Well, the summer season is officially underway.

The MCU returned to the first weekend of May, earning another #1 spot with Thunderbolts. Which hopefully will be a sign of good legs ahead. Meanwhile, Sinners had another incredible hold, despite losing IMAX and other premium-large formats.

The Top 10 earned a combined $142.3 million this weekend. That's up a massive 108.2% from last year, when The Fall Guy flopped and delivered the worst start to the summer season in decades.

Debuting on top, Marvel Studios' Thunderbolts earned $74.3 million in 4,330 theaters. That's below Captain America: Brave New World ($88.8 million), which premiered on February. Compared to other MCU titles, that's below Ant-Man and The Wasp ($75.6 million) and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings ($75.3 million) and above Eternals ($71.2 million).

All in all, this is a solid (but not fantastic) debut. At the end of the day, it's a team-up film following secondary characters that aren't very popular, with the exception of Bucky and Yelena. Marvel probably wasn't expecting this film to open at $100+ million, considering Brave New World didn't get that with a more well known character. Thunderbolts only had one hook: the introduction of Sentry. There's also curiosity surrounding the meaning behind the asterisk in the title (we'll get to that in a moment).

Marvel knows that audiences haven't been fully on board with some of their previous projects (Quantumania, The Marvels, Brave New World, etc.), but they still hoped the audience could be interested in Thunderbolts. To the point that one of its trailers highlighted the crew's involvement in multiple projects (most of which were A24). Well, the crew's involvement at least resulted in some great reviews (88% on RT). Not to mention the fact that back in March, Marvel confirmed that a lot of cast members from the film would be back in Avengers: Doomsday next year. While that spoiled the fate of the characters, it might have helped boost interest.

According to Disney, 65% of the audience was male. Marvel has had a problem in attracting younger audiences, and this film is another proof of that: only 30% of the audience was under 25. What does this mean? That they're losing ground with Gen Z. This has been noted a few years, and it doesn't look like it will be fixed any time soon.

In some good news, the audience gave the film an "A–" on CinemaScore. That represents a solid response from the audience, although the MCU mostly falls in the "A" score. At the very least, that's better than Brave New World's poor "B–". There's no competition over the coming weeks, although Final Destination: Bloodlines will probably dethrone it in its third weekend. We'll see how it goes, but for now, a final total around $200 million is likely for Thunderbolts.

Marvel didn't even wait until the second week just to finally confirm on social media the meaning of the asterisk in the title. Just today, they've started promoting the film under a new title (big spoilers in that article). That's a bit too early, but will the audience be more interested in the film now?

Even with the arrival of Thunderbolts and losing IMAX and other formats, Sinners was not affected in the slightest. The film dipped just 28% this weekend, adding another $33.1 million. That's almost on par with Get Out's third weekend drop (26.5%), which is simply insane. The film has earned a fantastic $179.8 million domestically, and it should continue legging out. For now, the film should hit $270 million domestically. The fact that it's getting close to $300 million is simply spectacular.

A Minecraft Movie dropped 40%, adding $13.7 million this weekend. One thing on its favor was the "rowdy screenings" for this weekend. Have theater employees in your hearts, for this might have been a very ugly experience. The film has earned $398.2 million so far.

Well, the math is out and the numbers aren't good for The Accountant 2. The film earned $9.4 million, which is a very poor 61% drop from last week. In contrast, the original dropped just 44.8%. Through 10 days, the film has earned just $41.1 million, which is $6 million below the original through the same point. That gap will continue to widen. For now, the film should finish with around $60 million domestically.

Until Dawn won't see a sunrise any time soon. The film dropped 52%, adding $3.8 million this weekend. That's not a horrible drop for a horror, but considering how low it began, it's simply unremarkable to make a difference. Through 10 days, the film has earned $14.3 million, and it only has one weekend before facing tough competition with Final Destination: Bloodlines.

In sixth place, The Amateur dropped 48%, earning $1.9 million. That takes its domestic total to $37 million, and while it should cross $40 million, it won't be by much.

The King of Kings continues losing steam. This weekend, it collapsed another 59%, earning $1.7 million. The film has earned $57.7 million so far, and it won't make it much further than $60 million.

A24's Warfare dropped 52%, adding $1.2 million this weekend. The film's domestic total stands at $24 million so far.

In ninth place, the Indian film HIT: The Third Case earned $955,000 in 950 theaters.

Rounding up the Top 10 was another Indian film, Guru Nanak Jahaz. Despite playing in just 119 theaters, it earned $685,000 this weekend.

Outside the Top 10, we find Nicolas Cage's new film, The Surfer. Unsurprisingly, it didn't fare well. It made just $698,114 from 884 theaters. It's not gonna last long on theaters, so hurry up.

A24's The Legend of Ochi fell outside the Top 10. It collapsed a brutal 76% this weekend, earning just $341,951. The film has earned a meager $2.1 million so far.

OVERSEAS

Thunderbolts also topped the overseas box office, debuting with $86.1 million abroad, for a $160.4 million worldwide debut. That's below Brave New World ($193.4 million), although that had an extra day on Monday. It was a mixed bag all around; some were pretty good, but others were soft. The best markets were China ($10.4M), UK ($7.7M), Mexico ($7.3M), Brazil ($4M), France ($3.8M), Germany ($3.6M), Korea ($3.5M), Australia ($3.4M), Japan ($3.2M) and Spain ($2.8M). Some of these markets were also boosted from local holidays (Labor Day). We'll wait for the second weekend to see if it has a chance of recouping its $180 million budget.

A Minecraft Movie added $26.6 million, taking its worldwide total to $874.6 million. The best markets are the UK ($69M), Germany ($35.7M), Australia ($33.5M), Mexico ($31.2M) and China ($27.5M). It's still fighting to hit the $1 billion milestone.

Sinners is also holding very well overseas, adding $10.4 million, for a $237.3 million worldwide total. The best markets are the UK ($13.8M), France ($6.7M), Australia ($4.3M), Mexico ($3.4M) and Germany ($2.7M). It's obviously going to skew domestically, but it looks like it could get close to $100 million overseas by the end of its run.

The Accountant 2 added $7.2 million overseas, for a $66.3 million worldwide total. Ouch, that's not actually great. Or good at all. It should still hit $100 million worldwide, but it feels like it should've done that without problem.

FILMS THAT ENDED THEIR RUN THIS WEEK

Movie Release Date Studio Domestic Opening Domestic Total Worldwide Total Budget Black Bag Mar/7 Focus Features $7,607,250 $21,474,035 $39,284,035 $50M The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie Mar/14 Ketchup $3,158,830 $8,875,344 $13,896,775 $15M The Woman in the Yard Mar/28 Universal $9,395,255 $22,405,985 $23,175,286 $12M

"Make a good original movie and people will watch it." Yeah, where were you when Black Bag played in theaters? Steven Soderbergh's film earned critical acclaim, but it has ended its run with just $39 million worldwide. How frustrating, isn't it? A film that deserved much better. Don't cry for Soderbergh tho; he has just recently said that Focus Features confirmed that the film would eventually be profitable thanks to home media and PVOD. He also recently said that his new film The Christophers has wrapped filming and could come out this year. Damn, 3 Soderbergh films in a year????

That's all, folks. The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie has closed with $13 million worldwide, failing to recoup its $15 million budget. But maybe Ketchup Entertainment is content with its performance, considering they just spent $50 million in buying Coyote vs. Acme, which will come out next year. Let's just hope it fares better than this.

Universal/Blumhouse's The Woman in the Yard has closed its run with just $23 million worldwide. That's the second flop in a row for Blumhouse, after the unremarkable run of Wolf Man back in January. Not to mention Drop is fading quickly. What's going with Blumhouse?

THIS WEEKEND

Nothing lol. For some reason, studios avoided releasing anything noteworthy. The only major release is Lionsgate's Shadow Force, but that has no chance of hitting #1. Probably not even Top 5.

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