You may be wondering how things could get any worse for Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, which has blown the lid off a worldwide discussion on whether or not the Marvel Cinematic Universe is finally running out of steam.
The franchise’s one constant source of solace – even when fans and general audiences alike don’t care for the movies in question – is that they can always been relied on to make a ton of money at the box office. However, Peyton Reed’s threequel is coming with a massive asterisk next to its existence after debuting to over $100 million last weekend.
A projected drop of over 70 percent will ensure that Quantumania winds up suffering the steepest ever week-to-week decline out of any of the MCU’s previous 31 features, but that isn’t all. If it dips by more than 69.1 percent, which is almost certainly will, then it’s additionally going to secure the unwanted benchmark of the heftiest drop for any superhero blockbuster ever made that opened north of nine figures.
Zack Snyder’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice previously set the bar seven years ago, and we don’t even need to mention how polarizing and picked apart that comic book adaptation has been ever since. That being said, you’d struggle to find many folks willing to say anything positive about Quantumania, which is perhaps an even more damning indictment.
Setting a new low for its own franchise is bad enough, but an entire genre? That makes it easy to see why there’s so much concern that the wheels are finally coming off.