I’m late and I’m grumpy. If you don’t want to endure me being grumpy, then skip to the paragraphs where I’m not being an overly bitter asshole. I’m not here to shortchange the spectacular success of Spider-Man: Brand New Day. I’m just here to add an asterisk to it. Is that fair? I dunno. Like I said, fair warning that I’m about to be annoying (and if you really don’t feel up for it, because for whatever reason I’m feeling very apologetic over being “negative” here, go ahead to the paragraph after the YouTube video).

As you’ve no doubt heard by now–unless you’re someone who waits until I get these reports up to look up box numbers, in which case, thanks, but also, what’s wrong with you?–is Spider-Man: Brand New Day, which is our “new record holder” for the biggest opening weekend of all time with a “three day” take of $360 million. My “problem” with that is that Brand New Day in no sense of the word opened on Friday. I know I’ve ranted about this before. I know the game has changed post-COVID. But Brand New Day had showtimes starting at noon on Thursday and then starting on average every half hour after that. And that’s not even accounting for the preview screenings that were exclusive to Prime members on Wednesday (and really, why are those even a thing?).

For the sake of comparison, our previous record-holder Avengers: Endgame didn’t start its Thursday screenings until 6:00 PM. That gives Brand New Day a six-hour head start. Is this me being nitpicky? Absolutely. Am I being a dick? Probably. Am I as impressed with Brand New Day’s numbers as I am with Endgame’s? Well…no. Am I kinda annoyed that we’ve lost anything resembling a level playing field for opening weekend titles? Yes. Is that petty of me? Maybe. But at the risk of being very unfair, I feel this is kind of like saying Olympic champion Usain Bolt had his record “broken” by someone who was allowed a ten second head-start. Does that make sense? I dunno. I seem to be one of the only people vocally bothered by this, so maybe this is just a “me problem.”

Okay, okay. I’m done being grumpy. Whether you count it as three days (or four days), there’s no denying Brand New Day performed above and beyond expectations. It has already surpassed the entire gross of Project Hail Mary, which is just insane. In a matter of days, it will swing past Toy Story 5 as the biggest movie of the year. I feel bad for The End of Oak Street–which was positioned to be the “last” blockbuster of the summer in two weeks–as it is going to get clobbered by the one-two punch of Tom Holland and…well, Tom Holland. Simply put, August is going to belong to Peter Parker and Christopher Nolan. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Brand New Day remains the number one film for the entire month.

You gotta hand it to Sony, even if you do so reluctantly: for all of the PR flack they get for refusing to let the Spider-Man rights fully slide over to Marvel Studios, you can’t really blame them at this point. Ironically, Spidey is probably in a better place than many of his Avengers companions, as he is the only one with his own “solo” franchise anymore. Yes, there was Madame Web. But for every Kraven the Hunter, there’s an Across the Spider-Verse. For every Morbius, there is a Venom. Spider-Man just might be the most valuable property in all of Hollywood. And that’s something no one would have said a decade ago after they fumbled the ball big time with 2014’s The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Garfield and friends might be gone, but no permanent damage to the brand was done (and heck, No Way Home proved those flicks have a fair share of passionate fans anyway, so really everyone won).

It’s worth noting that Brand New Day was able to pull this off with exactly zero IMAX screens, which kind of raises an eyebrow as to how essential they are for most summer tentpoles. The Odyssey still has all of those to itself as per a contract with Nolan (Oppenheimer had the same arrangement, and The Odyssey has already beaten that film). The fantasy epic based on the ancient poem which has very little fantasy and very little poem had a strong hold thanks solely to those large screens. For better or worse, no one is rushing out to see this one in any non-premium format. IMAX sales accounted for roughly half of The Odyssey’s ticket punches this weekend, so go big or take twenty years to go home.

Anyway, the top ten, via Box Office Mojo