In what’s already been a remarkable year for superheroes at the box office, Incredibles 2 has now smashed the opening night record for an animated film, taking in an impressive $18.5 million on its Thursday debut.
This more than doubles the record previously set by another Pixar sequel, Finding Dory, which took in $9.2 million on its first day. The 2016 film would go on to set the opening weekend record for an animated flick at a remarkable $135 million, and ended its run with the highest domestic gross of any Pixar production. Needless to say, it will be a pretty big deal Incredibles 2 carries on the way it does, with current projections having the film’s first weekend total at $150 million.
To compare these numbers with some of Disney’s non-animated releases, the movie’s beaten the opening day figures for hits as big as Thor: Ragnarok ($14.5 million), Spider-Man: Homecoming ($15.4 million) and even the live-action Beauty and the Beast ($16.3 million). And while we aren’t quite talking Avengers: Infinity War levels of popularity here, the new Incredibles did also comfortably surpass the all-star superhero team-up Justice League, which only managed $13 million on its first day.
Moreover, this isn’t even the first record that the movie has broken. It was also recently reported by Fandango managing editor Erik Davis that “Incredibles 2 is already making history as our top animated pre-seller of all time.” Once more, this was a title previously held by Finding Dory, making this a somewhat humbling week for the forgetful fish.
Incredibles 2 shouldn’t get too comfortable in its top spot at the box office, however, since Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is just one week away from its North American release and there’s only so much that a long-awaited, critically acclaimed animated film can do against another round of Chris Pratt trying not to get eaten by big lizards.