million, depending on who you ask (the studio points to the lowball numbers). So $125 million is either the high end or low end, and $112 million threads the needle.
WBD and DC Studios are sticking to the conservative lower-end predictions, while other tracking and press lean toward the higher range, or at least where the overlap exists. That's why you see competing tracking estimates depending on which media you pay attention to, and why some is lower (again, trying to hedge bets and not get expectations so high that a good opening creates an impression of being 'low').
My current numbers suggest it'll probably open around $120-130 million domestic, with a lowest end of about $100 million and a high end swinging way out to $150 million. This is just domestic box office, remember, without international box office figured in. Forbes Superman Returns (Again) - How James Gunn's Reboot Defines DC's Future By Mark Hughes
Where it winds up depends on word-of-mouth over the weekend. So watch the Friday night grade it gets at Cinemascore — A or a A+ grade suggests it will land closer to the higher end or exceed it, and A- grade probably means it'll hit closer to the middle, and anything lower means the low end of expectations.
Once we have the weekend numbers, then we can look at the audience grades and how much competition there is for the same demographics in the first two weeks, and from that we can tell what the final multiplier will be — The final multiplier is simple, it just means you look at the total opening weekend box office and then multiply it by a number to get the final box office at the end of it run.
For example, if a movie opens at $100 million and has a final multiplier of 3x, that means it's total gross at the end of it theatrical run is three times the amount that made on opening weekend, or in this example $300 million.
So if Superman opens to $120 million domestically, then a 3x final multiplier would hypothetically mean it finishes its theatrical run with about $360 million domestic.
We need to find out what the final multiplier will be, and as I said that depends on audience word-of-mouth and competition. The Cinemascore grade helps a lot here. Generally speaking, the higher the grade the higher the final multiplier. With a B+ grade for example, you might expect a near 2.5x final multiplier. With an A+ grade, you could get anything from a 3.3x to 4x final multiplier. It's obviously not exact, but it gives you a pretty fair idea of the range.
My own moderate guess right now is that Superman will open to $120 million domestic, anywhere from $100 million to $150 million overseas, and with an A audience grade. And I'm currently estimating an opening between $220 million worldwide to $270 million worldwide, with the sweet spot being $245 million, give or take a few million. Forbes New 'Superman' Trailer Hopes To Inspire Audiences To Look Up Once More [Updated] By Mark Hughes
If those numbers hold up, including the A grade I'm predicting, then the final multiplier would be anywhere from a low-end 3x to high-end 3.7x is my guess. And that translates to about $660 million to $999 million in total global box office by the end of Superman's theatrical run (I don't expect that high-end number, honestly). The mid range is roughly $830 million.
Then we need to consider the competition, and that's where a big secondary question is gonna hold a lot of sway.
Jurassic World: Rebirth open a week earlier, and it's probably going to be the biggest film this summer if it's even halfway good. This film should wind up in 2025's final top tier of earners, with Avatar: Fire and Ash undoubtably taking the crown while the rest fight it out for the remaining top spots on year-end charts.
Smurfs opens a week later, and while I don't think this one is going to be a runaway animated blockbuster hit to the tune of Disney and Pixar releases, it'll still be successful. I expect $400 million-$500 million, but I haven't done all of my math on this one yet.
Then comes Fantastic Four: First Steps two weeks after Superman opens, as probably the biggest relevant challenger. It's going to be a big film, regardless of which of these superhero movies winds up with the biggest numbers for the year. There's a wide range on this MCU franchise-starter, anywhere from $750 million range if it has a softer play, to possibly making a run at $1 billion if it delivers the Marvel goods and plays more like the studio's typical big summer releases.
Superman shares some key target demographics with each of those above films, the most important being superhero movie fans and families. Which means week by week, there will be varying forms of competition for some of Superman's key demos.
The Jurassic Park sequel will cut into some of the general mainstream audience, particularly those looking for popcorn spectacle, and lots of action fans. Smurfs will, of course cut into the younger audiences and family audiences, but it remains to be seen just how much this will wind up mattering across July (where Superman will make the vast majority of it box).
Fantastic Four is the movie that most targets the same audience demographics as Superman . Coming in two weeks later, it has the potential to eat more into Superman's weekly holds.
But as we have seen in the past, audiences are also more than willing to reward multiple big movies that are in theaters at the same time, if they're good. In fact, if they're good enough, often times movies like this will make audienced so happy that they go out to see the other films as well, actually boosting one another's box office instead of suppressing it. But that's a magical situation we can't really count on or gauge with our numbers, so it's just something to keep in mind as an unexpected hypothetical. Forbes Box Office Predictions Summer 2025: 'Superman,' 'Jurassic Park' And More By Mark Hughes
I don't expect any magical outlier scenarios here. It appears inevitable that some audience will drop off from Superman once there's another superhero film on the market. The question is how much all of these films (opening a week before Superman , a week after, and two weeks after) suppress Superman's potential box office.
If as I suspect Jurassic Park is the biggest film of the summer, the second-biggest of summer should wind up being one of these superhero movies. I'm inclined to give Marvel the edge, because history suggests they have it. But we are in very different times, so it's hard to say for sure.
As much enthusiasm as there is for Superman , it's undeniable that audiences mostly turned against DC's brand for a while, so we'll find out if viewers are ready to give DC another shot, or if people instead take a wait-and-see approach. A wait-and-see approach could potentially be a problem for Superman , because anything longer than about 10 days of waiting and it becomes increasingly more likely those audiences will decide to see the Marvel movie in theaters and catch DC on streaming.
I'm not saying this will be a big portion of audience, I just think it's relevant enough that I'm inclined not to expect Superman to finish at the highest end of potential, unless we see opening weekend and second weekend numbers pointing in that direction. That's not saying it won't do well, since I do think it will be a huge hit in one of the years biggest blockbusters.
Taking all of this together now, I think we are looking at maybe 15-20% suppression rate of demographic attendance across Superman's second, third, and fourth weekends. So I am currently guessing it will finish somewhere between about $600 million and $800 million worldwide. But this is still early, so as we enter July the data will get better and we'll have enough pre-sales and awareness data to make much better predictions.
The two big unknown factors on which it will all hinge are, as I said, Fantastic Four's performance, and the 'Krypto factor.' That awesome dog could wind up being so popular and pull in many people who otherwise wouldn't have shown up, and could be a breakout star with kids in the audience. That's the sort of thing that we can't gauge yet, but if it happens, then it introduces a much better chance of a rising tide lifting all boats toward higher end of potential.
If anyone can deliver that, it's James Gunn. His track record (box office and qualitatively) speaks for itself, and I think everything we've seen from this movie so far looks like everything Superman needed in order to have a chance at reaching his full box office potential. If the movie delivers on the promise of the trailers and is as good as early scenes look, then it's bound to succeed — because if it doesn't, then frankly I don't even know what you could possibly do with this character that audiences would show up for anymore.
As long as Superman does at least $700 million, DC Studios and Warner Brothers are going to be happy. Anything north of that, and they're gonna be ecstatic. Forbes Counting Down And Ranking All 11 Superman Movies From Best To Worst By Mark Hughes
Anything less than $700 million, though, and it starts to look even more similar to what happened last time than it already does. I don't expect this type of outcome at all, but if it happens, then I would guess it's because Jurassic Park is so immensely popular it keeps eating the box office, plus Fantastic Four shows up and picks up where Jurassic Park left off by owning too much of the box office as well. Meanwhile, Smurfs overperforming even a little bit and generating a moderate equivalent of 'Minions fever' among younger kids would make it into a long haul competitor as well.
If all of this happened, and if audience disinterest in DC movies continued to linger too much, and if Superman itself was actually not as good as the trailers look, and if as a result the film is front loaded with fans and interested parties getting those advance tickets (thus causing a big drop off week to week after a huge debut, akin to Batman v Superman having a record-setting worldwide opening weekend but then falling off the cliff at the box office each subsequent weekend, then I think Superman would in this scenario wind up at the lower end of potential. In this obviously HIGHLY unlikely series of negative events piling up, Superman would probably wind up finishing somewhere in the $500+ million range.
That's not good, to be sure, but the reason even this train wreck scenario still gets it to a non-trainwreck number (again, the last nine DCEU releases in a row across five years each failed to reach $400 million except the Aquaman sequel that limped across that threshold) is because those advance ticket numbers, it's online footprint, and the related overindexing demographic data all suggest enough interest to put the right number of the right butts in seats.
But technically, if everything went bad enough, and the movie absolutely sucked, and if some huge economic disaster took place nationwide, then it could certainly flop to the tune of something like $350 million-$400 million. It happens sometimes, more so recently, as we've seen.
Hopefully, though, it's clear how unlikely all of that is. If we walk backwards from here, then it starts to become more clear that the context and theatrical marketplace is all primed for the arrival of Superman . Putting up $700 million, after the past nine years of DCEU films struggling to reach $400 million, would signal a reversal of fortunes for WBD's plans for a larger shared universe of their most valuable stable of characters. Forbes 'Superman' Soars In His Best Film With 4K 40-Year Anniversary Release By Mark Hughes
While I do think it would've perhaps been a bit wiser to wait an additional year to put even more distance between Superman and the previous DCU, it's also impossible to predict what the future holds in store – another pandemic? worse economic pain? a war? social and political unrest? Any of those, or all of them combined as the unfortunate situation may be, could lurk around the corner.
Audience tastes also change, and technology moves forward in ways that could disrupt everything even more (AI is increasingly adopted into filmmaking, more than most of the public and even folks working in Hollywood seem to grasp yet, and it will only increase in the coming months and year). So my own sense that it would've been best to let the DCEU memories fade more, I also expected The Batman: Part II to release this year or next, and without that there's more reason for DC to want and need Superman sooner instead of later.
Fans should rest easy that all signs, even from a conservative reading, point to this movie doing well enough to be successful, even if that success is only moderate compared to expectations and hopes. A bad scenario, while possible, would more likely look like about $500 million worldwide gross and involve enough external factors to call it a mulligan, especially if reviews and audience scores are good, and if The Batman sequel and other DC projects are shaping up well. Of course, as the days and weeks progress, I will continue fine-tuning my estimates and have more solid final numbers before opening weekend arives.
More likely is that Superman is catching the mainstream global public's attention in a way he hasn't for a long time (although the fantastic Superman & Lois series was sort of proof of concept that a more earnest and relationship-driven approach was a winning formula). While I do currently expect Marvel to win the superhero match up this summer, I don't think it's at all a sure thing and I think with Krypto's help Superman definitely has a fair chance to score an upset victory.